Since the 1930s, however, small family farms have been on the decline, and many of these reasons are clearly directed at [sic] government intervention in the market. The wartime draft, inflation in the 1970s and '80s but most of all the regulations created by the FDA and USDA, which are destructive to small farms while only a minor inconvenience to Big Agriculture, which has the money, lawyers and lobbyists to deal with any government conflicts.
Remember that local farm recently promoted by the JS and even Moochie Obama?
Well, memories may be all you have in the near future:
...Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) can make a huge difference in getting the poorest Americans access to healthy foods.
CSA has exploded in the last few years, from fewer than 100 in the early 1990s to close to 1,500 according to the New York Times. To many sociologists who aren’t hell bent on wealth redistribution, CSA may be a free market answer to America’s growing health epidemic.
That is until 2009 when President Obama signed into law the Food Safety and Modernization Act. The bill was in response to Big Agriculture’s reckless food production, which caused an e-coli breakout throughout the US. It expands the FDA’s authority over both processed food and fresh fruits and vegetables on all farms that make more than $500,000. It was lobbied for by Kellogg and Grocery Manufactures of America and was opposed by local food enthusiasts like the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and The Farm-to-Consume Legal Defense Fund. While it seems a necessary evil for larger expansion of government agencies to protect the safety of American’s food, the new law is another case of a Big Government and Big Business in cahoots. As Tim Carney of the Washington Examiner writes of the law, “This is big government: It trashes traditional ways and local, small business in favor of one-size-fits-all rules that prop up the big guys… Obama’s legislative agenda really serves the companies with the best lobbyists.”
It is useful, once again, to bring up SUBSIDIARITY, a/k/a the 10th Amendment. There's no reason that the Feds are involved in most of this; the State of Wisconsin (or of Colorado, or Texas) could--and DOES--monitor food-sources. They could do just fine for the vast majority of regulated products.
1 comment:
Dad, This is very relevant.
I buy as much of my food as possible from small local producers and avoid the big national chains. Three miles from my house is a small organic farm that has a CSA that supplies eggs, beef, lamb, pigs, and vegetables. I frequently shop there.
Now I receive the following email telling me that all is not well and they see the intrusion of the Federal government:
Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 10:17 AM
subject Action Alert: Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement
Action Alert: Food Safety Modernization Act.
http://www.cornucopia.org/2011/06/action-alert-big-agusda-could-run-organic-leafy-green-growers-out-of-business/
Follow this link to share your thoughts with the USDA.
Hello again –
We hope you don’t mind an additional note regarding an important issue that could impact small producers of leafy greens such as Turner Farm and the many other small farms that you purchase salad and cooking greens from. If you care about this, please let your voice be heard.
The Food Safety Modernization Act, which includes the new Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement, was recently passed by congress. The USDA, charged with enacting this rule, is open to comment on it by July 28th. The Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement as proposed could shut out of the market sustainable organic and local growers who take different approaches to food safety.
According to the Cornucopia Institute, the plan fails to tackle the root of our food safety issues, such as feeding practices and waste disposal in industrial-scale farms, and it is unclear how a set of national rules can accommodate both large-scale, monoculture growers and small-scale, diversified farms. Rules that may be appropriate for one type of farm may put unnecessary burdens on other producers—and with large-scale growers setting the standards, chances are that the smaller-scale and diversified farms’ needs and concerns will be the first to go.
If this issue is important to you please visit the links above for more information and submit your comments to the USDA as soon as possible.
http://www.regulations.gov/#!submitComment;D=AMS-FV-09-0029-0150
Thank you so very much.
Megan Hill
Turner Farm
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