My two friends, "Mellani" and "Mike" raise grass-fed sheep on 50 acres of organic pasture set in a wooded farm in Missouri. They had a record-breaking 38 lambs born this year, which, on the face of it, sounds great. But not so great actually. The problem is, they really don't have a market for their lambs (nor the cattle or hogs they used to raise before the market price dropped below the production price). It's eight hours round trip to the nearest large city where they might be able to sell their "crop" but that isn't practical.
The local market is too small to adequately support even their current production - the result is they're cutting back on the number of ewes and, so, lambs next year...
You can read the complete article at Spot-On.
Kevin Weeks is a Gather food correspondent (Paisano), personal chef, cooking teacher, and writer in Knoxville, Tennessee who spends too many hours on his feet, cooking. "Paisano" is a column focused on peasant dishes from around the world. To read more of Kevin's writings or connect to him click here. His blog, Seriously Good, is read by 75,000 cooks a month and in addition he writes a weekly column for Spot-On.
recommend this
email
print
link to this page
Comments: 13
I've discussed your ideas with Mellani, because they occurred to me as well. And, of course, obviously to her. There are really only two possible direct markets and the closest one, as I noted, is 8 hours round trip. As for mail-order, that's apparently possible, but selling out-of-state requires using a USDA -certified slaughterhouse. Again, this requires not only the funds up front to pay for the services, but also an investment in equipment to preserve inventory.
The point is the farm bill does nothing to serve the needs of small farmers and in fact gets in the way -- witness the USDA certification requirement.
Excellent article, though. Thank you.
>How sad that we live in a culture where small farms cannot survive.
They can't survive as Jefferson described them and lobbyists and politicians describe them. But that doesn't mean they can't survive. A lot of small farmers survived the 60s by forming co-ops that spread the cost of marketing over lots of small farms -- OceanSpray is the best example.
And you and I can certainly help them by trying to send our tax dollars in their direction instead of to ConAgra.
I agree.
Good for you.