Friday, September 24, 2010

Real Milk and Local Dairies

Since Colorado passed legislation that allows their citizens the right to seek out and enjoy the healthy benefits of real milk, they have gone from 1 to 50 raw milk dairies in just a couple of years. These dairies can't keep up with the demand!

When you consider the idea that in Wyoming it is (technically, by their legal definition) illegal to consume food made in your own kitchen, maybe it doesn't seem so far out to grasp the fact that it is currently illegal to buy fresh, whole milk from your neighbor, or even drive to purchase it in one of the surrounding states and serve it to your family? 

Maybe it doesn't seem so crazy that someone who owns a cow or a pig can butcher it themselves, or take it to the local custom meat processor and have it cut up for their own use... this is considered perfectly safe by the USDA, but the minute you might sell a pound of hamburger to anyone else, that same meat becomes absolutely illegal and unsafe?  What?  If the meat is safe for the person who owns the animal, why is it not safe for someone else?  If all home butchered or custom meat is unsafe, why don't laws prohibit us from eating animals we own?

The point is that these laws and regulations have absolutely nothing to do with food safety, and everything to do with protecting big business from competition from local producers.

2 comments:

  1. Our laws are so arbitrary. I'm not sure why we can't be adults and decide for ourselves what is safe. We have raw milk around here, but they make it so difficult for the dairies, that most don't want to be bothered.

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