Interview: Organic Consumers Association's Ronnie Cummins tells the truth about organic milk that isn't

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With consumer demand for organic products continuing to grow, more large corporations are entering the organic market. To maximize profits, some of these companies don't follow organic standards but still label products as organic. For example, Horizon Organic and Aurora Organic, sold by Wal-Mart and other retailers, continue to produce "organic" milk under factory-farm conditions that few reasonable people would consider truly organic.

According to the Organic Consumers Association, half of Horizon's "organic" milk today comes from what can only be considered "factory" dairy feedlots -- and much of Aurora's organic milk does as well. Rather than buy organic calves that have been raised from birth on organic farms, these companies seemed to have discovered it's cheaper to buy conventional calves that have been raised on conventional farms, install them in factory feedlots, then milk them and call it organic.

The situation has become so alarming that the Organic Consumers Association ultimately called for a boycott, and many knowledgeable consumers are now avoiding the Horizon brand entirely.

The organic milk controversy extends to organic soy milk as well. Horizon Organic's parent company, Dean Foods, also bought out Silk, the leading organic soy milk brand in the United States. Dean Foods has pushed for lower organic standards in the United States and to allow industrial-style production to be called "organic."

Meanwhile, major grocery chains import cheap, so-called "organic" soybeans from China, where the workers are treated much like slaves and organic standards are dubious. They are also imported from Brazil where the Amazon rainforest is being bulldozed in order to create more acreage for growing soybeans.

To gain more insight on the details of this emerging battle over organic standards, NaturalNews editor Mike Adams sat down with Ronnie Cummins of the Organic Consumers Association for some straight talk on organic milk. What follows is the full interview.

Mike: I am here today talking with Ronnie Cummins, National Director of the Organic Consumers Association. That is at www.OrganicConsumers.org. What's the overview of the situation on organic milk, Ronnie?

Ronnie: Well, the good news is, there is such a huge demand for organic products across the United States and North America that there is a serious shortage of supply. One of the types of products that are in serious short supply is organic milk. This is already more than a $1-billion-a-year industry in the United States, out of the $15 billion in organic food sales last year.

The problem is that our government - specifically the U. S. Department of Agriculture - takes about $90 billion of our tax money every year, and they give subsidies to all of these factory farms to go organic, but they give no subsidies to help family-scale dairies make the transition to organic. We literally do not have enough family farmers with the wherewithal to achieve organic certification and make the product.

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