No one is more responsible than Dr. Lester Crawford for the 10+ years of delay before the USDA would allow the word “organic” to appear on packages of meat. While heading up the Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) at the USDA, during the G. H. W. Bush Administration, he...
An Open Letter From Jim Riddle (Mr. Riddle is an organic farmer, inspector and current Chair of the NOSB) Dear friends and colleagues, I am very concerned by the fractured state of the organic community. I have farmed organically since 1980 and been an organic inspector since 1986. In...
Strong and growing consumer demand for organic milk and organic dairy products is pushing dairy product producers to seek imports. The following story from New Zealand highlights the issue. US firm wants Fonterra’s organic milkpowder New Zealand Herald September 22, 2005 An American dairy farm is asking the New...
New York Times By MARIAN BURROS September 14, 2005 JOHN MACKEY, chairman of Whole Foods Market, with the buying power of his 173 stores across the country behind him, said in a telephone interview yesterday that he wants the Department of Agriculture to strengthen its standards for organic milk....
MAYBE NOT! BY Jim Slama When you pick up organic milk at your local grocery, you probably have visions of happy cows, frolicking in a beautiful pasture, chewing their cuds and basically hanging out. You may be surprised to learn that this may not necessarily be the case. In...
WASHINGTON DC: A letter addressed to USDA Secretary Mike Johanns, from The Cornucopia Institute, today asked the Secretary to personally intervene in rebuilding the once promising collaborative environment that existed between the organic community and its regulators. In its letter, the Cornucopia Institute called the current working relationship between...
A study finds benefits are ‘immediate’ and suggests that youths are exposed to the chemicals primarily through food, not spraying of homes. By Marla Cone L.A. Times Staff Writer September 3, 2005 Switching to organic foods provides children “dramatic and immediate” protection from pesticides that are widely used on...
By PHILIP BRASHER THE DES MOINES REGISTER (link no longer available) REGISTER WASHINGTON BUREAU Washington, D.C. – Contented cows lazing on rolling green hills. That is the idyllic image that many consumers have of the farms where organic milk is produced. The reality is becoming something different. With consumer demand...
Experiments a Threat to Public Health, the Environment, and Farmers PORTLAND, Maine – More than 47,000 field tests of genetically engineered crops were authorized by the U.S. Department of Agriculture between 1987 and 2004 despite serious environmental threats and inadequate regulations in place to monitor their impacts, according to...
Cornucopia Institute Files FOIA Probing USDA Rejection of Adopted Pasture Guidance FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Mark Kastel, 608-625-2000 WASHINGTON, D.C.: Organic dairy farmers from around the nation once again converged on Washington for the semiannual meeting of the USDA’s National Organic Standards Board. The dairy producers attended the August...
The Cornucopia Institute’s Senior Farm Policy Analyst Mark Kastel journeyed to Washington, D.C. for the August 15-17 meeting of the National Organic Standards Board. He was there to push for final adoption of the proposed pasture guidance for dairy cows and ruminants that would close loopholes being used by...
The following is the exact language that the National Organic Standards Board adopted on August 16 as guidance requirements for pasture and dairy cows and other ruminants.
The Cornucopia Institute, through research and investigations on agriculture and food issues, provides needed information to family farmers, consumers and other stakeholders in the good food movement and to the media.
