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CORNUCOPIA,
Wisconsin, January 12, 2005, the Cornucopia Institute:
The USDA's National Organic Program immediately responded
to sharp criticism from the organic community alleging
that, through complacency, they were allowing large
factory farms to produce organic milk while skirting
the legal requirement that the cows have access to pasture
as a fundamental part of their feed source. The NOP
late Monday, January 10, issued an internal memorandum
requesting that the National Organic Standards Board
develop a strict policy on the pasture requirement so
that the agency can issue a guidance document, enhancing
enforcement.
The heat was turned up on the agency when a front-page
article in the
Chicago Tribune compared management practices at the
5600-cow Aurora dairy
farm in Colorado and the 4000-cow Horizon farm in Idaho
with a more
traditional, 70-cow family-scale farm in Wisconsin that
ships its milk to
the Organic Valley Cooperative. Aurora, Horizon, and
Organic Valley are the
largest producers and marketers of organic milk in the
country.
In addition, The Cornucopia Institute, a progressive
farm policy research
group, filed a formal complaint on January 10 with the
USDA, asking them to
initiate an investigation into alleged violations of
the federal organic law
by Aurora¹s industrial dairy operating in Colorado.
"We are obviously pleased at the rapid response
to our concern that factory
dairy farms are playing loose with the organic rules.
But it shouldn't take
the threat of legal action or scrutiny from the news
media to wake up our
regulators at the USDA," said Mark Kastel of the
Wisconsin-based Cornucopia
Institute.
A primary mission of The Cornucopia Institute, Kastel
noted, is the role of
"government watchdog" at the USDA's National
Organic Program. Along with
other advocacy groups, they have long criticized the
agency's adversarial
environment.
"It sure is an unusual juxtaposition," Kastel
stated. "Every other sector of agriculture fights
like hell against regulatory oversight. Here we are,
the organic farming community, begging for strict regulation,
and it takes political pressure and the power of the
press before we get any attention."
"While it appears that the environment is becoming
more congenial at the
USDA¹s National Organic Program, it is unfortunate
that a discernible
pattern appears to be emerging," Kastel added.
In April 2004 the USDA's
National Organic Program promulgated a series of "guidance
documents"
perceived by many in the organic farming community as
loosening up the
requirements for organic certification. It wasn't until
The Cornucopia
Institute and many other organizations and individuals
vehemently protested,
leading to widespread media coverage, that the USDA
withdrew the flawed
documents.
"The staff at the NOP clearly responds to heat.
But we need an agency that
embraces the true spirit of organics, not the past adversarial
history."
Kastel said.
While organic farmers and consumers await the results
of any pending
investigation by the USDA, all eyes will be on Washington
this March for the
next meeting of the National Organic Standards Board.
"In the past, the
NOSB has proposed strict pasture requirements for livestock
producers," said
Kastel. "These were never implemented by the agency,
so we are now quite
interested in seeing if the USDA now concurs and embarks
on an aggressive
campaign forcing farms that are now not in compliance
to file new farm plans
and change their management practices."
In their complaint to the USDA, The Cornucopia Institute
stated their intention to file additional actions against
other factory farms that appear to be profiteering at
the expense of organic integrity. For more information:
www.cornucopia.org
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