On May 10 in Bologna, Norman Lofts' documentary Michael Schmidt - Organic Hero or Bioterrorist opens at the Slow Food on Film Festival and international foodies will learn how one of the most basic organic foods is banned in Ontario (Canada). .

Michael Schmidt is an Ontario farmer who sells raw milk from his own cows to a list of subscribers. They love the taste. Raw milk is a food, it is rich in nutrients and tastes of flowers and grass, the cow's food.  But the sale of raw milk is illegal in Ontario (and Canada) and Schmidt is being prosecuted by the Ontario government on  a variety of non criminal charges. His trial starts in Newmarket on May 23, 2008.

That's the tip of a huge iceberg - enough for a whole chapter The Last  Brie in my book Last Chance to Eat. Raw milk is the basis for one of the world's greatest foods -- raw milk cheese, cheeses like Parmigianno, Roquefort, Brie, Epoisse, Livarot, Camembert, Munster, Comte, Gruyere, Vacherin Mont d'or and hundreds of others, including a growing number of excellent raw milk cheeses in North America.

The ostensible reason for banning raw milk is that it isn't 100% safe and may contain pathogens like e coli bacteria that could kill you.

That's why all commercial milk is pasteurized, a heating process that kills all pathogens -  but it also kills the good bacteria that give milk its taste and nutrition.  

That's why people people all over the world, including Europe and 28 states in the US, prefer raw milk.

Raw milk dairies like Schmidt's are squeaky clean, routinely inspected, the milk comes from his own cows that he keeps healthy.  

So why doesn't Ontario (Canada) say fine: the risk is minuscule and the buyers are aware of it and still want the milk.

Because the government is protecting Ontario's millionaire dairy farmers.

The farmers have  a lockhold on the milk we drink: no variety is allowed. The reason we can't get richer cream and butter (which is essential for making light pastry) is because the dairy farms don't want to make better dairy because it isn't as profitable as inferior dairy. I've asked individual farmers whether they would make say a 48% butterfat cream and they all said no, unless there was a big market for it. That's why the rich milk from Jersey cows isn't sold any more. The farmers don't want ANY competition.

How different it is down South. There a revival of individual creameries, selling rich products and raw milk, which  is being greeted by ecstatic consumers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/20/dining/20dairy.html?sq=marian%20burros&st=nyt&scp=2&pagewanted=print  

Schmidt is getting alot of support from his customers, from Jamie Kennedy, and others. He's facing five prosecutors.  Originally he was to have been defended by Clayton Ruby but money's run out. http://www.foodrightsalliance.ca/