"Talk is cheap," adds Vallaeys. "Consumers should not only know whether there are GMOs in their food, but also whether their hard-earned dollars are supporting companies that then turn around and invest those profits in the effort to sell-out their right to know."
The Cornucopia Institute, which developed the funding guide, stresses that the organization is not against corporate involvement in organics.
"We welcome corporate involvement in the organic food industry, but only when the parent company subscribes to the values that the organic food movement is based on," says Kastel. "We have a problem with the duplicity of corporations that hide under a "holier-than-thou' marketing brand and then undermine the very values of the organic movement."
"For example, when Kellogg donates money to the Organic Trade Association, the Kashi brand appears on the OTA website. But when the same company donates to the effort to defeat Proposition 37, Kellogg will do everything in its power to make sure that its Kashi customers, who seek wholesome and natural foods, do not associate the Kashi brand with a corporate contributor to the effort to kill Proposition 37," adds Kastel.
The same is true for the R.W. Knudsen and Santa Cruz Organic brands, owned by Smucker, and the Cascadian Farm, Larabar and Muir Glen brands, owned by General Mills. These corporate brand owners have donated $387,000 and $520,000, respectively, to defeating Proposition 37.
By using Cornucopia's Proposition 37 funding guide, consumers can invest their food dollars in organic and non-GMO companies that are truly committed to supporting sustainable agriculture.
"Hiding the truth about our food is pervasive, unethical, and only done for money," says Michael Potter, CEO of Eden Foods, an organic food manufacturer that financially contributed to support Proposition 37. "Let this [Prop. 37] be the beginning of an end to it."
In terms of businesses supporting Proposition 37, Dr. Joseph Mercola, of drmercola.com, has contributed $800,000. The committee supporting Proposition 37 has also raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from individual citizens. The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) has been a key funding and organizing driver of the GMO labeling effort.
Many of the seemingly duplicitous companies that are contributing to defeat Proposition 37 are also some of the largest member-donors to the Organic Trade Association (OTA), the trade-lobby group for the organic industry. The OTA has long been criticized by public interest groups for its efforts to weaken the organic law and standards.
On the Board of Directors of the Organic Trade Association sit Julia Sabin (Smucker) and Kelly Shea (Dean Foods), both working for corporations that have contributed to the committee opposing Proposition 37.
"The Organic Trade Association lists brands as major donors, like Kashi, R.W. Knudsen, Cascadian Farm (General Mills) and others that are owned by corporations that financially contribute to defeating Proposition 37," says Cornucopia's Kastel. "The OTA is in large part run by and funded by some of the same companies that are in bed with the biotechnology industry and its destructive agricultural practices."
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