The right to raw almonds lawsuit:

Gabriel Cousens, MD, has asked the Cornucopia Foundation to provide the Tree of Life worldwide family with a one page summary of the raw almond lawsuit that was filed by The Cornucopia Institute last week.  The attached summary also indicates how people can help us win this suit.  Joan Levin, one of our volunteers, talked with Dr. Cousens over the weekend at Raw Spirit.  She was advised to send this to your attention for potential distribution to the many people that follow and support Dr. Cousens work. 

By way of background and introduction, The Cornucopia Institute is a food and farm policy group, based in Wisconsin, working on issues concerning organic and sustainable food and agriculture.  Our mission is dedicated to the fight for economic justice for the family-scale farming community.  We act as an organic industry watchdog.  Through research, organizing, networking, coalition building, and economic development, Cornucopia seeks to empower farmers and consumers, both politically and through marketplace initiatives—protecting the environment, human health, and economic justice—preserving organics as an ecological stewardship alternative that supports sustainable rural communities.  The vast majority of our members are sustainable and organic family farmers.
 

We have been working with and assisting the 15 almond growers and handlers involved with this lawsuit.  Since the almond pasteurization rule was announced, our organization has been seeking to modify, at first, and now repeal this rule.  We helped assemble the legal team to analyze the rule and prepare the lawsuit, after our compromise proposal that we offered to the USDA and the Almond Board was rejected earlier this year.

As you may know, under the almond federal marketing order, those who have the ability to file a lawsuit to repeal the rule is narrowly limited to farmers and handlers – meaning that TheCornucopia Institute, consumers, retailers, and product manufacturers all lacked "legal standing" to file this suit.  We are committed to working with our farmer and handler friends to overturn this rule and will continue supporting their efforts in this matter.  We are excited by the prospect that Dr. Cousens and his network will also stand with us in this fight and help regain and restore the sale to consumers of truly raw almonds grown by American farmers.  We believe we have a pretty strong lawsuit grounded in the law – not rhetoric and bluster. 

Please contact me at your convenience should you have any further questions or thoughts.  And, as I am always a little concerned about sending something to someone who hasn't had contact with me before, would you please acknowledge receipt of this email?  Thanks – that will help my peace of mind.    

Sincerely,
Will Fantle, Codirector
The Cornucopia Institute
715-839-7731

www.cornucopia.org

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STOP Mandatory Almond Pasteurization!!!

"Starting in August or September of 2007, raw almonds available in the USA, Canada and Mexico, will no longer be "truly raw" due to a mandate passed by the USDA, FDA and the California Almond Board, announcing that all almonds including organic must be pasteurized. Information is available at the following link:

Action Plan and Pasteurization - Frequently Asked Questions"

An opprtunity for the voices opposed to mandatory almond pasteurization can be heard. A petition to sign and more information is available in the following link.
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/mandatory-almond-pasteurization-is-wrong.html

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