Farm Brewery Legislation in your state

What made those mandates possible, and realistic, is NOFA-NY's project to restore grain growing to NY. Before railroads opened up the midwest, and hop growing got going in the PNW, NY was a leading producer of both. In bringing back some of the old varieties, adapted to the cooler, wetter climate of the northeast, something else was re-discovered : flavor. : ) As with other things , modern breeding, for other factors, had bred out some of the flavor. ( If you're in/near Ithaca, Green Star Co-Op/Market has flour & pasta from a local grower in Freeville. Worth a trip, to sample the difference.)

Not sure if a farm brewery law would translate everywhere, unless the base of producers is there. Maybe if the law is structured differently, so that the brewing demand leads to supply, before any supply stipulations kick in. Or maybe just leave that out, and not worry about it , letting things fall as they may.

One helpful thing about the farm winery law, that the beer law was modeled after, is that their license travels with them. The local winery comes to small business events where I work. They can hand out samples, and sell the wine there, though we have no liquor license .

 

Some things I wonder about :
What if the TPP goes through? Will somebody, such as large multinational brewers, sue for damages, via the investor-state trade dispute provisions? Will the threat of such suits delay or derail new farm brewery laws? Could NY's existing law be challenged?
Even without that, could they be challenged on a violation-of-equal-protection theory? I've been pleasantly surprised that, as far as I know, that hasn't happened. So far, the NYFBL seems to be working as intended. (Happens every now and then. ) Of course, that may be irrelevant in a legal case. : )

 

The main advantage of the NY Farm Brewers license was that Farm Brewers could sell beer by the pint at their breweries. The prohibition against selling pints at breweries was an onerous regulation put in place by the state. So this was a matter of government "fixing" a problem created by government in the first place. NYS has since gone on and allowed any brewery, not just farm brewers, to sell pints, more or less rendering the farm brewery license moot.

Farmhouse Brewery in Owego has really taken it upon themselves to champion the cause of using local ingredients. They have their own malt house, they use I want to say 90%+ NYS ingredients, and they put on malting seminars for brewers. Our proximity to the agricultural school at Cornell also helps, as it did for wineries.

 

Not sure about a special classification or license to set them apart from other types of breweries, but Oregon has some farm breweries: Logsdon, Agrarian, and Wolves & People. In addition to local malt and hops, these and other breweries in the state like to take advantage of local herbs, spices, and fruit. Even for breweries not designated as farm breweries, a preference for local ingredients seems prevalent.

Edit: It looks like the NY law was intended to give farm breweries some leniency in sales and distribution options in exchange for a commitment to local ingredient use. Since OR already allows brewery sales by the pint and self-distribution, additional classifications or requirements are not mandated for farm breweries.

 

So far as I can tell we don't have such legislation but there are indications it could happen here:

http://www.craftbeer.com/brewers_banter/farm-breweries-when-local-means-your-own-backyard

Lots more local sourcing of ingredients and the new malting house is here in SE PA.

 

The farm brewery laws overall are great. Only downside, is that if the laws force the farmer to use significant quantity of hops grown locally it limits the beer potential as its tough to grow those exotic hops in many places like upstate NY etc. Citra and Galaxy etc....many of the NE unfiltered IPAs we've grown to love probably won't be from local farm brewers/growers.

 

VA has farm brewery legislation, not sure of the details but believe its very similar to our farm winery and farm distillery regs