Update ~ Raw Milk BC Cow-op - Still Under the Gun

By Robert Freeman, in the Abbotsford News: “A search warrant was executed by health officials last week at the Chilliwack, BC, dairy farm at the centre of the raw milk controversy in B.C.
Nothing was seized during the August 25th search, but Fraser Health Authority spokesman Roy Thorpe-Dorward said photographs of the farm on Prairie Central Road are being reviewed to determine if a permanent court injunction issued last year against distribution of raw milk is being obeyed by the current farm owner.

He said the search did not arise from any complaints, but a warrant was obtained after FHA officials were denied entry for a “routine inspection” on August 12th.

Last year, after co-op co-founder Alice Jongerden was found in contempt of court for disobeying a court injunction and distributing raw milk labelled “Not For Human Consumption” to shareholders, operations of the “Home On The Range” farm was handed over to Michael Schmidt, a raw milk advocate from Ontario, and re-named “Our Cows.”

He continued distributing raw milk to investors in the “cowshare” co-op – not as food, but as a line of cosmetics, which falls under federal regulation.

“We take dividends from our jointly-held asset in the form of fluid milk labelled Enzymatic Bath Lotion,” co-op co-founder Gordon Watson said in an Internet blog.

But in a telephone interview he said the herd is private property, owned by the shareholders, and what they do with the milk is none of the health authority’s business.

“The FHA will say they anticipate that people will drink it,” he said. “I say it doesn’t matter what they do with it. They can paint with it – or they can drink it, if it suits them.” Watson made no bones about what he does with his milk. “I do drink my milk,” he said.

Watson said he doesn’t want a court fight, but he would “welcome” a prosecution, if it’s held “in open court and done properly." "I’m convinced what I’m doing is legal,” he said.

Watson argued that B.C. health authorities issue only a public “alert” when health hazards like tainted seafood are discovered, but shut down operations like raw milk cow-shares in which members are fully aware of the risk.
Raw milk is sold legally in Washington state, he pointed out, “but up here it becomes a biohazard. It’s not about health, it’s about the milk marketing monopoly,” he said….”

By Robert Freeman, in the Abbotsford News:

RAW MILK ~ BC COW-SHARE DEVELOPMENTS - June, 2008, the Greater Vancouver Coastal Health Authority threw its weight around... detaining 21 large jars of raw milk which were awaiting pickup by shareholders at one of the Vancouver, BC milk pick-up depots. (The logo of Vancouver Coastal Health Authority proclaims: Promoting Wellness, Ensuring Care.)
Using the Health Act (RSBC) they slapped some tape with ominous wording on our property, so that legally, it was stuck in the cooler at the delicatessen, the pick-up depot, and we could not use or enjoy it. The pretext is that it’s "food which has been obtained from a source not approved by government". " reported Gordon Watson, co-founder of Home On The Range - Chilliwack, BC, Cow-Co-op.
It’s amusing to see on the ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH INSPECTION REPORT: “The sample was then transported to JR Labs with ice packs and a thermometer in the cooler”. Obviously the government is paying attention to what they have been told in my latest letter to them (and  what Mark McAfee taught us), that the continuous “cold chain” is a crucial practice in handling REAL MILK properly.
So what are they really after? I believe the government won’t make an issue of "risk of disease" from raw milk, because they can’t win that arguement, in the face of the legal sales of REAL MILK in Washington State, Oregon and California. The fact that they’ve stooped to enforcing minor regulations to prevent convenient delivery gives away that the motive was ‘restraint of trade’. I am not a lawyer, but what I see unfolding is the provincial government declining to take us on, regarding the issue of the "health risk" of raw milk, yet using little sub-regulations in order to make it inconvenient for us, the shareholders, to get our property. So doing, they have acknowledged the absurdity of  the presupposition set out in Health Act Regulation 181/88 ... i.e. "all raw milk is always and only inherently disease-ridden ab initio".
So, we are back to the do-it-ourselves mode; we will not be deterred… a refrigerated truck parked on the lot of a sympathetic shareholder now serves the purpose.
What irony… probably a hundred containers of foodstuffs were offloaded at the Port of Vancouver, from the squalor of every third world country you can name - all pretence of inspection being a charade - while at the same time, the best food in the world, produced within 100 miles of our homes, REAL MILK, is illegal!
Once upon a time in America we had Liberty under Law. Everything was permitted except that which was immoral. Now, everything is prohibited except that which is licensed.
This issue has many levels and is also a story in which a very hard-working mother of five (very healthy) children went from milking one cow in her backyard, a year ago, to supplying REAL MILK to 200 households in the Big City from 16 shared ownership cows. The demand was almost all by word of mouth, as informed consumers were eager to reject the stuff produced by industrial agriculture, in favour of fresh whole unadulterated raw Jersey milk... proving that there most certainly is a demand for this fine gourmet product, yet it's outlawed. 
Seven years' of involvement in this issue convinces me that the government knows full well that raw milk is good food, if  properly handled. We recently had the world expert, Mark McAffee from Organic Pastures in California, here to speak to us. I gave a DVD of that seminar to the Minister of Health as part of my method of being completely above-board... Being transparent with them about everything we’re doing.
As too often happens, government does not exist to accomodate the citizen. There is no other more logical inference to be drawn but that this is happening because the government prefers the profitability of the Dairy Cartel rather than the nutritional needs of the Public.
Also: this commotion is a national story. If we prevail here iin BC, then our success will mean, using the same model, that 30 million Canadians can choose the kind of food they want, rather than having to just take what's pre-decided or offered on the shelves of corporate retailers.
Twice, the World Trade Organization has judged that Canada's centrally-dictated / heavily subsidized model of milk supply is illegal. Thus, this seemingly tiny little bunch of consumers/health enthusiasts/dissidents threatens the monolith.

Ivan Illich figured it out… human institutions wind up doing the exact opposite of what they set out to do.

by Gordon Watson, The REAL MILKMAN.

updates at: http://www.freewebs.com/bovinity/

more raw milk articles at:

UPDATES ~ Prosecution of Raw Milk Farmer in BC - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/1364
Raw Milk Supply - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/159
National Raw Dairy Association? / On the Legal Front / Business Under Siege / Sharon Palmer / Aajonus Vonderplanitz - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/1299
RAW MILK - Michael Schmidt Wins in Ontario; in BC the Fight Has Just Begun - Update - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/1212
Drugged Milk is Dangerous - Corporate Manipulation - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/999
U~moo's classes in Vermont & Beyond Milk Politics: Raw Dairy "Pet Food" - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/942
Raw Milk Stories - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/930
Raw Milk Intolerance Continues Unabated in Ontario - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/906
RAW versus PASTEURIZED MILK - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/158
A Raw Milk Story With an Almost Happy Ending - http://www.thehealingjournal.com/node/1211