American Stewards | EPA Rule Threatening Small Meat Processors Raises Concerns for Local Food Buyers

EPA Rule Threatening Small Meat Processors Raises Concerns for Local Food Buyers

A new EPA rule that could force 3,879 small meat and poultry processor’s out of business is gaining more scrutiny and raising alarms nationwide about what this would mean for local food markets.

Dr. Robert Malone, the physician and biochemist who invented the mRNA Vaccine Technology and exposed the dangers of using the technology in covid vaccines published a scathing piece, stating the rule was “another blow to decentralized natural meat production,” and a Clean Water Act violation.

Dr. Malone points out that the “Effluent Limitations Guidelines…” is “clearly another case of aggressive, arbitrary and capricious EPA regulatory overreach…”

After months of studies, the EPA found Nitrogen and Phosphorus in the wastewater of processing facilities, which Dr. Malone points out are hardly pollutants, but rather are “two fundamental elements which all living things are composed of (Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Oxygen, Phosphorus).”

And, as a result, the “EPA decided that the entire meat industry must now retrofit current facilities with lagoons and biomass dissipates to turn ‘nutrients’ into CO2 and methane to prevent the ‘pollutants’ from entering local water supplies.”

This rule, according to Christopher Young, the Executive Director of American Association of Meat Processors, would close 16 plants across the nation that process 50 million pounds each per year and 50 small plants processing 2.19 million pounds a year for a grand total of 910 million total pounds of protein removed from production each year.  “How does the industry feed America, let alone the world” with that great a loss of production questioned Young. “This is a direct attack on animal agriculture.”

But if the most extreme of the proposed alternatives is selected by the EPA, up to 3,879 processors would be required to comply with the new requirements.

Not only will the EPA rule cost processors millions of dollars, but it will result in the loss of thousands of jobs nationwide.  Reducing pounds processed will, according to Dr. Malone, have sizable impacts on food security, precipitate more processor closures, and disrupt our food supply chains.

The rule, if enacted, could eliminate the small regional meat processors used by producers who sell their product direct to the consumer. This would take away the opportunity for buyers to purchase their meat at farmer’s markets or online local services where they have the benefit of knowing where and how their meat was raised.

When the EPA proposed the rule on January 23rd, three days later, Reps. Ron Estes (R-Kansas) and Eric Burlison (R-Missouri) introduced the Banning EPA’s Encroachment of Facilities (BEEF) Act, H.R. 7079, to protect small family-owned meat and poultry processors.

“The EPA’s newly proposed regulation isn’t just an attack on family-run small businesses, it’s an attack on rural communities,” stated Rep. Burlison.  “The agricultural community, not leftists in Washington, D.C. are best able to make decisions on land and water management.”

Call your congressman and ask them to support H.R. 7079 to keep local meat on American’s tables.

Dr. Malone Substack

https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/epa-threatens-locally-produced-beef?r=ta0o1&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true

Text of BEEF Act:  https://estes.house.gov/uploadedfiles/beef-act.pdf

Estes press reléase: https://estes.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=4336