Raw Milk Updates, Spring 2023

by Pete Kennedy, Esq.

GEORGIA – HOUSE BILL 1175 FOR RAW MILK SALES

If there ever was a sign of how much the political and regulatory landscape for raw milk has changed, it is House Bill 1175 (HB 1175), legislation that is currently before the Georgia Senate Agriculture and Consumer Affairs Committee after having passed out of the House by a 100-62 vote. HB 1175 would legalize the licensed sale of raw milk for human consumption direct to consumers—something many bills in state legislatures around the country have proposed in recent years. Georgia law has long allowed the sale of raw milk for pet consumption. What’s different about this bill is that the driving force behind it is Georgia Milk Producers (GMP), marking the first time in memory that a conventional dairy industry group is pushing for legal raw milk sales.

GMP is a producer organization located in Watkinsville, Georgia; its mission is to support, sustain and help the Georgia dairy industry grow. On March 10, 2021, GMP Executive Director Farrah Newberry testified before the Georgia House Committee on Agriculture and Consumer Affairs that GMP had changed its position on raw milk and now supported legalization of sales for human consumption. In her testimony, Newberry disclosed that Georgia had declined from five hundred twenty-five dairies producing raw milk for pasteurization in 2000 to one hundred fourteen in 2021. She noted that Kroger and Publix operate the only processing plants in the state; Georgia has no plants producing either ice cream or cheese. Newberry told the committee that Grade A pasteurized milk was selling for $2.99 to $3.99 per gallon in Georgia while raw pet milk was going for $8 to $12 per gallon. She concluded her testimony by stating that legal raw milk sales for human consumption would protect the dairy industry in Georgia by having adequate safeguards in law for the production of safe raw milk and would provide market opportunities for smaller Grade A producers.

HB 1175 contains provisions not usually found in raw milk bills, such as clauses governing adding water to the milk, the use of “processed animal waste derivatives used as feed ingredients for any portion of the total ration of the lactating dairy animal,” and the prohibition against “unprocessed poultry litter and unprocessed recycled animal body discharges being fed to lactating dairy animals.” The bill gives broad power to the Georgia commissioner of agriculture to adopt regulations implementing and enforcing the bill’s requirements; the regulations must be of uniform application. The bill is written for Grade A dairies also wanting to sell raw milk for direct consumption; it’s unlikely that micro dairies looking to sell raw milk direct to the final consumer will be able to afford the cost of compliance.

ALASKA – REGULATIONS TO LEGALIZE RAW MILK SALES

Another sign of how much the political and regulatory landscape has changed for raw milk is a proposed regulation the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) issued on January 17 that would legalize sales of raw milk, cheese, butter, cream, yogurt, kefir and ice cream direct to the consumer and at retail stores. Less than a year ago, Governor Mike Dunleavy signed House Bill 22 (HB 22) into law, legislation that legalized the distribution of all raw dairy products through herdshare agreements; DEC opposed the measure when Representative Geran Tarr introduced the bill in 2019. The impetus for the proposed regulation was a survey DEC conducted in August 2021 through the Office of the State Veterinarian to determine the level of interest in raw milk sales; one hundred seventy-nine people responded, with nineteen animal owners interested in selling their animals’ milk and one hundred four consumers interested in purchasing raw milk.

In support of its decision, DEC posted the following statement on its website: “The most critical concern Alaskans hold for the future of food is the security of its food supply,” read a 2014 study on food security commissioned by the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services, with collaboration from the Alaska Food Policy Council. The supply chain disruptions that Alaskans have observed during the Covid-19 pandemic have further highlighted Alaska’s need to enhance the security of its in-state food supply.

Under the proposed regulations, producers are not required to have a permit but must register with DEC and obtain a registration number. DEC would not conduct routine inspections; the department would inspect only in the event a consumer complaint is filed or if either a foodborne illness or an animal health outbreak is suspected. There are container labeling, recordkeeping and physical facility requirements as well as a requirement to keep milk samples taken from each batch for fourteen days after milking; there is no routine testing mandate. The proposed regulation also mandates a “veterinarian-client patient relationship to oversee the health of the herd.”

There are provisions in the proposed regulations that could be amended to help producers. The draft regulation prohibits the sale not only of raw milk but any other raw milk products, including butter, more than four days after the production date. The draft could have amended the state food code to allow retail stores to sell raw milk without having to obtain a variance to do so; under current law, retail stores can sell only Grade A pasteurized milk products (except for raw cheese aged sixty days). It is also unclear how many of the dairies interested in selling raw milk and raw milk products would be able to meet the physical facility requirements in the proposed regulation.

This article was first published in the Spring 2023 issue of Wise Traditions in Food, Farming, and the Healing Arts, the quarterly journal of the Weston A. Price Foundation.