When organics get too large
The Organic Consumers Association's (OCA) call for a boycott of the nation's largest organic dairy brand, Horizon Organic, has recently generated stories in the New York Times, USA Today, National Public Radio, and the Associated Press. The media coverage has highlighted the growing backlash by organic consumers against industrial-scale dairy feedlots, who are misleadingly labeling their products as "USDA Organic," even though the animals on these factory farms have little or no access to pasture. In addition, most of the cows on these giant feedlots have been imported from conventional dairies, where they were weaned on blood, injected with hormones and antibiotics and fed genetically-engineered grains and slaughterhouse waste. While Horizon sources half of its milk from family farms where the lactating cows do have access to pasture, Aurora Organic, OCA's other major boycott target, gets all of its milk from intensive confinement feedlots. Aurora sells its organic milk to supermarket chains including Costco, Safeway, Giant, and Wild Oats, who bottle it under their own private labels. For more information, see the Safeguard Organic Standards section of the OCA website.
Gardening and mini-farming for fun profit and earth-restoring livelihood
