Stop "Organic" Factory Farms

SIGN PETITION TO THE NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD TO STOP FACTORY FARM ORGANICS

Now that organic agriculture is a $15 billion industry and growing, it is squarely in the crosshairs of multinational corporations. Major food manufacturers are entering organic production, cutting corners, inflating prices, and endangering the integrity of organic agriculture (factory farms, nonorganic inputs, and imported ingredients with questionable certification).

Some large corporations, along with a complacent USDA, have become masters at creating loopholes for corporate organic farming, such as:

Importing vegetables or feed grains from Third World countries without USDA site certification visits.
Raising chickens without access to the outdoors.
Including unapproved preservatives in products.
Buying replacement dairy heifers shot-up with antibiotics and from nonorganic sources.
Operating a factory farm with 70,000 chickens or 5000 cows.

"Organic" Factory Farms?
After years of inaction, the USDA's National Organic Program has recently been forced to address a number of large, industrial dairy farms-without adequate pasture that are producing "organic" milk. These factory farms range in size from approximately 3,000 to 4,000 cows and are basically confinement feedlots without legitimate access to pasture for feed and exercise, as required by the federal organic regulations. Milk from most of these mega-farms is being distributed by Dean/Horizon, the largest milk bottler in the United States, and under a number of private-label brands that are available at natural food and conventional grocers.

These corporate farms and their wealthy investors are jeopardizing the livelihoods of organic family-scale dairy farmers throughout the United States, along with the more modest-sized companies and cooperatives that market their milk.

Turf War
Recently, The Cornucopia Institute, a Wisconsin-based advocacy group that supports family farmers, filed formal complaints against three of these farms operating in Idaho, California, and Colorado. This issue will come to a head at the semiannual meeting of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) in Washington, D.C., March 1-3.

Farmers and consumers will make their voice heard at this meeting. Many farmers in the Northeast, and others as far away as California, will be coming to testify in support of enacting strong rules requiring access to pasture for dairy cows, sheep, goats, and beef cattle. They will also call for enforcement of the requirement for access to the outdoors for other species such as poultry.

Make Your Voice Heard
1. Please share this action alert with your circle of friends and colleagues.

2. E-mail, fax, or mail a letter to the USDA. If you email all your comments to The Cornucopia Institute by February 28, we will hand carry your message and deliver it formally at the Washington, D.C., NOSB meeting.

3. Please consider coming to the meeting in person. This is especially important if you are an organic livestock producer. For meeting information, directions, and accommodation options contact organic@cornucopia.org.

4. If you are an organic livestock producer or processor and cannot make it to the meeting, we will do our best to partner you with another farmer/rancher or a consumer from the Washington area who will read your three-minute written testimony. Again, please contact The Cornucopia Institute, preferably via e-mail, for full instructions on preparing your (proxy) testimony.

You Have the Power
Whether it is livestock raised in industrial conditions, imported organic soybeans from Brazil, or name-brand organic vegetables from China (burning down rain forests and shipping food around the world in not sustainable!), a lot is on the line right now for family-scale farmers. All the hope that organic agriculture has offered is at risk. If successful, this first action concerning organic livestock production will demonstrate to the agribusiness lobbyists, USDA bureaucrats, and members of Congress that the organic farming community is going to fight to maintain the ethical reputation we have earned in the eyes of the consumer. Please join us!

SIGN PETITION TO THE NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD TO STOP FACTORY FARM ORGANICS
It will be hand delivered at the National Organic Standards Board meeting in Washington D.C., March 1-3, 2005.

First-Name:
Last-Name:
Email:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip:

To the National Organic Standards Board:

I want to express full support for the recent Livestock Committee Pasture Requirement recommendations.  Enforcement of true access to pasture is necessary so that all organic ruminants receive a significant, and legally mandated, portion of their total feed intake from pasture.  This includes an allowance of only narrowly defined, short-term ("temporary") exceptions to pasture.  I strongly agree that lactation is not a "stage of production" during which dairy cows may be denied pasture for grazing.  I urge the NOSB to recommend specific wording be added to the Pasture Rule to keep this type of abuse from continuing to occur.

Pasture is an essential component of organic dairy production from many perspectives:

*For the health and promotion of the natural behavior of the cow

*Respecting the perspective of the consumer and their belief that organic milk is produced by cows having legitimates access to pasture

*Assuring the consumer's right to the extra nutritional advantage provided by grazing cows

*Acknowledgement of the many environmental benefits provided by pasture, including lower energy use (avoidance of machine-intensive systems of animal feed delivery and manure disposal), reduced soil erosion and the protection of water and air quality.

I further support the additional recommendations of The Cornucopia Institute, Northeast Organic Dairy Producers Alliance, and other groups who advocate specific and additional language including:

1. That the pasture definition be further refined such that "pasture" is land managed to maintain or improve soil, water, and vegetative resources and to provide maximum feed value by growing suitable grasses and other forages from which animals graze plant material still connected to its roots.

2.  Organic dairy animals, from 12 months of age and up, must consume no less than 30% of their daily dry matter intake from pasture for a minimum of 120 calendar days per year, with a maximum stocking rate of three lactating dairy cows per acre.

3.  Farms not in compliance with the above should be allowed one year to come into compliance but will need to file an updated and enforceable farm plan, providing for adequate pasture, within 60 days of the publishing of any new pasture guidance document by the USDA.

Note:  Based on inspections/farm plans, many farms will have the capacity to create pasture supplying more than 30% of feed intake; at the same time, to be able to maximize feed from pasture, most farms will have a stocking rate well below the three cow maximum.  It is incumbent upon farms and certifiers to maximize pasture potential to meet the spirit of the law, not just the minimum quantitative requirements provided.

I urge the NOSB to adopt the Livestock Committee Pasture Recommendation and add the above specificity, making true access to pasture a reality.

Sincerely,

[petition signatures]

Questions regarding this issue:
organic@cornucopia.org

Note: If you have problems submitting the data on this petition form, it is due to high traffic levels on this website. You can also submit your petition information directly via email. Also, if you are outside of North America, you can sign the petition by sending all of the contact information requested above to:
Craig at the Organic Consumers Association

2/17 - Organic Valley Speaks Out Against Intensive Confinement Dairies Certified as "Organic"

2/17 - More News on the New Federal Court Ruling on Organic Standards

2/4 - Cornucopia Institute on the "Greenwashing" of Organic Factory Dairy Farms

1/26 - Debate: Can a Factory Farm Dairy Really Be "Organic"

1/24 - Mega-Dairy Aurora Organic Admits It's an Intensive Confinement Organic Feedlot

1/14 - USDA Feels the Heat on Allowing Factory Style Dairies to be Certified as "Organic"

1/12 - Group Files Complaint to USDA on "Factory-Style Dairy Farms" Certified as Organic

1/11 - Industrial Organic Milk vs. Organic Family Farmers