Pork project

Will the USDA start enforcing its own rules to help small farms?

By Culinate staff

November 8, 2010

For all you legal eagles out there, it turns out that — surprise! — there’s already a federal law that, as the blog Civil Eats recently noted, “levels the playing field between family farmers who raise cattle, hogs and poultry and the large meat packers who purchase their livestock and bring it to market.” But the USDA doesn’t enforce the law, known as GIPSA, and proposed rules to make it do so are causing a ruckus in D.C.

Why should you care? Because only a few companies control the vast majority of the U.S. meat market, and small family ranches are disappearing faster than swatted flies. Have your say before November 22 at the Land Stewardship Project.