Activists understand what’s wrong with milk marketing; where are the regulators?

href=”http://www.milkismilk.com/blog/” mce_href=”http://www.milkismilk.com/blog/”>Milk is Milk Blog by Alex Avery

A recent posting on an environmental activist group blog took up the topic of the Cornucopia Institute’s attacks claiming certain organic milk was more organic than competing brands based on differing grazing practices. The commentator complained, “Consumers now face a dizzying array of milk choices,” adding, “What a bummer. Now, even milk is complicated.”

Even if we put aside the fact that nutritionally, chemically and by all other measurable aspects the organic milk under attack by Cornucopia is the same - as is all milk organic or traditionally produced; and if we ignore that Cornucopia’s attacks are apparently also funded by the “more organic” dairy interests who benefit from these campaigns (hmmm, is anyone else thinking RICO suit?); the real problem revealed here is that special interest groups are teaming up with for-profit marketing interests to bilk consumers and as a result also harm America’s family dairy farmers. If even environmental activists understand that complicating milk is “a bummer,” then how come the majority of state and federal regulators empowered to protect consumers appear to be ignoring this problem?

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist or a think tank-funded study to see the problem. Just look at the dairy case in your local Safeway, Kroger, Star Market, Trader Joe’s(which appears to be on some kind of misleading “hormone-free” kick lately) or Wal-Mart. They don’t look anything like the dairy cases of yore. In the good old days - say 5 or 10 short years ago - what did we find in the dairy case? Milk, cream, butter… maybe some eggs and cheese. Then the only milk choice was skim, 2% or whole. Today consumers are faced with “a dizzying array of milk choices” which usually includes a lower-priced store or generic brand, a premium labeled and priced brand which often includes some production-oriented distinction (e.g. “Free Farmed” or “rbST-free”), and a high-priced (often 100% more expensive) organic brand exclaiming a range of misleading qualities (e.g. “free from toxic pesticides,” “no hormones” and “antibiotic-free”). Next to these dairy offering we find soy “milks” and power drinks - many of which promote their benefits over dairy products. No wonder consumers are drinking less milk - these choices and claims presented side-by-side are confusing and scaring them away from a safe, affordable and important source of nutrition.

All of the respected, independent health and science experts agree that milk is milk. The American Medical Association, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, U.S. Department of Agriculture and the dozens of food and animal scientists who study and publish on dairy issues all report that from a quality, chemical, nutrition and safety perspective traditionally produced milk — milk produced from cows receiving approved animal health and productivity treatments — and organically produced milk is exactly the same. Independent research clearly shows that dairy consumers are confused and misled by marketing claims into believing that generic, premium and organic branded dairy products have safety, health or non-descript quality differences - differences which simply do not exist.

According to the National Council Against Health Fraud, the FDA has been issuing warning letters regarding false and misleading marketing of various products at a rapid pace. Last year it ordered more than 100 companies to stop making illegal claims for dietary supplements, herbal products, homeopathic products, and/or devices. Yet, despite receiving numerous complaints about false and misleading marketing by a growing number of unscrupulous marketing interests in the dairy industry FDA’s only action to date has been to issue four warning letters over two years ago - these complaints targeted some of the smallest possible violators with no apparent follow-up or enforcement. Yet, of the countries largest multi-million dollar dairy companies continue to make the same claims which FDA has clearly said are false and/or misleading and in violation of laws which govern the labeling and marketing of food products. Some examples of the companies which regulators fail to enforce truthful and non-misleading claims against - claims which harm consumers and America’s family dairy farmers - include:

A more comprehensive list of false and/or misleading claims is available at the Stop Labeling Lies coalition Web site. These marketing practices are harming dairy farmers and swindling consumers. FDA and other state regulators have received complaints for years about this from consumer coalitions, dairy farming cooperatives, and food industry alliances. But the regulators lack of meaningful enforcement and blind eye to the worst offenders has left farmers, packagers and retailers with little choice but to jump on the false and misleading marketing bandwagon.

One positive example of consumer protection and stewardship that FDA and other states should consider are the good people at the Washington State Department of Agriculture. When they became concerned about misleading antibiotic and hormone claims associated with “Free Farmed” labels they took responsible action and today those labels are gone in Washington State.

Feel free to take a minute and forward this article or your comments to Felicia Satchell at FDA - Ms. Satchell appears to be pretty good at ignoring dozens of emails, calls and letters about this problem so don’t expect a response right away.

Felicia Satchell, Office of Nutritional Products, Labeling and Dietary Supplements
U.S. Food & Drug Administration
HFS - 820
200 C Street, SWWashington, DC 20204
Felicia.Satchell@cfsan.fda.gov

Remind Ms. Satchel of what she already knows - milk is milk, and it’s her job to make sure consumers are protected against people trying to sell us claims to the contrary.

Milk is Milk Blog by Alex Avery

My last posting asking questions about the Cornucopia Institute’s financial and other links with the $160+ million dollar Organic Valley behemoth generated several comments this past month; all but one were positive. The one critical comment was a not-so-thinly veiled threat of litigation from Cornucopia’s lawyers at Garvey & Stoddard claiming our comments were “inaccurate” and thus “damaging to the reputation” of their client. Cornucopia’s lawyers demanded we apologize, publicly retract our statements, and remove them from our Web site lest we face “magnified” damages.

Heavens to Betsy, apparently I was about to be taken out to the woodshed for a whoopin. As I take the accuracy of my commentaries very seriously I immediately wrote back to Cornucopia’s legal browbeater Ed Garvey and asked him to specifically spell-out any inaccuracies in my column. To date I’ve received no response. No response to the fact that Cornucopia’s Web site was registered at the same time that Mark Kastel was being quoted as an official spokesman for Organic Valley, and no response as to our question wondering how much money Organic Valley contributes/pays Cornucopia and/or Mr. Kastel. While we’re back on this subject perhaps Mr. Kastel can explain why Cornucopia used a UPS Store post office box in California back in 1999 to register their Wisconsin-based organization Web site - was it because they wanted to mask their links to him his bosses at Organic Valley at the time? I won’t hold my breath waiting for an answer this time.

While Cornucopia and their lawyers have yet to get back to us to us, they did post some previously unreported clarifications regarding their funding to other online discussion groups. Without disclosing amounts or names, Cornucopia admitted to being financially supported by several organic dairy companies in comments they posted to an organic dairy industry-sponsored O’Dairy online newsletter, stating:

“We have received financial support from somewhere around 10 different organic dairy organizations but all these donations total only about 10% of our budget combined. The majority of our funding comes from foundations and individual contributors, mostly farmers. We’re proud to have received contributions from farmers shipping to all the major organic dairy processors…”

As I frequently repeat here and every other time this false allegation is raised (which I guess would be defamatory - Attorney Garvey, perhaps we should talk?), CGFI is a project of the non-profit Hudson Institute. All of our money - and I can tell you our very small budget pales in comparison to those of the activist groups attacking us - comes from Hudson in the form of unrestricted grants. Publicly available tax returns and annual reports show that Hudson’s financial support comes from a wide range of philanthropic foundations and other donors. Many of the foundations supporting Hudson’s various efforts - including our work at CGFI - are the same foundations supporting agricultural research at America’s colleges and universities, funding food pantries, child nutrition advocacy and sustainable farming programs. Are all these groups tainted, or just those who disagree with the organic-only zealots like Cornucopia and those who profit from their activities like Organic Valley?

Cornucopia’s law firm Garvey & Stoddard apparently also works in the realm of food scares and organic black marketing. Last year they helped sponsor a conference on Food Law in the 21st Century with such noted food fear activists as Organic Consumers Association’s Ronnie Cummins; Mad Cow USA author John Stauber, and Center for Food Safety’s Doug Gurian-Sherman. Garvey & Stoddard’s lead partner and the author of the warning letter sent to CGFI Ed Garvey is the publisher of “Fighting Bob.com” which had CGFI on their radar screen long before Cornucopia came on ours. Among the dozen or so articles attacking conventional agriculture and promoting organic found at Fight Bob, they published a Cornucopia authored attack on the Center for Global Food Issues‘ (CGFI) public education campaigns last December asserting we were corporate shills. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.

Garvey & Stoddard’s related commercial activities include counseling activist groups on dairy coop legislative lobbying, legal counsel to the local environmental action league, and serving as legal committee chair for the local Sierra Club - a group which is suing dairy farmers. So, I guess we’re going to be in the same mix of victims like family dairy farmers and ranchers being chased off the land by activists and zealots who oppose safe, higher-yielding and sustainable food production.

Sixty years ago Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued a call for “a second bill or rights” among which he called for “the right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living.” Whether conventional or organic, dairy producers do deserve the right to use whatever legal tools and practices are available to them to economically and responsibly produce safe, affordable milk. Cornucopia’s attacks on traditional and organic producers who don’t meet their standards - standards which benefit their financial sponsors - deny farmers a simple right and freedom to farm in a manner that can sustain their family while sustaining food production to meet today’s demands. I’m happy to stand with farmers, traditional or organic, who are under attack by Cornucopia, Organic Valley and their lawyers.