Push to Eat Local Food Is Hampered by Shortage
Kevin McCollister raises sheep and pigs on his farm in East Montpelier, VT., and has had trouble arranging for slaughter (C) Matthew Cavanaugh for The New York Times
Excerpted from NYTimes
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Erica Zimmerman and her husband spent months pasture-raising pigs on their farm here, but when the time came to take them to slaughter, an overbooked facility canceled their appointment.
With the herd in prime condition, and the couple lacking food and space to keep them, they frantically called slaughterhouses throughout the state. After several days they found an opening, but their experience highlights a growing problem for small farmers here and across the nation: too few slaughterhouses to meet the growing demand for locally raised meat.
In what could be a major setback for America’s local-food movement, championed by so-called locavores, independent farmers around the country say they are forced to make slaughter appointments before animals are born and to drive hundreds of miles to facilities, adding to their costs and causing stress to livestock.
As a result, they are scaling back on plans to expand their farms because local processors cannot handle any more animals.
“It’s pretty clear there needs to be attention paid to this,” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said in an interview. “Particularly in the Northeast, where there is indeed a backlog and lengthy wait for slaughter facilities.”
According to the United States Department of Agriculture, the number of slaughterhouses nationwide declined to 809 in 2008 from 1,211 in 1992, while the number of small farmers has increased by 108,000 in the past five years.
In Canada we also have to deal with onerous rules and regulations that are essentially working against the whole local food idea and making it very difficult for small farmers to provide local meat direct to their customers.
Smaller indepepndent slaughterhouses are closing their doors or having to turn away this type of small farm customer because it is not worth their while to go through the federal inspection process.
It is a real problem that is being created largely by good intentions on the part of the Federal government to put in place protocols to ensure food safety in the wake of numerous food recalls by huge food processing giants. Unfortunately the regulations are hitting small, indepenedent farmers, those who produce the safest food, the worst.
.-= Angela´s last blog ..Offering free lessons in dishwashing – apply here… =-.
Food safety legislation has never been about safety, ever. It has always and ever been about whitewashing and legitimizing the power players of industry to insulate them from political/market pressures and to drive out their up and coming competitors who cannot compete with them when it comes to regulations.
All food safety regulation has ever accomplished is to drive out the small, local, clean players and entrench the big dirty problem companies.