Are PMAs Spoiling Food Security?
Welcome to Raw Milk Mama, a newsletter about food freedom, our food systems, and how to create local food security in our communities. Sign up here for weekly posts, or keep reading…
If you value this content, please consider a paid subscription.
Let’s get right to the point here…
PMAs don’t work
The brutal truth about the vast majority of Private Membership Associations (PMAs) sold to most farmers and food buyers is that they simply do not work. They haven’t in the past and they will not–in the ways that many “food freedom” advocates would like for them to–without significant change to our legal system.
PMAs have become popular and profitable recently in certain “freedom” circles.
Claims abound.
I’m not going to get into the details of the claims and the legality or legitimacy of each one.
The basic foundation remains the same:
There are many coops and farms promising that “membership” (for a hefty fee) in their “private association” will provide the customer with all kinds of foods and opportunities that are not available elsewhere.
It’s simply not true.
As I wrote in another recent article,
“Just because [farmers] flagrantly claim exemption from…regulation does not make that regulation non-existent or unenforceable. Nor does any claim of “Private Membership Association” nullify the regulation.
For those who want to rant and rave about “government interference in our food choices” and “overregulation of small farms” I get it. I really do.
But the cultural ideology is a long way off from agreeing to that premise. And the dairy cartel is not about to buy into it or let loose one iota of the control they have over the current system.”
I’ve vocally and vociferously advocated for better exemptions, scaled laws, and repealing regs that are negatively affecting small farmers and a local food system. My track record is clear on that and I’ve effectively worked for that change on both the state and federal levels.
For the purposes of this article, I am not making any claims as to the necessity or morality of these food regulations. I’ve made my position clear in other articles. Note that I am NOT, in this article, making any statements in support of or against specific regs.
Here, I am commenting on the functionality of the “Private Membership Associations” that have seen a spike in popularity.
Many of the farms or coops argue that a “Private Membership Association” exempts them from food safety regulations, permits, or distribution regulations.
It’s not true.
Take the recent kerfuffle in Michigan with the “raid” against a business that aggregates from several local farms. They claim to be operating privately. Are they? Or are they shipping products all over the country?
Are they gambling and banking on their “PMA” while using it as a veil to hide their own little slice of greed such as many other “PMA” based operations do?
Why would they take that risk? Who could be advising farmers and buying clubs that a ragtag non-compliance PMA like all of the ones I’ve seen would hold up against an agency or hold up in court? And I have seen MANY!
Where is the proof? Where are the clear victories in court?
For the farms, coops, and buying clubs shipping food all over the country claiming that their PMA provides them the protection of private sales, well–in truth, these PMAs provide little if any protection at all.
There is no legitimate argument that I have seen to support the claim that PMAs such as (and similar to) Amos Miller's PMA offers legally sound protection against most, if any, food safety laws .
While farmers, buying clubs, and other entities are running around claiming that the PMA model will work to keep bureaucrats off their farms, agencies everywhere are rolling their collective eyes.
And, the self proclaimed scriveners of these documents are raking in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars from highly vulnerable producers and consumers.
It's not shocking that concocting these “PMAs” has become a highly lucrative industry within the raw dairy black market itself.
What are PMAs?
Let me tell you a short story.
Many years ago, I was consulting a small Amish farm on how to get started using direct sales.
I expressed to him the reality of the regulations he would have to follow in order to do direct, retail sales of his meats and dairy products.
He assured me he would not have to follow the standards, regulations, and safety procedures.
He told me he had hired a man to write a letter to the state agency declaring that he was running a private membership and therefore the state had no jurisdiction over his farm or anything produced there.
The letter, as described in part below by yet another farmer, was paid for AFTER the PMA he had already purchased, for a small fortune, did absolutely nothing to protect him from enforcement by the state.
Here is what part of that unexpected additional PMA protection expense looked like:
“Notice of Agreement
Legal and lawful Notice has been given to you, as the Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture and as of receipt of this correspondence you agree to the terms and conditions as spelled out by this Lawful Notice of Contract.
Notice to Principle is Notice to Agent and Notice to Agent is Notice to Principle.”
The “Notice of Agreement” goes on to say in part:
“2) …It is understood by this tacit agreement that these are private entity’s, private contracts and private relationships and as such outside of your delegated public authority.”
And
“4) Be it further understood we are responsible for this food up to and until the time that this food leaves the Farm and we lose control of the custody, care and sanitation of the food at which time that becomes the responsibility of the recipient.
5) Be it further understood that any infraction of this agreement will result in a Charge of one Million/1,000,000.00 Federal Reserve Notes or just compensation equivalent thereof, per infraction, per actor/violator, per day, judge your actions accordingly.
By my hand this day,
[Victim that paid for this document]”
It was laughable except that an apparent con artist had defrauded this young farmer out of thousands of dollars that could have otherwise gone towards true investments such as infrastructure for his farm or honest marketing practices for his high quality meats and dairy.
Go to many raw milk dairy farms and you’ll see signage at the farm claiming that it is private property, operates under a PMA, and that government agents cannot trespass, nor do they have any jurisdiction.
Look online for sources of raw milk and you’ll often see language claiming PMA status and implying exemption from certain laws.
It should be noted that organizations calling themselves a “ministry” or “1st amendment private association” with claims that certain foods are religiously protected rights are quickly becoming the new racket.
These are some of the claims in such documents:
“[Entity] is a private, unincorporated [ministry/coop/association] that operates outside the jurisdiction of government entities, agencies, officers, agents, contractors, and other representatives, as protected by law.
[Entity] lawfully stands on the authority our Creator gives to free men and women as revealed in the Holy Scriptures, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the Constitution of the United States of America, the constitutions of the several states of the union, and the Charter of Rights of Canada.”
But guess what??
None of these silly papers actually exempt people from following the laws.
Their claims simply do NOT change enforceable law.
Imagine this…
Imagine that the top heroin and fentanyl cartels get together and draft up a silly PMA “contract.” They declare themselves outside of the jurisdiction of the United States of America’s laws and say that they are operating on a ministry because people want the drugs they have to offer and these drugs provide a spiritual experience for the people getting them.
Their “contract” could say that, because they only sell these drugs to people who sign the PMA form, that it is a legal human freedom.
How about that?
Is that all it takes?
Why not apply these same standards to other entities?
Even more, (which I do not have time to get into in this article), what if the very farmers that force consumers and coordinators to purchase these PMAs don't in-fact follow the terms themselves? What if the people profiting greatly by selling these PMAs flagrantly and regularly breach their own PMA contracts for profit or to barter for lighter enforcement when finally caught?
That's a whole article within itself!
Why do we need laws at all?
Some thoughtful Constitutionalists, principled anarchists, or NAP followers might be arguing that we don’t need laws, that private contracts are the way to go for everything, that this is something we should be aspiring to, not ridiculing.
While I can certainly admire a consistently principled approach to this topic, we’re not even close to seeing something like that work on any level in America.
The foundation of many of the PMAs is potentially fraudulent. Many of the entities marketing PMAs as “the solution,” drafting the letters and providing “counsel” to the farmers and coordinators know it will never hold up in court.
But they are doing it anyway. AND, it is not the armchair attorney’s name that permanently gets put into government records. It’s the poor farmer or coordinator that unknowingly joins the potential “domestic terrorist club” by signing and submitting the hefty priced PMA or follow-up documents to state and federal agencies!
I cannot see any legal or culturally acceptable basis for the route they are taking.
Yet, while these ridiculous documents are causing tremendous harm, ignorant–often well-meaning–people are donating hard earned money to the “legal defense” of farmers who continue to belligerently not follow appropriate guidelines for food safety and find themselves on the wrong end of an investigation. Farmers, coops, buying clubs etc who are going to lose their cases and continue setting terrible precedent for everyone else.
While it might appear that some of the PMAs work because there is no enforcement action taken against those particular farms or buying clubs, it’s a game of chance. And any moment the dice could roll against you.
Instead of changing the laws on the books, people who are using PMAs are taking enormous risks and thinking they’re the ones not going to get caught.
Some set out to be renegades and rogues but they don’t focus on making the changes.
The laws are there to be changed.
If we don’t like them, we change them. That’s what participatory government is. Why are so many people doing things that they know are going to cause enforcement action to be triggered?
Farmers and coordinators are not getting busted for getting permits or for communicating with the local entities that are monitoring and enforcing.
They are getting busted for flagrantly breaking laws and hiding behind ridiculous PMAs that don’t amount to anything.
And, with all the publicity and media attention going to the enforcement actions, we could literally change the laws preemptively. Together–if we cooperate.
Changed laws that when in place, the people in charge of enforcement will not have to enforce.
Why we DON’T want “radical disruption”
In the many years that I’ve been working on food rights and food access issues, I’ve heard many folks say that we need “radical disruption” in our food system.
I used to think so too. I wanted to see major changes immediately!
But I don’t think so anymore. And it’s NOT because I agree with big ag or the mentality of centralized control.
No. It’s because any kind of radical disruption would result in millions of people starving.
Right now, “big ag” feeds the vast majority of us. Like it or not, that’s the reality.
Until we build a system underneath it that could competently and realistically feed 330+ million Americans, the biggest consequence of massive, rapid change would be lack of food access for too many people.
People who we love and care about.
This is why it remains imperative for more Americans to take responsibility for their own food products.
It starts now and it starts with the people who know there’s an issue.
The only solution is coming together to make change.
Meanwhile, there are very few entities working towards changing the laws and/or increasing exemptions.
I believe this is where the bulk of our efforts need to go as we work towards a community-centric food system.
In an infrastructure or institutional collapse, or even serious supply chain disruptions, 100 miles might as well be 1000 miles.
If you don’t want to create more exemptions, use the ones we’ve got.
We have exemptions–and many of them–in place for a decentralized, healthy, clean food system.
There are thousands of ways to carve out exemptions for personal production and personal use.
But the scary part of that is it takes personal accountability and participation.
You can’t have both your “freedom” and outsource all your food production to others.
It doesn’t work that way.
Learn to make your own yogurt. Work with a neighbor to make kefir to share or kombucha. Grow tomatoes. Figure out a way to trade for other value-added products.
Since so much of this is about the economic viability of certain things, take it out of the economy. Make it the food trade or barter economy. Make it local and small scale.
Many of these exemptions circulate around participation.
Your participation in your own food production and processing is the exemption to many of the regulations that people are opposing.
Yes, it’s hard. Yes, you have to navigate hurdles and find land to use and cooperate with others. Yes, it takes work and sacrifice. Yes, it requires staying in one place long enough to see the fruits of your labor.
And NO, you don’t have to own chickens, dairy cows, or hogs. That would be nice though.
There are no shortcuts. There are no secret little laws or clauses that make you somehow exempt from the laws of the United States of America. You’re not your own little nation with your own little laws no matter how much you pay a scammer to write a letter for you.
The other way is to work together to change the minds of our lawmakers and regulators and then to effectively change the laws for everyone. It’s long and hard and it takes an unbelievable amount of persistence and patience.
With the near-constant failure of the PMAs, it’s long past due to change from a pseudo-fraud based approach to actually coming together to change the laws.
Folks, those are your two options. The PMAs don’t work.
About Raw Milk Mama: I believe that we can reclaim our food systems through direct action. But it takes your participation whether you’re growing food, processing, or willing to support those who are. And sometimes, it takes calling on your state or federal elected officials.
I’m dedicated to helping people understand our food system and how we each fit into it..
Here’s how you can be part of it:
Subscribe here to get new posts weekly.
Subscribe to the Nourishing Liberty Podcast for different audio content.
Get daily emails about personal and community wellness and transforming our food systems.