Cornucopia, a 10,000-member, nonprofit, farm policy research group characterized the lobby group's recent public relations push as "a not-so-veiled attempt by the OTA to greenwash their corporate approach to organics."
"OTA's job is to represent business; it pays lip service to respecting and supporting family farmers. But when it comes down to truly respecting our opinions, on issues of organic integrity or ones that affect our livelihood as farmers, they obviously intend to push their agenda by creating what smells like a Trojan Horse of a grassroots group ," Parrott lamented.
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"So we have corporate executives, corporate lawyers and corporate lobbyists (with companies that buy agricultural commodities from farmers) now representing producers? Or are they just having a problem convincing rank-and-file farmers that their $40 million a year checkoff (tax) is legitimate?" Cornucopia's Kastel cynically asked.
After the Arthur Harvey federal lawsuit ruling, the organic community negotiated amongst different organic organizations with the goal of approaching Congress in a unified manner to request legislation that would "dial back to pre-Harvey."
The Harvey decision made all synthetics illegal in organic farming and food production (and most of us in the community, at the time, felt comfortable with the NOSB process of carefully reviewing non-organic substances to assure they were safe and appropriate for use in organics). If the Harvey ruling had stood, a high percentage of certified organic, processed food would leave the market.
"The OTA participated in these discussions, said they would collaborate, and then, behind everyone's back, went to Congress and sold their own deal -- which was adopted by Congress and weakened the law rather than simply restoring the way the NOP/NOSB had been operating," said Kastel.
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