April 28. 2011
By Josey Hastings
Full Article
It may come as a surprise to some Vermonters to discover that they cannot, legally, buy pork or beef from the farmer up the road who has raised and slaughtered his or her animals on the farm.
As the local food movement grows in Vermont, both farmers and consumers are running up against many of these kinds of regulatory limitations.
In the case of meat sales, farmers are required to bring their live animals to a state-inspected slaughterhouse if they want to sell any of the meat to neighbors or friends, not to mention stores. While this is an acceptable arrangement for some farmers, others, such as Carl Russell of Earthwise Farm and Forest, feel strongly about slaughtering their own animals on the farm.
Russell’s farm is run by hand and horsepower, and he raises his animals with a sense of deep commitment and caring. In describing his relationship with his animals, Russell tells the story of finding a very cold, new-born Jersey bull in a rain-filled ditch in the early dawn. The calf’s mother had struggled in labor, sliding under a fenceline and down an embankment, to end on her back in the ditch where, unable to right herself, she dropped the calf in the cold flow of spring run-off.
Russell got both calf and mother back to the barn where the cow collapsed in exhaustion. He warmed, dried, and bottle-fed the new calf, which two seasons later he slaughtered to feed his family. This intimate level of connection with animals and with one’s own food is rather unique in today’s predominantly large-scale agricultural world, and it is this connection that Russell wishes to maintain by taking responsibility for slaughtering his own animals.
Russell sees the growing interest in local food as being, in part, about the yearning people feel to be involved in their food story—to know where their food comes from, how it was raised and by whom. He recognizes that, were it not for federal law, he could sell meat from his family’s farm directly to consumers who value the time, effort, and insight he invests in raising his animals.
Russell would like to see a tiered regulation system that would allow small farmers and consumers to benefit from direct sales. “As owners of our land and entrepreneurs in our community,” he says, “we feel we should be able to make business arrangements with our neighbors in a way that suits us.”
Russell’s desire for greater freedom in local, direct food sales is shared by many others who have begun to form what is now being called the “food sovereignty movement.” Russell believes this movement has developed a critical mass. “I don’t think that policymakers will be able to stem the tide of the food sovereignty movement,” he says, “People will buy the food they want, raised the way they want.”
Rural Vermont, a statewide nonprofit group founded by farmers in 1985, is currently planning a food sovereignty campaign which it intends to launch this summer. The campaign’s primary goal is to pass local food and community self-governance ordinances in towns throughout the state. One of Rural Vermont’s first steps will be to hold town meetings on the topic.
The ordinance is intended to protect the rights of consumers and farmers to engage in the direct sale of farm-raised and farm-processed goods without the oversight of state or federal government. This idea is not without precedent. Sedgwick, Maine residents recently made national headlines when they unanimously voted to adopt such an ordinance.
On Wednesday, May 4 from 6:30-9 p.m., Rural Vermont supporters from near and far will convene at the West Monitor Barn in Richmond for Rural Vermont’s 2011 Annual Meeting. Bob St. Peter, of Sedgwick, who is the executive director of Food for Maine’s Future, will give a keynote address on “Local Food, Local Rules: Creating Food and Farming Policies that Work for your Community.”
According to St. Peter, “Up until the last couple generations, we didn’t need a special license or new facility each time we wanted to sell something to our neighbors. Small farmers and producers have been getting squeezed out in the name of food safety, yet it’s the industrial food that is causing food borne illness, not us.”
The event is free for Rural Vermont members and all kids, and $10 for non-members.
If you are interested in participating in Rural Vermont’s food sovereignty campaign, contact Shelby Girard at or shelby@ruralvermont.org.
To read the full text of the ordinance, visit http://savingseeds.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/localfoodlocalrules-ordinance-template.pdf.