Investigation: "Factory Farms" Producing Massive Quantities of Organic Milk and Eggs

Just like the debate over the farm bill, where limiting payments to large-scale operations has never gained traction with either political party, the problems in the organic industry appear to be bipartisan in nature.

"Follow the money," said Kastel. "Although the food industry pretty much ignored organics when Congress passed the enabling legislation, as part of the 1990 farm bill, now that giant corporations like General Mills, Smucker's, Kellogg, and WhiteWave have massive investments in organic pioneering brands, their lobbyists are all over the USDA making sure that the decisions that come out of the agency favor their preferred industrial model of food production."

The prominent infographic, Who Owns Organics, can be accessed on the Cornucopia website: http://www.cornucopia.org/who-owns-organic/

Peer-reviewed published research indicates clear nutritional advantages in consuming milk and meat from cattle that are grazed on fresh grass, including elevated levels of omega-3 fatty acids.

Eggs and chickens from birds that are allowed, as the law requires, to engage in their instinctive behaviors as omnivores in foraging on grass and insects, produce eggs that are coveted as being more nutritious and more flavorful.

"We keep expanding our flock but still can't keep up with demand," said Cameron Molberg, a certified organic egg producer who rotates 19,000 birds on pasture near Austin, Texas. "We are proving that this model can be highly successful in the marketplace."

Just as the Bush administration was accused of dragging out enforcement against mega-dairies, many of which were later found to be scofflaws in terms of not grazing their animals, and instead pushing them for high production in confinement, the Obama administration has allowed factory farms producing organic eggs to flourish during its tenure.

"The department's claim that it needs more detailed regulations, specifying minimum amount of space outdoors, before they can enforce the law, is a specious argument," Cornucopia's Kastel affirmed. "If it was a question of whether or not these outfits were affording enough outdoor space to their birds, that would be one thing, but these are confinement operations with no, I mean zero, animals outside. They are flagrantly breaking the law!"

In addition to the published regulations, USDA Deputy Administrator Miles McEvoy issued a Policy Memorandum, on January 31, 2011, clearly stating, in terms of access to "outdoors," that producers must provide livestock with "an opportunity to exit any barn or other enclosed structure." Cornucopia contends that this memo clearly suggests that enclosed porches ("structures") do not meet the legal requirements for access to the outdoors, but the USDA has been unwilling to enforce their clear interpretive statement.

Cornucopia contends that consumers, who rightly assume that the animals producing their food are being treated respectfully, and consequently resulting in higher quality food, are being taken advantage of in the marketplace.

The widely respected and nationally prominent organic dairyman, Kevin Engelbert, chimed in when addressing the controversy regarding chicken production with, "If you think a porch represents true access to the outdoors, when your children or grandchildren ask to play outside allow them to do so, but note their response when you say they have to stay on the porch."

In the case of the Horizon dairy in Paul, Idaho (WhiteWave), instead of the USDA sending its own agents to investigate complaints against the operation, the USDA sent in the same certifier that initially approved the operation to investigate alleged improprieties.

"This is just unconscionable," said Kastel. "In this instance, the certifier, Quality Assurance International, has been implicated in a number of other improprieties. Our thorough investigation and legal complaint indicated this dairy, with no pasture, never should have been certified in the first place. The job of the USDA is to oversee the certifiers and ensure that they are doing their job. It is quite possible that, in this case, there could have been a conspiracy and/or negligence that the certifier was responsible for.

"Although the organic oversight system can, to say the least, be improved, there are few alternatives in the commercial food stream if consumers, especially parents, want to avoid agrochemical and drug residues in their food and provide superior nutrition for their families," said Kastel. "That's where it becomes imperative that farmers and their customers work together to maintain the integrity of the organic label. In the meantime, Cornucopia's scorecards provide guidance enabling shoppers to reward the true heroes in this industry."