Grass fed beef from a local small farmer is healthy. What's wrong with Raw Milk? It's good and has real cream that rises to the top, you can churn the cream and make your own butter.Large corporations have been trying to outlaw small farmers. It does seem "they" prefer us to have E-Coli to battle with...what happened to growing your own food? Why can't we grow and produce for us and the people around us?
Mega farms, imported food...what happened to the real America?
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article | posted November 16, 2007 (web only)
Old McDonald Had a Farm...and He Got Arrested?
The Nation
David E. Gumpert
Just in time for the holidays, four beef carcasses hang from the improvised slaughterhouse at Greg Niewendorp's 160-acre farm outside East Jordan, in the north of Michigan's lower peninsula. It should be a happy Thanksgiving because, for the first time in eight months, his farm isn't under quarantine by Michigan's Department of Agriculture (MDA) and Niewendorp is free to slaughter cattle from his herd of twenty and fulfill contracts in time for the holidays to the couple dozen friends and neighbors who prize the specially bred grass-fed beef he produces.
...
Cracking down
But as the re-emergence of a farm-to-consumer economy draws increasing amounts of cash out of the mass-production factory system, the new movement is bumping up against suddenly energized regulators who claim they want to "protect" us from pathogens and other dangers.
Whatever the immediate cause, the result is the same: regulators are cracking down on small farms with a ferocity that has their new urban customers aghast.
In just the last few weeks, there have been at least a half-dozen notable incidents. In Virginia's Nelson County, ten agriculture agents, aided by state police hauled off 62-year-old custom hog farmer Richard Bean, and his 60-year-old wife, Jean Rinaldi, for slaughtering their own hogs, charging them with a felony and eleven misdemeanors. Bean and Rinaldi were frustrated with the expense of having to haul their hogs more than two hours to the nearest slaughterhouse, and felt they could do it as well or better themselves.
...
Protecting Who?
As much as regulators like to talk about protecting consumers, when you speak with them, it sometimes sounds more like they want more to protect corporate interests.
Full article at The Nation LINK
Old McDonald Had a Farm...and He Got Arrested?
The Nation
David E. Gumpert
Just in time for the holidays, four beef carcasses hang from the improvised slaughterhouse at Greg Niewendorp's 160-acre farm outside East Jordan, in the north of Michigan's lower peninsula. It should be a happy Thanksgiving because, for the first time in eight months, his farm isn't under quarantine by Michigan's Department of Agriculture (MDA) and Niewendorp is free to slaughter cattle from his herd of twenty and fulfill contracts in time for the holidays to the couple dozen friends and neighbors who prize the specially bred grass-fed beef he produces.
...
Cracking down
But as the re-emergence of a farm-to-consumer economy draws increasing amounts of cash out of the mass-production factory system, the new movement is bumping up against suddenly energized regulators who claim they want to "protect" us from pathogens and other dangers.
Whatever the immediate cause, the result is the same: regulators are cracking down on small farms with a ferocity that has their new urban customers aghast.
In just the last few weeks, there have been at least a half-dozen notable incidents. In Virginia's Nelson County, ten agriculture agents, aided by state police hauled off 62-year-old custom hog farmer Richard Bean, and his 60-year-old wife, Jean Rinaldi, for slaughtering their own hogs, charging them with a felony and eleven misdemeanors. Bean and Rinaldi were frustrated with the expense of having to haul their hogs more than two hours to the nearest slaughterhouse, and felt they could do it as well or better themselves.
...
Protecting Who?
As much as regulators like to talk about protecting consumers, when you speak with them, it sometimes sounds more like they want more to protect corporate interests.
Full article at The Nation LINK