March 23, 2021
Soil Matters: Below the Surface of Authentic Organic
The Cornucopia Institute is adamant that the USDA National Organic Program (NOP) enforce the required management of the living soil. Authentic...
March 22, 2021
The Cultivator – Spring 2021
The Spring 2021 Cultivator, Cornucopia’s quarterly newsletter, is now available online. Download the PDF. In it you’ll find: Cornucopia’s New Executive Director is Building Bridges Organic Policy Watch The True Cost of Industrial Beef Kalamazoo People’s Food Coop is Nourishing Community A Legacy of Stewardship in South Carolina Soil...
February 3, 2021
The Cornucopia Institute is expanding its team!
The mid-level Communications Manager position will be crucial to enhancing Cornucopia’s visibility and sharing its mission and impact with the public. This remote position is ideal for someone looking to combine a heartfelt passion for organic food and farming with storytelling skills. The ideal candidate must be a willing...
February 3, 2021
What Unfolding Policy Means for Happy Calves On Authentic Organic Farms
A new rule is coming. And it’s desperately needed to ensure that healthy calves from organic cows grow up eating grass alongside their relatives. That scenario is commonplace among Cornucopia’s five-cow-rated dairies. But in industrialized organic dairies, scofflaws have long flouted existing “origin of livestock” rules, continuously transitioning conventional animals into production...
January 7, 2021
There Is No Normal Anymore
North Dakota seed breeders safeguard the future of food By Marianne Landzettel Theresa Podoll breathed a cautious sigh of relief. The harvest on her North Dakota farm had gone well and, at the time of our conversation in early October, snow was absent from the forecast for the rest of the month. “In 2018 and...
December 31, 2020
Melody Morrell Named Executive Director of The Cornucopia Institute
Ushering in a New Leadership Era With a Fierce Protector of Organic Viroqua, WI – Following many months of teamwork to navigate a founder transition, the board of The Cornucopia Institute voted unanimously to promote longtime staff member Melody Morrell as the organization’s next executive director. “Melody Morrell has...
December 17, 2020
More of the Same? Vilsack to Return to USDA
Here’s a quixotic scenario: a secretary of agriculture who is cozy with farmers, not corporations. Instead, we are preparing for the return of Tom Vilsack, who served as secretary of agriculture in the Obama administration between 2008 and 2016. Most recently, Vilsack worked in the private sector, as president...
December 16, 2020
The Truth Matters: Cornucopia’s Quest to Expose Organic Grain Fraud
This article was previously published in the winter issue of the Cultivator, Cornucopia’s quarterly newsletter. By Michele Marchetti, Co-Director of Development and Communications at The Cornucopia Institute Huddled inside a trade show booth, Anne Ross, JD watched dozens of icons, each representing an international shipping vessel, inch across a computer...
December 11, 2020
Reflections on Organic
In honor of the 30th anniversary of the Organic Foods Production Act, we asked some of the early champions of the modern-day organic movement to reflect on what the label means to them. Read the essays from Dr. Joan Dye Gussow, Dr. Barry Flamm, and Elizabeth Henderson below. Dr....
December 8, 2020
The Cultivator – Winter 2020
The Winter 2020 Cultivator, Cornucopia’s quarterly newsletter, is now available online. Download the PDF. In it you’ll find: Why I farm, by Cornucopia Board President Cameron Molberg Exposing Organic Grain Fraud North Dakota Seed Breeders, Prairie Road Organic Seed Welcoming Back Charlotte Vallaeys We Need You Revisiting the Origin...
November 11, 2020
Recap from the National Organic Standards Board Meeting
Demystifying the policy that impacts organics farmers and consumers In the wake of massive destruction to the organic dairy marketplace, a languishing rule intended to prevent the continuous cycling of conventional livestock into organic operation will finally reappear as a second proposed rule for public comment. Reporting from the...
November 11, 2020
Bearing Fruit
How a noni farmer in Hawaii found abundance in a cup of worm castings By Michele Marchetti Eighteen years ago, Steve Frailey boarded a Hawaiian Airlines flight with a suitcase brimming with 12 pounds of Indian blue worms. Those worms play a vital role in Frailey’s 70-acre certified organic farm in Kauai, Hawaii...
