Take Action: New Rules Could Force Organic Family Livestock Farmers Out of Business After eight years of political debate, legal wrangling and protests within the organic community the USDA on October 23 finally published a draft rule intended to clamp down on giant factory farms milking thousands of cows that have been abusing the spirit and letter of federal organic law by primarily confining their cattle to feedlots. The USDA could have made minor regulatory language changes to the current rule that would have clarified and forced the grazing of cattle. Instead, the USDA completely rewrote the complicated organic livestock standards without input from the organic community or the National Organic Standards Board. And they have given the organic community - farmers, consumers, retailers and processors - just 60 days to digest the sweeping changes and submit comments to government regulators. Unfortunately, it has taken the groups that represent organic farmers over 30 days just to understand the true meaning of the complex USDA draft rule and to develop the many needed and major revisions. While the draft rule that the USDA presented would effectively clamp down on factory farm scofflaws, it would also probably put out of business the majority of all family-scale livestock farmers in the United States. This is unacceptable.

Posted in Completed Action Alerts

Little-known food ingredient takes center stage in precedent-setting vote Public Comments due Monday, November 3rd Take a look at the bar of organic chocolate in your desk drawer or the carton of organic ice cream in your freezer, and you'll likely see a little-known but very common food ingredient: lecithin. Unless the ingredients list specifically states "organic soy lecithin," the lecithin was processed from hexane-extracted soybeans that were undoubtedly sprayed with pesticides in the fields, and possibly genetically engineered - in organic food???

Posted in Completed Action Alerts

Federal Regulations Would Harm Sustainable Farmers and Biodiversity We need your help in another battle to stop the slippery slope toward a sterilized and industrialized food system that threatens biodiversity and the very existence of family-scale farms that grow food in a safe, healthy, and environmentally sustainable way. In response to the E. coli 0157 outbreaks last year in bagged spinach, the USDA is considering a change in the federal regulations that could potentially require growers of all fresh leafy green vegetables to follow specified guidelines in the fields and during post-harvest handling. The federal rules would be similar to the California guidelines that were set by large-scale operations after the outbreaks. The guidelines include growing practices that discourage biodiversity and sustainable/organic farming practices, deplete soil fertility, and create "sterile-fields-methods" that have not been scientifically proven to actually reduce E. coli 0157 bacteria but are certain to reduce biodiversity, harm wildlife, and burden family-scale farms.

Posted in Completed Action Alerts

Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa Food Co-ops Join Efforts for Farm Flood Victims Margaret Bert, Director of Communications Outpost Natural Foods Cooperative Milwaukee, WI: The remnants of tropical storm Erin and the ensuing Midwest summer floods have literally washed away the harvest for many family farmers living and farming in the Kickapoo River basin and other neighboring regions of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa. "This flood is particularly disastrous to farmers in that area because they are just getting ready to harvest their summer crops," says Margaret Bert, Director of Communications for Outpost Natural Foods. "For some of our local produce suppliers, their summer harvest has been wiped out, not to mention some of their homes." According to Barth Anderson, research and development coordinator for the Wedge Co-op in Minneapolis, "Just to put in perspective how much money these farmers have lost: According to [CBS affiliate WCCO], Jack Hedin of Featherstone has already written off $200,000 worth of produce and Richard de Wilde of Harmony Valley mentioned a similar number." Food co-ops have joined together in solidarity to support their farmers in need.

Posted in Completed Action Alerts

The House is expected to vote on the Farm Bill on Thursday, July 26. Please call your representative immediately to express your support for these key important items: Urge your representative to support Country of Origin Labeling (COOL), to reject any attempts to weaken or further delay COOL, or to make it voluntary; and to pass mandatory COOL for meat and produce as Congress intended in the 2002 Farm Bill.

Posted in Completed Action Alerts