NPPC doesn’t speak for me: Rhonda Perry, a Missouri farmer and director of the Missouri Rural Crisis Center, is tired of Big Meat purporting to represent her interests in Washington. NAIS, a controversial animal tracking program [that we've covered numerous times], is just the newest example of the “farm lobby” abandoning the interests of actual farmers. But for once, family farmers had the opportunity to tell the USDA just how much they disagree with industry overlords: In listening sessions across the country, a vast majority of producers spoke out against the program, which is being pushed by the likes of the National Pork Producers Council and the National Milk Producers Federation.
Says Perry, “Given the shocking chasm between our corporate farm groups and real family farmers, NAIS is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to bad farm policy that emanates from of Washington. So the next time you hear that ‘farm groups’ oppose cracking down on antibiotics, or that they want to water down environmental regulations over factory farms or that we need another free trade agreement the likes of the one with Colombia, just remember whose interests these folks really represent–and it’s not rural America.” (Minuteman Media)
This isn’t exactly new news, but Perry says it better than many others we’ve seen. Read her op-ed, raise a fist, and hope the USDA and Congress are listening up.
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