Action | milk for manufacturing purposes |
Stage | Proposed |
Comment Period | Ended on 12/9/2002 |
This is a totally bad set of regulations.
By assuming many consumers are idiots and unable to make food choices VaDACS grossly overestimates the importance of their department. The efforts that they have put into harrassing small producers and families that simply have overages in milk production belies their claim for public safety., when there are many other areas that could more appropriately use these resources to address legitimate concerns. By demanding only cooked milk and milk products, and not cooked meat and meat products the department is showing a definite hostility towards small dairy producers, which is not warranted by the health facts presented. In addition, the restriction that ALL farmers may not sell/give away fresh uncooked milk is limiting their contractual rights to sell their goods.
I encourage the inclusion of an exemption for direct to consumer sales of all dairy products, as previously presented by the Office of Planning & Budget, which would allow the part time cheese maker to be able to market their farm products.
The State of Minnesota has a constitution provision which guarantees farmers the right to sell their products unencumbered by licenses and inspection~~~we do not see Minnesotans having these dire health consequences that VaDACS erroneously presents.
Virginia, the cradle of out republic, needs to honor it's farmers, consumers, and home producers by allowing them free trade of their goods rather than kowtow to agribusiness and producer lobbies.