Real Food Movement Scores!

[Gingerella72]

http://www.foodrenegade.com/maine-town-declares-food-sovereignty/#more-2721


If only more people would wake up and make changes like this all across the country.....but it's a start!

[bae]

Thanks for this pointer, I'll see if we can get our whole county to go for something like this.

[puglogic]

As a consumer of local eggs and dairy products I love this but am always wondering about the big issue, which is liability. The reason many of these milk/egg laws exist is because (in theory, anyway) it protects someone against lawsuits brought by a consumer who ends up with salmonella or other yuck from not-as-careful local producers. (Yes, I know all the ins and outs of that, but you can't deny that the risk of lawsuit exists in our suit-happy nation) How will these food-freedom laws deal with this liability issue? Through packaging? Waivers signed by consumers? Or just let the market handle it?

[Gingerella72]

Well, how are small scale farmers who are selling raw milk and other dairy currently handling liability issues? We the consumers should at least have the right to choose if we want to risk something by buying locally produced food. For those who do not want to take the risk, they can choose to go to a conventional supermarket and buy its USDA inspected products.

Smaller scale practices that utilize organic, grass fed methods won't have the kinds of problems that prompted those old milk/egg laws in the first place: overcrowded, unsanitary urban conditions. Humans drank raw milk and slaughtered their own meat for centuries without any problems before mass industrialization and urbanization began in the early 1900's. Once feedlots and milking operations housing thousands of cattle in cramped areas became the norm, is when all the problems began. Ditto for fruit and vegetables....mechanization on the uber-large scale that occurs now requires tons of extra processing, and the chance for nasty things to happen to the food. It's only because of the sheer size of the agribusiness industry and its un-environmentally friendly requirements to get that food processed that we have to have those kinds of laws and protections in place.

But if I want to drive to my local farmer's 'stead and buy raw milk (which is healthier anyway) and a portion of beef he slaughtered himself on site, I should have the right to. So should everyone else.

[puglogic]

I agree wholeheartedly. But we live in a nation where people win $20 million awards for burning their mouths by slugging hot fast-food coffee.

I am a person who takes responsibility for all my choices. If I buy raw milk, local eggs, pastured pork, I generally know the producer and can clear-headedly make a judgment that my risks are small -- for all the reasons you've stated so well --- and I accept them.

I agree with you G, I was just thinking out loud: As/if laws like this fall (as they should) increased numbers of people, good, bad, and ugly, will be consuming these products, bringing more producers online, increasing the risk at both ends. What will keep Safeway from mass-producing and distributing raw milk locally if there's a profit in it? And who carries the liability for the consumers who are itching to sue someone if they happen to get sick?

More of a musing than anything else; I have no answers. I think it works well on a small scale because I know my egg producer and she knows me -- and so we both know there's nothing to fear from one another. Unsure what happens when the wall comes down and zillions of consumers (and producers) get on the bandwagon.