Yesterday, I drove over an hour to attend media training from the Washington Dairy Products Commission. Upon arrival I am told by a fellow farmer that the federal inspector is up in our area on a neighboring farm. Now I know that our farm is where it needs to be but those words every time I hear them make me panic. I immediately tried contacting farmer. Of course no answer.
I attended the rest of the meeting with no word from him. I sat there not knowing if he was on the farm, if the inspector was there, etc. Now the federal inspection as well as state inspections are random drop-ins. The federal inspection is incredibly important because if one farm in an area fails, it could negatively impact every other farm. It is a lot of pressure making sure our milking parlor (where the cows are milked) and the milk house (where our milk is stored) is the way they want it.
So what do they look for?
- Overall cleanliness of the facility.
- Overall cleanliness of the milking equipment.
- Overall cleanliness of the equipment that cleans all the other equipment.
- They check all your medicines, antibiotics, etc.
- No cobwebs, clean window seals, etc.
After the meeting farmer contacted me. He let me know that the federal inspector did in fact show up. Each inspection the federal inspector is accompanied by someone from the Washington State Department of Agriculture. In addition to checking our facility they went through our barns to check our animals.
They left, a couple minor repairs need to be made. All the world is right.
Fifteen minutes after they leave, the state inspector shows up.
Repeat what just happened.
We have never had both inspections on the same day.
We have in fact passed our prior inspections.
Earlier this year we also had our dairy F.A.R.M. inspection. That inspection is solely focused on the animals, their overall health and their living conditions. We passed with flying colors. Our girls may or may not have mauled the inspector to death.
So today, I am thankful for inspections. We may not like them, we may stress over them but they are our “back up” so to speak that we are in fact doing what we say we are doing. What is it that we say we are doing? We are raising animals with love and care. We are providing a nutritious and safe products to families in our community.
So have a glass of milk with your cookies, pour it in with your oatmeal and enjoy the fact in knowing it was brought to you by families like ours AND well cared for girls (aka cows).
Krista Stauffer
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I can imagine the stress of inspections even knowing you are doing the right thing. A friend of mine that owns a business recently told me that OSHA inspectors have the power to shut down operations with fines so heavy that it would be impossible for her business to recover – so they too stress over unannounced visits. They too try to follow safety regulations but she said a lot of times it depends on the inspector. Anyway, thank you for describing the process for your dairy and I’m sure many folks will learn from this information.
I bet you were a bundle of nerves!! Inspections are always nerve wracking no matter how prepared you are. I’m enjoying your blog-found through the 30 day challenge and look forward to more posts 🙂
Thank you!
I am very curious, should a dairy fail an inspection, what happens?
If a dairy farm fails, they are not allowed to send their milk to market. The cows still have to be milked. So until they fix the things in which they were failed, the milk has to be disposed of.
If a dairy is “degraded”, do they still get paid for thier.milk?