When Big Ag decided it wanted to take on the organic market, we knew it would be catastrophic. Unfortunately, we weren’t wrong. Corporate players in the organic industry have weaseled their way into the organic regulatory systems and influenced a major shift from a system focused on supporting soil and environmental health, nutritious food for consumers, and fair prices for small farms, to a system focused on mass production, extracting resources, and selling cheap products. The organic dairy industry has shown just how destructive this corporate takeover can be.

This week the Real Organic Project sent out a letter describing this phenomenon as a tsunami that will affect all of us, specifically denounces Danone, a multinational food company and owner of Horizon Organic, for abandoning its commitment to sourcing milk from small dairy farms in Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and New York. In the letter the Real Organic Project asks consumers what should be a simple question:

‘Would you pay more for the milk from the pasture-raised cow?’ And proceeds to tell us the discouraging answer:

“What is happening right now is that you are being denied that choice at any price. Already that choice was pretty confusing because of false advertising, but now the industrial system is simply removing the choice from our stores. The tsunami is hitting the farms. It is hitting all of us.”

Read the Real Organic Project’s full letter here: Danone Abandons Organic Farms