Wendell Berry on NAIS

Kentucky legend Wendell Berry gives his electrifying statement against NAIS at the May 22, 2009 USDA listening session held in Louisville, Kentucky.

Audio courtesy of Agri-Pulse, the nation's leading farm and rural policy e-newsletter. A free, four-week trial subscription to Agri-Pulse is available on the publication's home page, www.agri-pulse.com.

Transcript:

The need to trace animals was made by the confined animal industry which are, essentially, disease breeding operations. The health issue was invented right there. The remedy is to put animals back on pasture, where they belong. The USDA is scapegoating the small producers to distract attention from the real cause of the trouble. Presumably these animal factories are, in a too familiar phrase, too big to fail.




This is the first agricultural meeting Ive ever been to in my life that was attended by the police. I asked one of them why he was there and he said: Rural Kentucky. So thank you for your vote of confidence in the people you are supposed to be representing. (applause) I think the rural people of Kentucky are as civilized as anybody else.




But the police are here prematurely. If you impose this program on the small farmers, who are already overburdened, youre going to have to send the police for me. Im 75 years old. Ive about completed my responsibilities to my family. Ill lose very little in going to jail in opposition to your program and Ill have to do it. Because I will be, in every way that I can conceive of, a non-cooperator.




I understand the principles of civil disobedience, from Henry Thoreau to Martin Luther King. And Im willing to go to jail to defend the young people who, I hope, will still have a possibility of becoming farmers on a small scale in this supposedly free country. Thanks you very much. (applause, cheers)

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People & Blogs

Tags:

• Wendell Berry
• NAIS

[Liberty4Ever]

Food freedom is about as basic as it gets. My land, to grow what I want. My body, to consume what I want.

My state will not be forcing us to chip our chickens, pay a $500 food producer tax every year, and submit to unannounced inspections on my watch.

[Liberty4Ever]

Wendel Berry is absolutely right. This is a pro-agribusiness initiative, made to benefit them by killing the small food producers. The irony is, the large scale outbreaks of salmonella, e. coli, and other pathogens, and the subsequent food recalls and cases of food poisoning have ALL occurred in the large scale agribusiness operations, but those health risks are perversely being used to promote big agribusiness and destroy small family farm operations.

[bigapplebucky]

A great man.

[makeeyecontact]

2-5-10 USDA announced its dropping NAIS...for the time being anyway...just read that at Farm and Ranch Freedom.

[kyleencornell]

Wendell Berry is my hero! I just finished "The Unsettling of America - Culture and Agriculture" and its content is still extremely pertinent. Thank you, Mr. Berry, for being the small family farm champion for many generations.