an idea for encouraging local raw milk production

[Guest guest]

Yesterday I caught the last half of a TV program about

some things Heifer International has been doing in US

communities (http://www.heifer.org). I knew about

their work in disadvantaged countries, and have

donated to them, but I wasn't aware of the extent of

their contributions here at home (sorry if this is

sounding like a commercial).

This program showed how they had facilitated the

acquisition of livestock by poor families, who had

some land but needed help, organization, training and

local support to get started raising food for their

own families and some surplus to sell locally. For

instance, one man they helped get set up to do

pastured poultry (this was in the South somewhere),

and to find the local niche market to sell it. There

were also people doing beef cattle, pigs, goats, and

they were reaching out to local poor kids to help them

get involved and have a marketable skill.

Another segment was about a woman who initially just

wanted to get a single cow to help feed her family, it

turned out to be more milk than they could use so they

sold some to the neighbors. Pretty soon she got

another cow because she had people asking about buying

milk, and now she has 3 cows, bottles the milk and

cream and makes butter at home, and delivers it to

local stores to be sold. All started by her initial

gift heifer and nurtured by the local support she

found by getting involved with Heifer International,

with a local homesteading group being the catalyst.

Anyway, my idea was that if people want to help

encourage local families with the available land to

start raising good food, perhaps contacting Heifer

would be a likely starting point. They (the families

raising the food) could make money, you could buy

their products. Worth a try. Not as if people can't

get started without this kind of help, but it makes

things happen when there's a guiding sense of

organization from people who know how to make those

connections.

End of infomercial.

Aubin

__________________________________________________