The food rights movement is entering a new phase. We might best think of it as the “legal phase.”
All those raids on food clubs and farms (mostly over raw milk distribution) over the last few years–the “crackdown phase”, if you will–are now showing up in court cases that need to be resolved. (Not that the crackdown phase is necessarily over.)
All you have to do to appreciate what is going on is take a look at the new legal calendar on display at the new web site of Farm Food Freedom Coalition.
First on deck is Canadian dairy farmer Michael Schmidt, who goes before an Ontario appeals court tomorrow seeking to have his conviction on 13 counts of violating the province’s dairy law heard on appeal. There is no automatic appeal in Ontario, so Schmidt’s lawyer will be seeking to convince the judges that there is a public interest in hearing the case.
The Bovine has done a nice job of summarizing Schmidt’s arguments, plus it has his legal documents available as well.
Next up, in three weeks is Alvin Schlangen’s first trial, scheduled for August 15 in Minnesota. Later in the month is Michael Hartmann’s trial, also in Minnesota And on it goes.
Some of these dates will change, as cases are delayed, so keep an eye on the calendar. I link to it from the “Links” page listed at the top of the home page, and you can make it a book mark as well.
Because a number of these cases will no doubt be heard by juries, local food rights groups will be organizing “jury nullification” promotion efforts–educating citizens on their right to rule in favor of defendants who may have technically violated unjust laws.
The outcome of these cases will go a long way toward setting precedent about our private right to make our own food choices. It seems like it should be a no-brainer, but in America in 2012, the outcome is definitely in some doubt.
It’s also important that supporters of the defendants show up at these cases, and let both the judges and state prosecutors know that there is growing public support for private food rights.
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As long as I’m on legal matters, the Farm-to-Consumer Foundation is offering a four-part series of webinars on setting up and maintaining cow shares and herd shares. This is an excellent way for producers of raw milk to establish a legal basis for private distribution.
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The customer is always right.
It’s one of the oldest sayings in business. I thought of it as I was reading the complaints from several food producers and others bemoaning the seeming obsession of American consumers with convenience and price, following the post about Tracy and Amy last week.
It is an obsession fed by our Internet culture and corporations continually trying to figure out new ways to service customers and, ideally, make money in the process. So if you go into any Whole Foods and ask a stocker where the ketchup is located, the individual won’t just motion you to aisle 6, he or she will walk you there. Now, you will likely pay a higher price at Whole Foods for that ketchup than at Price Chopper, but if you value service and convenience, which more people do, you’ll pay the price, and feel good about it.
In my years running a business, I came to question the adage that the customer is always right, especially after dealing with some truly unreasonable customers. However, I came to realize as well that such disagreeable people aren’t necessarily wrong. Maybe my business didn’t offer what they truly wanted. Maybe someone else did.
The larger lesson is that it’s not wise to fight what the marketplace wants. The challenge for business owners, including farmers, is to figure out what your target market most desires, and then how you can give it to them.
For example, one big new thing on farms today is “Dinner in the Field”. It’s not new, of course, but all kinds of farms are doing it. I had to chuckle when I saw in a Boston Globe article today that a local farm stand with a few acres in a Boston suburb, where I’ve long bought fresh corn and tomatoes in the summer, launched its first such event last month, at $95 a person, and sold out in three days. I went to one in Vermont a few years back. When I wanted to go again last summer, the farm had raised the price 50 per cent, to $85 a person, and required payment in advance. The farm continued to sell out, without my patronage.
The message? I may no longer be part of the target market for that particular item, but clearly there are lots of people out there willing to pay big bucks, weeks in advance, to have a picnic served to them. Congrats to the farms that have figured out the formula and are cashing in.
For Tracy, it might be a matter of focusing mainly on customers willing to travel to her farm. Or encouraging customers to organize into carpools to ease the pain of product pickup. Or requiring that customers pay in advance via credit card when they place orders–to reduce problems with no-shows. Or raising her prices further to compensate for her higher quality over factory food. I’m not sure any of these options would work–my point is that food producers need to be thinking in terms of satisfying the marketplace, while avoiding the boot of the food police, in a profitable way, rather than whining about how the marketplace is screwed up.
The marketplace for good food is booming. The challenge for producers is to capture and serve those who understand the value of what is being provided.
The state says there is no prohibition against drinking raw milk, but prohibition of sales is a de facto prevention of purchase, which is a de facto prohibition against drinking it, unless, in the mind of the state, anybody and everybody can (and should) own a cow or goat.
I would say that the “consumer is brainwashed and ignorant and when they get educated they are always right”. Just my take on dollar-voting and the statements that most consumers make to me when making an inquiry. If the consumer is always right….why are we all so fat, diabetic and asthmatic etc….
When consumers at Wholefoods ask ” on which isle is the Soymilk ( GMO, thyroid disruptive and gut killing ) is located”….that is not an educated consumer, that consumer is not right, that is an ignorant consumer and that is a sold-out retailer, that will do anything to sell a product and take the money. That is a retailer that has stopped educating and begun an economic tryst with the devil. That is a retailer that has no moral north star….consumer choice is one thing…lack of education is another. Retailers have an obligation to be educators and help consumers make good choices. Good choices will bring better health and better health will sell more good foods.
Speaking of education, RAWMI held its first ever RAWMI Training Day in Newburg Oregon on Monday this week. It was attended by 50 Oregon Micro Dairy raw milk producers. the event was sponsored by ORMPA ( the newly formed Oregon Raw Milk Producers Assoc ). Its leadership is speerheaded by Charlotte Smith of Champoeg Creamery. She is herself a very type A, high achiever, well spoken, motivated, educated, ethical, super clean grass fed raw milk producer ( super delicious raw milk with great bacteria counts I might add ! ). She is probably going to be the First RAWMI LISTED producer in America. She has already been inspected, she has completed her 100 question application, her initial bacteria counts are in ( wow!! ) and we are currently completing her RAMP food safety program checklist of risks.
The training day was truly an historic event. A video of the training day will be posted at RAWMI very soon and I will bring a link back to TCP.
All of the producers were on the same page….they were all dedicated to a bright and safe future for raw milk and they all rose above any individual jealously for the benefit of their consumers and their own production risks. It was awesome!! Nothing like a little crisis at Foundation Farms to bring together those that had never met before in a “Common Cause for Common Standards”
Those that attended were given a certificate worth 6 hours of RAWMI Food Safety training credit. ORMPA now has a core of producers that really care and know more than ever…and are deeply committed to going home to their own production systems and making thoughtful improvements. It is hoped that many of these producers will join Charlotte and become RAWMI LISTED.
There are anti-raw milk hearings being held this fall by the Pasteurized Dairy community in Oregon. ORMPA is now well prepared to deal with these pressures and will be able to show the standards they embrace and the tests showing the results of these standards in Operation.
Mary Martin and Bill Marler, both of you played a part in the days training. Ecoli…STEC and HUS was discussed and explained in depth. The risks of illness were stage front and center. We skipped nothing. The benefits of raw milk and the studies about raw milk were also explained and discussed. Charlotte took everyone on a farm tour from GRASS TO GLASS and everyone was thoroughly emersed into a new world of raw milk risk reduction systems.
We are off to a very good start. The key to RAWMI success in Oregon is the SUPPORT the LOCAL leadership for raw milk. RAWMI is not the local leader…it is the resource that comes in to help and mentor the local voice and leadership. That is the RAWMI Secret Sauce.
We got this down…
A short Power Point showing Dr. Rubiks microscopic photophic work was also shown. This was also a first. These pictures show the comparisons between, Blood and raw milk….pasteurized milk and raw milk and UHT and Raw Milk at various magnifications. They are breath taking and startling.
I rest my case. Pictures do not lie.
Bill…send in that $25k donation to RAWMI, our work has definitely improved food safety in Oregon. Raw milk is not going away….it is just getting better and better. I even used a nice picture of you in my slide show….I chose a handsome dashing shot….you would have been proud. You heat definitely is an incentive to move forward. Not always seen as constructive….but definitly a force to be recognized. Now RAWMI is the constructive progressive force that will address the needs of the raw milk producers.
This is progress.
Mark
Also, on a different subject of your blog post, won’t FTCLDF inspire the wrath of Marler and Co by offering advice on that subject? (!!)
Just thought that statement needed repeating….
“The challenge for producers is to capture and serve those who understand the value of what is being provided.”
People who want certain things will move mountains to find them, it may take a while, yet, they will eventually find them. People need educating on a lot of things. As you said; the value of what is being provided (costs to the farmer,etc) People need educating on storing, preparing/cooking the products. The list is long. Food was higher priced in Little Rock than it was is Sacramento- that goes for both the stores and the farmers market. The quality in Little Rock was lacking.
I’ll post this link here and hope folks will take a peek at what’s coming (this is in Canada, but we’re right in there with them). Interesting and infuriating. The gubment (no matter where you live) doesn’t WANT us to be self-sufficient.
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/07/authorities-seek-to-destroy-couples.html
My family members buy ALL kinds of food (not just veggies) from a CSA (some things from our dweeby farmers market) – we help out each time we got to pick up our baskets. Every time we go, there are other families helping out. THAT’S the model we need to use everywhere, not just here in my part of the country where people have been doing this for generations.
Part of the problem with food rights is that we essentially have no property rights. I know, it involves a link but if you want to know and learn it’s the only way I have to communicate the messages of others. Copyright does not allow for cutting and pasting entire articles. Sorry.
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/06/all-over-america-government-agents-of.html
The idea of owning land:
http://www.context.org/iclib/ic08/gilman1/
From a legal standpoint, this is interesting/entertaining – except these questions are always based in the UK or somewhere. The usa must not allow us to even ask these questions. Thank heavens censorship is not yet worldwide.
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/precisely_who_owns_my_land_and_p
I’m a firm believer in teaching the man to fish so he can feed himself for life…..
I hope people take time to sign the petition.
Ken
Congratulations, Mark, on RAWMI Training Day and on your first RAWMI listed farm. Great news. You ought to do a little video segment of the training day to present at the upcoming anti-raw-milk hearings. But you will almost certainly have to fight to have it shown–the opponents DON’T want legislators or others to hear about such things, just as they don’t want anyone to hear about the positive research. They are all about negativity.
Sylvia, that is a good way of describing a target market–“those who understand the value of what is being provided.” In other words, an educated segment of the market. Educating consumers is admirable, but can be very costly, and take a long time. Some farmers don’t have the time to do that, while others, as you found, have taken to charging people for education (tours). The main point of my post is that farmers need to be trying to think more like business people–that there is nothing wrong with earning a profit at farming and providing people with good food. Mark McAfee, Joel Salatin, and any number of other farmers many of us know and admire will testify to that.
One of the things I encouraged the group to do was make darn well sure that they charged a sustainable price for their wonderful healing and under valued raw milk. Many were concerned about the cost of safety, testing and improvements. It takes money.
What does that math mean….the price is too cheap.
One thing that RAWMI may get blasted for is this….everywhere that RAWMI reaches and teaches….raw milk prices may rise.
It is about damn time that farmers are paid properly and can afford to feed their families, not be treated like slaves and invest in new equipment and preventative maintenance. When farmers get to know the medical value of their raw milk….raw milk will become rightfully a little more valuable.
I can see it now…everywhere that RAWMI goes….raw milk doubles in price and farmers no longer get introuble with regulators for outbreaks. Sounds like a great deal.
When Charlotte Smith increased her price this week from $7 to $8 per half gallon, her customers praised the action and gave her email and text hugs. They love her and they love her milk and what it does for their families.
Everyone that drinks raw milk will consider high quality raw milk a great deal at any price…if they can sleep-in on Christmas morning and not milk the cows twice a day for 365 days each year.
One of RAWMI’s greatest gifts to farmers is this:….the education to understand how undervalued high quality low risk raw milk is! and how grateful you should be to just buy your raw milk and not have to milk and feed and breed and take care of that cow everyday….24-7-365.
Cheap raw milk is farmer slavery.
I believe there is a line where you can price yourself out of customers or limit the ability of customer being able to pay. I could easily have afforded the $90 to see P Allen Smith’s farm- it would have been an expensive lunch that I wouldn’t have eaten, as posted, the use of chemicals appears to be prevalent there. That is my educated decision. Most think the chemicals are harmless, I do not.
As an RN, I don’t know many other nurses with kids that could afford $15/gal of milk consistently and most don’t take vacations other than day trips with their kids. (I am not referring to those who live off credit cards, I am referring to those who live within their means)
I’m not sure that I’d agree that farmers need to think more like business people. Of those I’ve met and have seen (small farmers), they are happy with their life now and don’t appear to want to expand and they do appear to be doing fine financially. Several do take vacations, which means they hire someone to fill in for them, One sends their kids to private school…. McAfee has @400 acres and Stalatin 550 acres; not small at all. I’m not saying there is anything wrong with their farms, or the running of them. Not every farmer has their goals. So why should they change?
How much input goes into maintaining a farm is a balancing act limited to individual discretion, namely, the extent to which he or she is willing to go in terms of their use of off farm income in order to subsidize operating costs and ultimately what the consumer pays for food.
Most farmers including myself at least in this part of the world have scaled back their framing operations in order to limit their loses and devote more time to their families and/or off farm incomes.
Ken
http://www.champoegcreamery.com/
Mark
Also, I’ve found over the years that a lot of people don’t seem to understand the difference between a farmer and a rancher. Of course, when you say dairy farmer it’s pretty obvious. My family ancestory involves ranching (mostly pastured Herefords) and very little farming. Most of the neighboring folks were the same. Then some seed company came along and offered bonuses and benefits and whatnot for folks to plant test seed plots and things went downhill from there, as far as pastured animals went. Pretty soon we had plowed fields and everything was dusty and dirty all the time. Even at my age then, around 8 or 9, I could see the downside to digging up topsoil and planting acres and acres of seed. Then it had to be trucked and weighed and stored and hauled by train or truck to some other destination, which made no sense to me then and makes no sense to me now. What did animals do before grain?
Exactly.
First on deck, Gumpert, was the Rawesome deposition hearing in Ventura yesterday. It’s also important that the defendents show up themselves (ahem, James Stewart) if they don’t want to have a warrant issued for their arrest.
If one does not have food Rights then the courts are the last place to be pursuing them!
In regards to individuals, courts along with other “legal” entities deal with privileges. They are not in the business of Rights. They are into regulating (i.e. taxing) privileges.
If you convert a Right to a privilege you are literally selling out your birthrights. It is a form of voluntary servitude.
However, If one has food Rights (as well as property Rights) then every adverse action, beginning with the initial trespass, must be immediately responded to in ways that hold each individual trespasser fully accountable for their trespass. Every time those individual trespasses are allowed without an immediate response that effectively (and fully Lawfully) repels the trespasser, then those trespassers appear to have some kind of justification for their actions.
Waiting to respond until the agencies present their trespass as a legal issue is a snare that best be avoided. Why more consideration isn’t put on repelling the trespassers and then holding them fully accountable under the common law before any legal actions begin is symptomatic of the legal realm’s conditioning upon the Amercian psyche.