USDA Cracking Down on “Organic" Factory Farms
Country's Largest Dairy Likely to Lose Certification
CORNUCOPIA,
WI: The Cornucopia Institute has learned that the USDA
appears about to revoke the organic certification of the nation's
largest industrial dairy operator, Aurora Organic Dairy, with
corporate headquarters in Boulder, Colorado.
Aurora operates several giant factory dairies milking thousands
of cows each in semi-arid areas of Colorado and Texas. The company
has been the subject of a series of formal legal complaints filed
with the USDA by The Cornucopia Institute. The complaints from
the Wisconsin-based farm policy group filed in 2005 and 2006,
called for a USDA investigation into allegations of numerous organic
livestock management improprieties on Aurora?s facilities.
?After
personally inspecting some of Aurora?s dairies in Texas and Colorado,
we found 98% of their cattle in feedlots instead of grazing on
pasture as the law requires,? stated Mark Kastel, Cornucopia's
senior farm policy analyst. Cornucopia also found that Aurora
was procuring cattle from a non-certified organic source in apparent
violation of the law. ?Our sources tell us that the USDA's investigators
found many other violations when conducting their probe of Aurora.?
But
Kastel warned that the USDA is under intense pressure to scuttle
the Aurora decertification order. ?We understand that powerful
political influence is being brought to bear on the USDA in an
effort to delay or water down the penalties against Aurora,? noted
Kastel.
As part of their investigation of Aurora, compliance officers
at the USDA took sworn testimony from Cornucopia staff, visited
Aurora's facilities and interviewed their organic certifier, the
State of Colorado. The Institute found out about the impending
enforcement action, and the potential for its delay, from officials
in Colorado, a political appointee at the USDA and a highly placed
industry executive.
The
organic industry is carefully watching what the USDA does with
the Aurora matter because of its size and impact on the marketplace.
Aurora doesn't directly market milk under its own name, but it
is the country's largest private-label producer of organic milk.
Aurora packages store-brand organic dairy products for Wal-Mart,
Costco, Target, Safeway, Trader Joe's, Wild Oats, and other grocery
chains. “The organic regulations are scale neutral,"
added Kastel. “In terms of enforcement it shouldn't matter
if we are talking about a powerful corporate player, with thousands
of cows, or a smaller family operation, bad actors in this industry
need to be removed from the marketplace."
Because
of the delay in USDA enforcement against Aurora Dairy, The Cornucopia
Institute today filed a Freedom of Information request (FOIA)
with the USDA to secure documents that could uncover possible
influence peddling and favoritism at the Department. ?We hope
that the USDA will issue tough sanctions, if warranted,? Kastel
said. “And we want the agency to know that the organic community
is very closely monitoring this case."
Earlier
this spring the 10,000-cow Vander Eyk factory dairy in Pixley,
California lost its organic certification after an investigation
revealed numerous violations of federal organic rules. The industrial-scale
operation had been publicly spotlighted by The Cornucopia Institute
for organic management irregularities. The Vander Eyk dairy had
been selling its milk to Stremicks (Heritage-Foods) and Dean Foods
(Horizon).
Based
on documents recently received by Cornucopia through an earlier
FOIA request, the Vander Eck dairy lost their ability to market
organic milk not only because they lacked pasture for their cattle
but also because they violated requirements for careful record-keeping
to assure that all cows milked were eligible for organic certification
and all the feed they consumed was actually organically grown.
“It
now appears that our concerns about the giant industrial dairy
cutting corners by confining cattle in a ?factory-farm? setting
was just the tip of the iceberg,? said Will Fantle, Cornucopia's
research director. ?The foundation of the organic certification
process is the maintenance of a comprehensive farm audit trail
which can be reviewed by independent certification inspectors
and the USDA. The fact that Vander Eyk could not produce the documents
requested by his certifier, and that he did not appeal the enforcement
action, is just damning."
The
controversy about the growing number of factory-farms producing
organic milk has come to a head this year as the number of farmers
transitioning to organic dairy production has dramatically increased
causing a surplus of organic milk for the first time. That surplus,
largely attributed to the mega-farms, is now driving down prices
to family farmers around the country endangering their livelihoods.
It's also become a tragedy for some family farmers around the
country who have gone through the arduous and expensive three-year
transition to organic management but now have nowhere to ship
their milk.
“With
at least 15 of these giant dairies operating, mostly in the arid
west, they have succeeded in jeopardizing the livelihood of the
1500 or so ethical dairy farm families who are doing this right,"
said Merrill Clark, an organic livestock producer from Cassopolis,
Michigan and former member of the USDA's expert advisory panel,
the National Organic Standards Board.
“The
good news for consumers is that in our survey of organic dairy
brands (posted on www.cornucopia.org) a full 90% of namebrand
products received very high ratings in our scorecard that critiqued
the environmental and animal husbandry practices used in sourcing
the organic milk for the dairy products," the Cornucopia's
Kastel said. “With a small amount of research, consumers
who care about maintaining the integrity of organics can easily
find organic dairy products they can believe in."
MORE:
Aurora
is owned by some of the same conventional factory-farm operators
that founded the Horizon Organic brand and then later sold it
to Dean Foods. Aurora's largest equity stake is controlled by
CharlesBank of Boston, which invests capital for the Harvard endowment
fund.
Rumors
have also been swirling in the investment community that Aurora?s
owners are seeking to sell the company or to take it public.
The Cornucopia Institute is dedicated to
the fight for economic justice for the family-scale farming community.
Through research, advocacy and economic development our goal is
to empower farmers both politically and through marketplace initiatives.
The Organic Integrity Project acts as a corporate watchdog assuring
that no compromises to the credibility of organic farming methods
and the food it produces are made in the pursuit of profit. |