Customers and Other Supporters Stand with Farmer!

Submitted by Kimberly Hartke

The FDA reign of terror against family farms who are serving the needs of private buying clubs is culminating in one Wisconsin farmer facing federal charges. Citizens deserve the freedom to choose, and are staging an event in support of this principled farmer, Vernon Hershberger. He is being dealt with unjustly, and is standing strong with the support of the families he serves. (Kimberly Hartke)

February 24, 2012–Baraboo, WI. Food sovereignty activists from around North America will meet at this tiny town on March 2, 2012 to support Wisconsin dairy farmer Vernon Hershberger and food sovereignty. Hershberger, who has a court hearing that day, is charged with four criminal misdemeanors that could land him in prison for three years with fines of over $10,000. The Wisconsin Department of Agricultural Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) targeted Hershberger for supplying a private buying club with fresh milk and other farm products.

DATCP has charged Hershberger with, among other things, operating a retail food establishment without a license. Hershberger repeatedly denies this, citing that he provides foods only to paid members in a private buying club and is not subject to state food regulations. “There is more at stake here than just a farmer and his few customers,” says Hershberger, “this is about the fundamental right of farmers and consumers to engage in peaceful, private, mutually consenting agreements for food, without additional oversight.”

At a pre-court rally scheduled for 11:00am, in front of the Sauk County Courthouse in Baraboo, food rights activists will read and distribute a “Declaration of Food Independence” that asserts inherent rights in food choice. A signing ceremony will be part of the rally. The signers expect the declaration will inspire a growing food sovereignty movement. Speakers at the rally will include members of Hershberger’s club.

Hershberger and other farmers around the country have been and are facing state or federal charges against them for providing fresh foods to wanting customers. In recent months the FDA has conducted several long undercover sting operations and raids against peaceful farmers and buying clubs that have resulted in farms shutting down and consumers without access to their food.

Farm Food Freedom Coalition wants to ensure that America’s treasures, our independent farms and ranches, are able to thrive. We aim to preserve our agricultural heritage and the future availability of traditional, farm fresh foods. Americans want and deserve the freedom to choose natural, unprocessed foods for generations to come.

Information about farm raids: FarmFoodFreedom.com. For additional information on raw milk: westonaprice.org.

More event information: RawMilkFreedomRiders.com

The Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF), a nonprofit nutrition education foundation, reviewed the 2010 government guidelines and declared that they provide inadequate nutrition for growing children. Specifically, the guidelines do not permit sufficient fat soluble vitamins, A,D, and K, and critical nutrients for neurological development, choline and Vitamin B-12.

WAPF President, Sally Fallon Morell suggests that the best way for children to get a decent lunch is for parents to make their own childs lunch with natural whole foods and send it to school. And, now we find that even homemade lunches are being targeted by the government for scrutiny!

Please see our press conference video Nutrition Experts Critique the 2010 USDA Dietary Guidelines.

Obesity, diabetes, bullying and school violence are problems that can all be attributed to poor nutrition. The Weston A. Price Foundation has issued an alternative set of guidelines, which it believes will help improve the mental health and physical well-being of our nation’s children. See Healthy 4 Life.

Sally Fallon Morell is based in Washington, DC and available to do interviews on the school lunch issue.

We can make her available from the National Press Club Broadcast Center, if that would be of interest.

See CNN news story that sparked the controversy here.

Kimberly Hartke, Publicist

Weston A. Price Foundation

703-860-2711, cell 703-675-5557

It is with much sadness that we report the two-year war waged by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) against Pennsylvania Amish farmer Dan Allgyer has been a success. The Washington Times and others are now reporting that, following a ruling last month by Judge Lawrence F. Stengel that Allgyer could no longer ship raw milk across state lines, he is officially shutting down his entire Rainbow Acres Farm.

Provoking Allgyer to shut down his farm appears to have been the goal of the FDA all along, which back on February 4, 2010, conducted a gestapo-style raid on Allgyer’s Kinzers, Penn., property to search for evidence that he was shipping raw milk across state lines. After illegally trespassing on the man’s property, the agents proceeded to harass Allgyer about his supposed involvement in interstate commerce (http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com).

Just a few months later on April 20, 2010, the FDA again sent its Nazi-sympathizing thugs back to Rainbow Acres Farm, this time at 4:30 a.m. while Allgyer was still asleep, to conduct another raid. Violating the provisions of their so-called warrant, which specified that any inspection must be conducted during “reasonable times during ordinary business hours,” the agents proceeded to once again ransack the farm in search of evidence to back their claims that Allgyer was engaged in illegal interstate commerce (http://www.naturalnews.com/029322_raw_milk_Amish.html).

Following this second sting, the FDA claims to have discovered the evidence it needed, and immediately sent Allgyer a warning letter notifying him that he was in violation of interstate commerce laws, according to their view (http://www.farmtoconsumer.org/aa/aa-26april2010.htm). The agency also filed a civil complaint against Allgyer around the same time.

With hundreds of happy and satisfied out-of-state customers that relied on him for fresh supplies of raw milk, Allgyer attempted to satisfy the FDA’s demands by restructuring his farm’s distribution process into private cow share agreements with customers. Such agreements allow individuals to directly purchase shares in the cows from which they get milk, which means they personally own them, and they are not subject to FDA jurisdiction.

Rogue judge essentially declares FDA has jurisdiction over private property use, in this case cows

But on February 3, 2012, Judge Stengel decided that Allgyer was still in violation of interstate commerce laws, even with the restructured cow sharing arrangements, and ordered him to stop distributing raw milk altogether. Private cow share agreements do not constitute interstate commerce, of course, but Judge Stengel apparently pays no regard to individual liberty, having declared that the FDA basically now has jurisdiction over private property use.

Likely worn down from the perpetual and never-ending harassment, Allgyer appears to have decided to simply give up trying to fight this unprecedented tyranny, and simply shut down his farm. Hundreds of families that relied on Allgyer for fresh milk, butter, cheese, eggs, and other nutritious goods will now have to find a new source for clean food, at least until the FDA shuts them down, too.

“I can’t believe in 2012 the federal government is raiding Amish farmers at gunpoint all over a basic human right to eat natural food,” said one of the farm’s former customers, who wished to remain anonymous, to The Washington Times. “In Maryland, they force taxpayers to pay for abortions, but God forbid we want the same milk our grandparents drank.”

Sources for this article include:

http://www.washingtontimes.com

http://www.farmtoconsumer.org/aa/aa-26april2010.htm
Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/035000_Amish_farmers_raw_milk_feds.html#ixzz1mdNRHCfA

Come watch the live streaming of the Raw Milk Debate hosted by the Harvard Law School Food Law Society on Thursday, February 16 from 7-9 PM. At Against the Grain Bakery, 203 High Street, Chestertown, MD.

Cookies and (gently pasteurized) milk will be available for purchase.

Debate participants:

Fred Pritzker, Pritzker and Olson Law Firm
Dr. Heidi Kassenborg, Director, Dairy and Food Inspection Division, Minnesota Dept. of Agriculture

Vs.

Sally Fallon Morrell, President, Weston A. Price Foundation
David Gumpert, Author, The Raw Milk Revolution

Sponsored by the Washington College Anthropology Club, The Center for Environment & Society, and the Chestertown WAPF chapter

For more information contact Bill Schindler, wschindler2@washcoll.edu

According to our sources, the rogue agency is digging in its heels on the NDI draft guidance that threatens so many supplements, refusing to listen to Congress or follow the intent of the law.

Senators Orrin Hatch and Tom Harkin met with Dr. Daniel Fabricant of the FDA on January 26 to request that the FDA withdraw its NDI draft guidance altogether—a meeting that ANH-USA, together with some trade groups, helped set up. They were following up on their recent letter to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg asking the FDA to stop the process altogether, withdraw the guidance, and start again after meeting with interested parties to address the list of significant concerns expressed by consumers and industry.

You may recall that the landmark Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA) required that guidelines be established for supplement manufacturers to notify FDA when a new dietary ingredient was introduced into the marketplace. The FDA’s Draft Guidance for New Dietary Ingredients was supposed to fulfill that requirement.

Unfortunately, the FDA’s proposed regulations are in fact completely contrary to the intent of Congress when DSHEA was passed, and Sens. Harkin and Hatch wanted to make that clear to FDA. They should know—they were the two principal authors of the legislation!

According to our sources, FDA has turned down the senators’ request. FDA in effect said that it is refusing to reconsider its interpretation of what the NDI section of DSHEA means, regardless of what Sens. Hatch and Harkin say they meant when they wrote the law.

Does this mean FDA intends to use the NDI process as a de facto pre-market approval system—something which regulatory observers believe was specifically excluded by DSHEA? In a word, yes. We have been told that FDA claims the NDI process is the only “preventive control” for dietary supplements in federal law. Whatever “preventive control” means, it is completely untrue that supplements are uncontrolled under federal law or that the FDA lacks the power presently to regulate them.

In refusing to follow the intent of the law as clearly stated by the law’s authors, the FDA is acting as a rogue agency. If you haven’t done so already, please ask your legislators to make a one-minute floor speech opposing the FDA’s guidance document. FDA’s plan would sweep many supplements off the shelf and make the ones that survive much more expensive.