In an investigation and legal case that dragged on for almost four
years, one of the largest organic cattle producers in the United
States, Promiseland Livestock, LLC, was suspended from organic
commerce, along with its owner and key employees, for four years. The
penalty was part of an order issued by administrative law judge Peter Davenport in Washington, DC on November 25.

Promiseland, a multimillion dollar operation with facilities in
Missouri and Nebraska, including over 13,000 acres of crop land, and
managing 22,000 head of beef and dairy cattle, had been accused of
multiple improprieties in formal legal complaints, including not
feeding organic grain to cattle, selling fraudulent organic feed and
“laundering” conventional cattle as organic.

“We are pleased that justice has been served in the Promiseland
matter,” said Mark A. Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst for the
Wisconsin-based Cornucopia Institute. Scrutiny from Cornucopia, one of
the industry’s most aggressive independent watchdogs, was part of the
genesis for the comprehensive USDA investigation and subsequent legal
proceedings.

Promiseland became the focus of Cornucopia’s investigation into
giant factory farms, milking thousands of cows, that were allegedly
operating illegally. Promiseland sold thousands of dairy cows to giant
factory dairy farms owned by Dean Foods (Horizon Organic), Natural
Prairie Dairy in Texas and Aurora Dairy based in Colorado. Aurora and
Natural Prairie supply private-label, store-brand milk for Wal-Mart,
Costco, Target and major supermarket chains such as HEB, Safeway and
Harris Teeter.

“It appears that it was the investigation into improprieties by
Aurora that finally led to the hammer coming down on Promiseland,”
Kastel observed. Aurora operates five dairies in Texas and Colorado and
was found by USDA investigators to have “willfully” violated 14 tenets
of federal organic regulations in 2007. However, Bush administration
officials let the $100 million corporate dairy continue in operation
under a one-year probation.

“It’s sad that the civil servants at the USDA, who had recommended
Aurora be decertified, were overruled,” Kastel lamented. “They should
have been banned from organic commerce the same way Promiseland, and
its owner Tony Zeman, now have been.”

Although Cornucopia has praise for the professionalism of law
enforcement agents at the USDA, and the career staff at the National
Organic Program (NOP), who carried out the Aurora and Promiseland
investigations, the farm policy research group has harshly criticized
past management at the USDA which allowed Promiseland, and Aurora, to
operate illegally for years.

“From formal legal complaints that we filed, Bush Administration
officials at the USDA were alerted, starting in January 2005, to the
alleged improprieties by massive factory farms masquerading as
organic,” said Will Fantle, Research Director for The Cornucopia
Institute.

Documents secured under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by The
Cornucopia Institute indicate that the initial investigation was
squashed for political reasons by Dr. Barbara Robinson, who until
recently directed the USDA’s organic program.

“It is inexcusable that these improprieties took place for so long
and that justice was delayed,” said Gary Cox, an attorney who
represents Cornucopia. “Ethical organic dairy farmers have been placed
at a distinct competitive disadvantage and consumers were obviously
taken advantage of.”

An investigation by the Office of Inspector General at the USDA,
focusing in part on the relationship between Robinson and prominent
agribusiness lobbyist and lawyer Jay Friedman, was profiled in a July 3
Washington Post story. Friedman, in addition to representing Aurora and
Dean Foods, also was the lawyer for Promiseland when they were targeted
by the USDA for investigation.

New documents made public have prompted Cornucopia to prepare
additional legal complaints asking the USDA to focus attention now on
Quality Assurance International (QAI), the certifier for Promiseland
when many of the alleged abuses took place.

“This is not the first time QAI has been suspected of incompetence
or improperly accommodating corporate agribusiness,” said Fantle. The
Robinson, Friedman and QAI connection is part of an investigation by
the USDA’s Inspector General. QAI also certifies portions of Aurora’s
operation and Dean Foods’ corporate-owned industrial dairies.

“However grim it sounds, this investigation and the legal proceeding
illustrate that if organic stakeholders are persistent, the system
works,” Kastel said.

Cornucopia and other organic policy groups have been delighted by
what they have called a “decisive shift” that has taken place since
Obama administration officials have taken over at the USDA and its
organic program.

At a recent industry meeting in Washington, D.C., Miles McEvoy, USDA
Deputy Administrator and the new director of the National Organic
Program, stated emphatically that we were now entering the “age of
enforcement” at the NOP.

“We started asking for new management at the organic program in
2004,” said Kastel. “We had suggested that they go outside of the
Department to gain the needed expertise from someone who was
universally respected by participants in the organic industry. We
couldn’t have asked for a more qualified candidate than Mr. McEvoy.”

In addition to investigating QAI, Cornucopia has formally asked USDA
Secretary Tom Vilsack to reopen the Aurora matter, alleging that the
consent agreement allowing their probation included illegally favorable
provisions. The farm policy group also asked that complaints involving
Dean Foods and its Horizon label, which had languished under the Bush
administration since early 2005, now also be actively investigated by
the new administration.

“We think that organic consumers and the family farmers who have
built this industry have good reason to be optimistic and confident
that from this point forward, when they see the organic seal on a
product, they know that the public servants in Washington share their
steadfast desire to maintain the integrity of the organic label,”
Fantle stated.

“If I’d been guilty of just one of these ‘willful’ violations, my
farm would’ve been shut down in a New York minute,” said Bruce
Drinkman, a farmer from Glenwood City, Wisconsin and board member of
the Midwest Organic Dairy Producers Alliance.

“Rumors swirled for years about shady practices by Tony Zeman,” said
Bill Welsh, long-time Iowa organic livestock producer, Cornucopia board
member and former member of the USDA’s National Organic Standards
Board. “Many of the major players that bought meat and dairy
replacement animals knew very well what the allegations were and chose,
during a period of time when supply was extremely tight, to look the
other way. I’m sure there’s some heavy soul-searching going on right
now.”

It appears that QAI, the certifying agent, did not act in the
Promiseland matter until they were compelled to do so by USDA
investigators, even though court records indicate that QAI had reported
they knew of “significant audit trail deficiencies” as early as 2005.

Promiseland was found guilty of not allowing USDA investigators to
audit and inspect their financial and organic operating records. “The
“audit trail” is the backbone of organic certification,” said Fantle.
“Obviously, they had something to hide!”

At the time the legal action was finally brought against
Promiseland, in June 2008, Cornucopia and other industry observers were
highly critical that the Bush USDA only asked for a suspension of
Promiseland, and its owner Anthony J. Zeman, in lieu of requesting a
permanent decertification of the operation. The USDA and the
administrative law judge both found Zeman and Promiseland had
“willfully” violated federal law.

In addition, the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990 gave the USDA
the right to fine operators like Zeman up to $10,000 per incident for
willful violations of the law. They could have levied millions of
dollars worth of fines but failed to do so.

“Enforcement actions of this nature should serve as a strong
deterrent to other industry scofflaws,” said Kastel. “We lament the
failure of the past administration to aggressively carry out the will
of Congress in this regard.”

“Like Al Capone, they didn’t actually convict Zeman and Promiseland of actually cheating in organics,” Kastel said.

Al Capone was not convicted of murder or racketeering but rather of federal tax evasion.

The USDA’s decertification order can be viewed at:

http://www.cornucopia.org/USDA/Promiseland_Judgement.pdf