Big-money special interests lobbying government to increase restrictions on dairy producers
Milk is Milk Blog by Alex Avery
The latest soap opera inside the USDA National Organic Program is a battle royal between mega-organic dairy processors like Organic Valley and Horizon Organic - some of who object to feedlot-style dairies being allowed to call themselves “organic.”
When the USDA finalized its rules back in 2001, it stated that “The producer of an organic livestock operation must establish and maintain livestock living conditions for the animals under his or her care which accommodate the health and natural behavior of the livestock…This requirement includes access to pasture for ruminant animals.”
The “access to pasture” wording has become a massive point of contention among organic dairy farmers, depending mostly on where they are located and the style of dairy operation they run. What does “access” mean and to how much pasture? What type of “pasture” is required? These aren’t simple questions because dairy cows are never fed completely on pasture.
Even in areas with lush, green summer pastures, cows must be given feed during the winter months when the pastures are dormant. In many areas, this is more than six months of the year. As well, cows are often given supplemental feed even in the summer to fill out their diet. A happy cow’s health and productivity is largely dependent upon sound feeding practices.
For producers in dry areas, such as Idaho, Colorado, and the Southwest, “pasture” is a relative term even during the warm summer months. In such places, cows out in the “pasture” are fed mostly supplemental feed - often grown using irrigation - because the pasture doesn’t provide enough forage.
The cows really don’t care either way, as long as they have plenty of food and water. I’ve visited many dairies of both types, in dry and moist areas of North America as well as Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. No matter where you go you’ll see the same basic pattern. In the summer, when out on pasture, cows will split their time between grazing, chewing their cud under the shade of a tree, and making their way to and from the milking parlor two or three times per day. In feed-lot style dairies, the cows happily split their time between eating their forage and feed ration, chewing their cud on a comfy mat in the shade of the barn, and making their way to and from the milking parlor. During the winter, you couldn’t tell either type of operation apart as the animals are kept indoors most of the time.
The internecine organic dairy war is really about resentment from mid-Western organic dairy farmers over their lower-cost Western competitors - a dynamic that occurs outside of the organic realm as well. Western feed-lot dairies relying on irrigated forage are able to produce large amounts of milk at lower cost. But organic mid-Western dairies saw in the pasture argument an opportunity to neutralize their Western competition and the battle was joined.
The $200 plus million Organic Valley, one of the larger mid-western organic dairies, has funded the Cornucopia Institute to lead the attack against their Western, feed-lot-style competitors, principally the $250 plus million Horizon Organic dairy, which has roughly 70 percent of the U.S. organic dairy market. Cornucopia has successfully pushed the issue onto the agenda of the National Organic Standards Board, which this spring adopted new “guidance” language that they would like the USDA to adopt. The proposed amendment to the organic standards says:
“Ruminant livestock shall graze pasture during the months of the year when pasture can provide edible forage. The Organic System Plan shall have the goal of providing grazed feed greater than 30% dry matter intake on a daily basis during the growing season but not less than 120 days. The Organic System Plan shall include a timeline showing how the producer will satisfy the goal to maximize the pasture component of total feed used in the farm system.”
Get that? They would require that the cows graze pasture at least one-third of the year. The other 265 days of the year the cows could be kept indoors. Moreover, the wording only states that a farm’s plant have a “goal” of providing grazed feed “on a daily basis,” not how much of the cow’s nutritional requirements must come from the grazed feed.
So in the end the cows couldn’t really care either way, the milk is the same, and the only difference for consumers is the cost. Mark Twain once said in reference to the dry West that “whiskey was for drinking, water was for fighting over.” Now he could add organic milk to the list of fightin’ words.
As always, milk is milk, and don’t forget it.