Growing numbers of American consumers want to buy their food directly from farms, because the food is tastier, more nutritious, and safer than the alternative.
There is an amazing endorsement of the safety factor in today’s Wall Street Journal, which has a front page article describing how two reporters tried to determine where in China a batch of pesticide-tainted ginger came from…without success. I was drawn to the article partly because of all the discussion we’ve had on this blog about our country’s regulatory obsession with clamping down on farms producing raw milk and other products to sell directly to consumers. I was also drawn personally because I consume a fair amount of ginger, using it heavily in vegetable juices I make. I try to purchase organic ginger, but more often than not it’s unavailable, so I wind up with the conventional stuff. I’ve kind of lost my appetite for it.
The Wall Street Journal attempted to trace back to Chinese farms ginger that in July was found to be contiminated with a dangerous pesticide. The reporters found that “while the tainted ginger’s country of origin was clear, the actual supplier—let alone the farm where it grew—was anything but. The path of this batch of ginger, some 8,000 miles around the world, shows how global supply chains have grown so long that some U.S. companies can’t be can’t be sure where the products they’re buying are made or grown—and without knowing the source of the product, it’s difficult to solve the problem. Layers of middlemen obscure who actually produces goods, complicating efforts to police the production process.”
Ginger is obviously just one small example. Assume the same thing applies to many of the other foods we obtain from Asia and Latin America—apples, pears, tomatoes, mushrooms, rice—and you begin to appreciate the scope of the problem. Hey, why leave the U.S. out of the list of potential offenders? And while our regulators fiddle with raw milk dairies and small farms butchering custom-raised beef for knowing customers (that have made no one sick), Rome burns. I think it’s safe to say that our food supply is more tainted than we will ever really know.
That begins to explain why so many people are outraged by the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). It envisions more of the same—the meat of unhealthy animals being shipped thousands of miles around the globe—at the risk of consumer health and small farm economic viability. Why is it that when industrialized processes repeatedly don’t work with food, there are so many who decide the solution is to simply do more of it?
The consumer-to-farm movement may not be something that pumps up our Gross National Product, but maybe we can do without the “Gross.”
There should be room for everyone at the table, given the common interests which exist in fostering the consumption of milk, meat and other dairy. The entire dairy and beef industry got slammed thirty years ago when ignorance and political correctness prevailed to declare fats/cholesterol a danger for heart disease. It is becoming more and more clear (as the country becomes ever more obese and diabetic on its "low fat" diet) that carbohydrates and not fats are the real problem, and the return to healthy foods with plenty of fats seems predictable. This means meat and dairy will return to a more important role, and as they do, these important foods should return with the truly healthy alternatives of raw milk, raw dairy and locally-grown and butchered meats freely available.
NAIS foolishness, California’s recent step backward (AB1735) as they attempt a stealth extinguishment of raw milk, and Ron Paul’s proposal (HB4077) to expunge the federal rule against interstate restrictions on raw milk are examples of the forces which are abroad in the land, in the former cases bad, and in the latter case good. There is simply no substitute for continued pressure from consumers on legislators and regulators concerning these issues.
The future health of the country is literally at stake. This revolution will not be pasteurized, unless you choose to go that way since, as an earlier post pointed out, evolution requires that all bases be covered:-).
Of the three routes from which knowledge is received—from authority, from experience, and from revelation/intuition—direct experience is the the most irrefutable (my mother—authority—told me repeatedly not to play with the electric outlets, but it was not until I stuck a bobby pin in one—direct experience—that the truth of what she said became incontestable). Whatever health benefit we experience from raw milk, no amount of argument from authority figures can change what we experience as true: Direct experience always trumps authority as a source of knowledge. So the unfair advantage that raw milk drinkers have, is that they become an army that cannot be swayed. Therefore, as far as the regulators are concerned, it is a battle that will never end.
However, direct experience cannot be transferred to anyone else. The knowledge obtained from it can only be passed on through the use of authority. This is the disadvantage we have in the battle for raw milk: We have very little authority with the establishment. (The acceptance of knowledge through authority is based on the amount of trust given to the authority figure. A culture’s religion usually receives the highest level of trust. Today, that would be the religion of Science.) There are not enough raw milk drinkers with P.H.D.’s or M.D.,’s after their names. There is a significant dearth of recent studies comparing the health of raw milk to pasteurized milk. Without these studies to give us authority, we will not be taken seriously by the establishment.
But we do not have to convince those in power (although it would be great if we did). As Sylvia , Milkfarmer, and Steve Bemis have alluded to in their recent posts, what we need is consumers of raw milk, those with direct experience of its health giving benefits. With a large enough army of raw milk drinkers who cannot be swayed, the legislative representatives will fall in line. We can do this one by one, face to face, with friends and neighbors, by the authority of anecdotes. To Science, anecdotal authority is anathema. It doesn’t matter that thousands of lactose intolerant people can testify that they can drink raw milk without problems, if it isn’t proven in a study it doesn’t exist. But in personal interaction, anecdotal evidence carries a lot of authority. Given enough time, we can win the battle. To paraphrase David’s quote in another context, to convert one person to raw milk is to convert the world
http://blog.oup.com/2007/11/locavore/
As a small hobby beekeeper, I’m sorry to see Colony Collapse Disorder included further down the list. That this is a common enough problem to have been so well known is a bad sign indeed. But perhaps that awareness will also include discussion about the role of insecticides and toxins in the environment and how the bees are our "canaries in the coal mine" warning of a great disruption in nature.
From our perspective there is little doubt that the case involving Richard Hebron has had an effect and that the state agents we have interacted with are aware of and responsive to the new locavore movement. Consumers need to continue to be heard, and advocate healthy alternatives and freedom of choice.
Do the common people ever read those studies? I remember when the MDs wanted to put my mom on hormone replacement therapy, "to prevent her osteoprosis from worsening" I researched the drug, premarin, in her case. The more I read, the more I informed her of the so called "studies". She made an informed decision not to take the pills. A change in diet, simple exercise and sunshine did wonders for her and her "osteo" did not worsen nor did she have any further problems.
A good example is the studies of the HPV vacc. They are really inconclusive as to what long term effects they will have (and I question the short term results that are posted by et al), it does NOT prevent HPV, if the small print is read, it only lessens the chances supposedly. And only for 4 types of the HPV and there is over 100 different types. Of those 4, only 2 supposedly MAY lead to cervical cancer, and with the majority of women with HPV, the body takes care of it in time without difficulties/side effects. I would never allow my child to have this experimental drug.
I just read a study the other day, I think it was from Denmark (or that area) and it was in reference to synthetic vit A, slowing down/resolving herpies. Imagine that! I don’t know how valid that study is, it was from a university. Something to keep in mind since over 90% of the population has some form of herpies.
Studies are manipulated. Follow the money to see who benefits from it.
Peter
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