Code Section

62715.  

Any individual distributor purchasing milk from a producer shall continue to have the right to specify quality requirements that are more stringent than standards set by public regulatory or health authorities, and to specify these standards in a contract with the producer, provided that all contract quality requirements by the distributor are identical as to all producers under contract with that distributor. The distributor may reject milk for class 1 purposes if it fails to meet these specified standards, and may continue to reject such milk continuously until it again meets these standards. Any such rejected milk must be picked up separately from all other milk, and the contract shall give the producers the unqualified right to sell this rejected milk to others. In the event the rejected milk is not sold or used for class 1 purposes, the producer’s pool quota shall be reduced by an amount equal to the amount of pool quota milk rejected during the period in which it is rejected. The producer’s pool quota shall be restored to its full amount when all his production meets the specified standards.

The quality standards specified shall be subject to review by the director, and the purported failure of a producer to meet these standards shall be subject to impartial laboratory tests or such other procedures as the director may find necessary to prevent abuse.