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Act. You can find out who represents you by going to www.house.gov If you are a livestock producer, take a few
or by calling the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121. Remember, calls extra minutes and ask to speak to the staffer
are far more effective, and they can take just a couple of minutes! If you who handles agricultural issues. Briefly explain
send an email, be sure to add a couple of sentences at the beginning to to the staffer any problems you have faced with
personalize it. lack of access to inspected slaughterhouses, and
Below is a sample text for calls or to help you craft your personal- how the PRIME Act would help your business
ized email. If you have already called or emailed, then skip the text and and benefit your customers. These personal sto-
simply call (or email) and note that you’re following up on your earlier ries about impacts to constituents are invaluable
call/email. Let your legislators know that this is an important issue to for impacting legislators.
you, which you’re not going to simply forget about!
Sample message for calls or emails: ANIMAL ID POSTSCRIPT
In the last article in Wise Traditions, I
As a constituent, I urge Representative ____ to co-sponsor H.R. talked about the USDA’s new plan to require
2657, the PRIME Act, and work to include it in the Farm Bill. electronic ID on cattle. At that time, USDA had
This important bill will make it easier for small farms and said that it would publish its proposal in the fall,
ranches to succeed financially and provide consumers with greater yet had since stayed quiet. Since then, we have
access to locally raised meats. The bill simply removes the federal learned that the proponents of electronic ID
ban on the sale of meat from custom slaughterhouses directly to have changed their strategy. Rather than have
consumers and venues serving consumers within a state, subject to the agency openly publish its intentions, it is
state law. This returns power to the states to establish a regulatory staying quiet while the agribusiness and tech-
scheme that makes sense for their citizens. nology companies in the National Institute for
The PRIME Act is the first step to rebuilding local processing Animal Agriculture work out all the details of
infrastructure, which can revive rural economies and enable com- how to implement the requirements. When they
munities to become more self-sufficient in meat production. have their plan, they will take it to the USDA,
Please support our local farmers and consumer choice by co- who will then try to claim that it’s simply doing
sponsoring H.R. 2657. what “the industry” wants. We don’t plan to stay
Name silent while they do this … stay tuned for action
City, State alerts!

PRIME ACT PRIMER
For those who may have missed earlier articles and alerts, H.R. 2657, the Processing Revival and Intrastate Meat
Exemption (PRIME) Act, would tackle the scarcity of small-scale slaughterhouses by allowing the sale of meat by the in-
dividual cut from “custom” slaughterhouses. Currently, meat can only be sold by the individual cut if it is from an animal
slaughtered and processed at a federal- or state-inspected facility.
Many farmers have a custom slaughterhouse much closer than a federal- or state-inspected facility. But under the
current law, if the animal is processed at a custom facility, the meat can only go to the individual or individuals who
owned the animal at the time the slaughter took place. This means that the customer(s) must buy the whole animal while
it is still alive, effectively purchasing hundreds of pounds of meat without knowing the final weight or price per pound.
Not many people can or want to do this!
The PRIME Act would give individual states the freedom to permit intra-state distribution of custom-slaughtered
meat to individual consumers and to restaurants, hotels and grocery stores that directly serve consumers. Beef, pork,
lamb and goat are covered under the bill.
The PRIME Act does not dictate what states should do. Each state would be able to set the requirements and limita-
tions on the custom slaughterhouses that it considers appropriate.
Custom slaughterhouses are generally small facilities where often only a few animals are slaughtered each day; con-
trast that with the USDA-inspected plants where up to 300-400 cattle are slaughtered per hour. Small custom slaugh-
terhouses can provide better quality control and safety than the massive plants that process the majority of meat in our
country. Thousands of Americans—hunters, homesteaders and farm families—already eat meat processed in custom
slaughterhouses. It’s time to allow more choice for both farmers and consumers seeking local meat!

100 Wise Traditions SPRING 2018