By Gilles Stockton If you were not concerned about our loss of national sovereignty before, you should be now, following the World Trade Organization (WTO) recent ruling against the Country of Origin Labeling (COOL). Although the WTO acknowledges that the United States has the right to label, and even though Canada has their own version of COOL, the WTO cites a very minor excuse to deny American consumers from knowing the origin of their meat. The labeling requirement, Read More …
Tenancy and land speculation constitute a very serious economic menace and should be reduced to a minimum. But there is a more serious economic menace on the horizon which also involves the land, and follows when ownership and tenant systems break down; namely, corporation farming. Although this menace has not progressed very far, yet it is very serious because it is being promoted by the industrialized, urban-minded, mechanized, stock-gambling forces of this generation. The unsound, agricultural technique of Read More …
In today’s unhealthy, unfair and broken corporate controlled industrial food system, more and more people want to know where their food comes from and how it’s produced. The biggest food companies on the planet are well aware of this fact and the shift towards local. Farm to table and the new local food movement is being hijacked by Big Food. The world’s biggest food companies, including meat packers, processors and food distributors are carefully strategizing and planning on Read More …
November 11, 2014 For Immediate Release USDA Stonewalling Cattlemen – OCM Files Complaint Today, the Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM) filed a complaint for injunctive relief, demanding the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Agriculture make a final determination and release all required records related to a 2013 FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request regarding Beef Checkoff audit reports. The action filed today follows an 18-month struggle to obtain the truth about an OIG Beef Read More …
Eating healthy foods from growers and ranchers using sustainable practices may seem like a daunting task but an organization called “Courage for the World” is making it easier. Using established networks, they are teaching people about food sources, the economic advantages to shoppers for buying locally even though it may cost slightly more, and the severe economic and environmental damage caused by multi-national corporate food factories and laboratories. Their message shows us how to go into a grocery Read More …
Conflicts of Interest in Research and Promotion Programs As a general matter of policy, the Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) guidelines for oversight of all checkoff programs expressly require contracting procedures that “avoid any conflict of interest or a situation that could reasonably be perceived by a third party as a conflict of interest.”1 The Beef Order includes provisions that reflect these principles, as well. Before service on the board or as a Federation representative on the Beef Promotion Read More …
Driving down the middle of the road is a common practice in rural areas where back roads are marked mostly by two bare tracks. Meeting requires that passing cars yield by splitting the track. I remember once a long time ago when passing neighbors crunched bumpers on a gravel road. The law was called to establish liability for the crash. When a deputy arrived, he surveyed the scene. He determined no one was hurt, no tempers inflamed, no Read More …
“The Segregation Cost Arguments Do Not Hold Water” By: J. Dudley Butler Some opponents of COOL seem to use the term commingling as a synonym for segregation. Nothing could be further from the truth. Meat is commingled. Cattle are segregated. COOL does not deal with live animals. It deals with the sale of commodities such as beef and pork at the retail level. The COOL statue does not allow commingling of covered retail products. The use of commingling Read More …