North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Richard Harrison <rharrison922@yahoo.com>]

Donna,

    One of the farmers in the article you gave, Maryland farmer Nick Maravell, WON"T be affected by the bill, apparently. The bill EXEMPTS all sales directly to consumers. If he sells to a grocery store or restaurant, he would have to keep books on sales for 6 months. No inspection, no license. Wholesale farmers would be the ones licensed and inspected---farmers who sell mainly to middle men whe re-wholesale it. Many relatively small farmers sell wholesale to dealers.

     I oppose the bill because I would be unable to wholesale pecans as we have done for over 50 years(unless we became licensed and inspected). The varieties we grow are mostly acceptable to shellers rather than direct consumers--too small, too hard-shelled.

     Also, this COULD cause maple syrup to disappear from MOST grocery store shelves because it is produced by "small farmers" who mostly sell wholesale, mostly to processors. The processors are ALL supplied by "small farmers" as far as I know, because not many folks are willing to perform the tedious and timely task to collect the maple sap from the trees, transport it quickly to a  syrup house where it is boiled (40:1 ratio, I think) into syrup and then sell it. If they get set up large enough to do a few gallons for themselves, they use the same equipment to produce more than enough for themselves and they wholesale or retail it. It would indeed be very expensive to get set up to produce just a gallon or 2 for family consumption.The same would be true for much of the sugarcane and sorghum syrupmakers.

      Peddlers of produce---and probably fruit and vegetable stands(unless they grow their own) would be out of business, too. It would affect the poor much more than the rich.

                                                                                  Regards,

                                                                                  Richard Harrison

--- On Fri, 8/21/09, Kieran &/or Donna <holycow@frontiernet.net> wrote:

From: Kieran &/or Donna <holycow@frontiernet.net>
Subject: [NAFEX] Farmers critical of food safety bill
To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Friday, August 21, 2009, 11:14 AM

I think the parts that will interest Nafexers are the $500 annual registration fee that would of course raise the price of produce from any farm too large to just quit selling altogether, and the quarantine proposal, and the whole notion of enforcement after an incident rather than prevention.   Donna

Farmers critical of food safety bill