Natural Communities Magazine A magazine devoted to the local natural wellness culture.

USDA Finds Largest Organic Dairy Perpetrating Fraud

Fails to Levy Fines or Yank Certification

Watchdog: Organic Community “Taking the Law into Its Own Hands”

Announcing the filing of additional legal complaints with the USDA, and threatening civil litigation, the nation’s most aggressive organic watchdog, The Cornucopia Institute, blasted the USDA for not penalizing the industry’s largest organic milk producer after government regulators found that they have perpetrated consumer fraud by violating the federal organic labeling law.

On August 29, the USDA announced that Colorado-based Aurora Organic Dairy had willfully violated 14 provisions of the regulations of Organic Food Production Act. Aurora operates a dairy processing facility in Colorado and five giant factory-farms in Texas and Colorado. The USDA investigation began after the agency was alerted to organic irregularities at Aurora’s operations over two years ago.

“This giant agribusiness enterprise, with majority ownership by Charlesbank, the investment arm of the Harvard endowment fund, was found to have illegally confined their cattle to feedlots, depriving them of fresh air and healthy grazing conditions as required by law,” said Mark A. Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst for the Wisconsin-based Cornucopia Institute. In addition Kastel stated, “Aurora was also found to have brought in conventional cattle to their operation instead of milking cows that had been managed organically for their entire lives. This corporation was out and out cheating.”

The fact that the founders and managers of Aurora had been some of the most successful entrepreneurs in the industry, having also founded Horizon Organic Dairy prior to its purchase by Dean Foods, has left many in the industry resentful of what they call a “sweetheart deal” between the USDA and the giant dairy operator.

“Anyone found to be committing willful violations of the regulations, anyone, should not remain certified,” affirmed Jim Riddle former chairman of the National Organic Standards Board and a recognized international authority on organic certification. Family-scale farmers from all over the country have questioned on Internet forums whether they would have been allowed one year of supervision instead of being fined and having their organic certification revoked, after being found to have willfully violated the law.

Aurora is the leading private-label organic milk processor supplying store brands for Wal-Mart, Target, Costco, Wild Oats, Safeway, and many other grocery chains.

The USDA launched their investigation based on a formal legal complaint over Aurora’s management practices filed by The Cornucopia Institute in November 2005. Cornucopia had first alerted the Agency of Aurora’s irregularities with a legal complaint in January 2005, but the USDA closed the case without conducting any investigation, for what Cornucopia describes as “political reasons” revealed in documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act by the watchdog group.

This week the nonprofit farm policy research group filed an additional legal complaint alleging that a newer 4000-4200 head dairy that Aurora has brought into production, which the company describes as a “pioneering green-fields model for organic dairies,” was also skirting the law.

“Our initial investigations, including photography, satellite imagery, and interviews with dairy industry professionals who visited the facility, indicate that this giant farm is also not grazing their cattle or providing pasture in accordance with federal law,” stated Will Fantle, research director at Cornucopia. “Although they have more pasture, the number of cows per acre does not meet legal precedents, and the quality of the pasture, grown in the semiarid conditions of Colorado, also does not meet legal definitions—this corporation is continuing to ‘game the system’ and needs to be brought to justice.”

Cornucopia also announced the filing of a legal complaint against the two USDA accredited certifiers associated with Aurora. The complaint alleges that the illegal activities identified by the USDA at Aurora were overt and should have been uncovered by the certifiers, Quality Assurance International (QAI) and the state of Colorado’s organic program, if they had been fulfilling their oversight responsibilities.

Cornucopia also asked the USDA to sanction the two certifiers for consulting with and helping Aurora with damage-control and the public relations fallout after the USDA enforcement action was issued August 29. Representatives speaking for the two certifiers continued to praise Aurora for their organic management practices in the company’s August 29 news release and failed to mention their own negligence in Aurora’s organic fraud.

“It is incumbent upon organic certification officials to maintain the highest level of impartiality and to protect their organizations from conflict of interest. QAI and the state of Colorado have failed miserably in meeting this mandate,” Fantle stated.

In addition to the new legal complaints, Cornucopia is conferring with a team of lawyers about a potential civil action on behalf of farmers and other processors that have been economically injured by a flood of surplus milk, much of which has come from illegal Aurora facilities. In the third quarter of 2007 organic farmers started to see the price of their milk drop, and some have been shut out of the marketplace.

“The majority of all organic farmers in this country, and the brands that we sell our milk to, truly believe in the ethics that are the foundation of our industry,” said Steve Pechacek an organic farmer from Mondovi, Wisconsin, and immediate past president of the Midwest Organic Dairy Producers Association. “We cannot allow greed and the inaction of the USDA to tarnish the reputation of organic products,” Pechacek added. “We sincerely hope that the USDA will act on the new Cornucopia complaints, and if the executive branch won’t, we will seek justice in the courts.”

Cornucopia has consistently emphasized that the vast majority of dairy brands in the marketplace are from highly ethical companies. Cornucopia maintains a listing and scorecard on their web site, www.cornucopia.org, so that consumers can identify brands whose milk comes from ethical family farmers who maintain high environmental standards and practice humane animal husbandry.

www.cornucopia.org

SUCCESS STORY: Thanks to pressure from organic consumers, Cornucopia Institute and the OCA, the USDA has finally taken preliminary enforcement action against Aurora Organic for falsely labeling factory farmed milk as “organic”. Aurora is the nation’s largest supplier of “private label” organic milk to large retail chains and wholesalers including Wild Oats, Wal-Mart, Costco (“High Meadows”), Safeway (“O” Organics), Target, Giant (“Natures Promise”), UNFI (“Woodstock Farms”), and others. Part of USDA’s long overdue slap on the wrist of Aurora includes a legally binding Consent Agreement by Aurora to stop labeling some (but not all) of its milk as “USDA Organic” and to sell off hundreds of conventionally raised cows from their massive feedlots. In effect the USDA has forced Aurora to admit that they have deliberately and willfully defrauded organic consumers since 2003 by selling millions of dollars of cheap feedlot milk as organic, utilizing intensive confinement of their milk cows and illegally importing calves from non-organic dairy farms. For more information on this issue see: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_6912.cfm

THE NEXT STEP: For more than a year, the OCA has called for a boycott of Aurora’s bogus organic milk. While we are happy to see USDA bureaucrats finally get off their butts and at least do something to protect organic dairy standards, concerned organic consumers are outraged that the USDA has not done all that federal law requires. Although this multimillion dollar corporation was found to have “willfully” violated federal law in misrepresenting their milk as organic and defrauding consumers around the country for over three years, they have been allowed to remain in business and have seemingly gotten away without being fined a single cent. We’re sick and tired of greedy corporations like Aurora degrading organic standards.

It’s time for grassroots Organic Consumers to prepare for legal action and stop this fraud once and for all. But to do this we need your help. If you feel you have been defrauded by purchasing “organic” milk from any of the retail chains or wholesalers listed above (i.e. those that get their milk from Aurora), and you are willing to work with a team of OCA-allied legal researchers to stop this organic labeling fraud, please contact us with the information requested below, and our legal research team will contact you by email or telephone.

You can also help us out a lot if you purchased any storebrand organic milk or butter from the retailers listed above or from other stores, from January 2004 through today, by dropping us a note at ronniecummins@organicconsumers.org or calling the OCA office at (218)- 226-4164 and letting us know:

1. Your name and phone number
2. Name and brand of purchase
3. Name of store
4. City, state and addresses available
5. Approximate timeframe of purchase (ex. 2004-2006)

www.organicconsumers.org

Nearly every doctor in the United States accepts gifts of some sort from pharmaceutical companies, but in many cases there is no benefit to patients, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Researchers surveyed 1,662 U.S. doctors and found that 94 percent of them reported “some type of relationship with the pharmaceutical industry.” Eighty-three percent of respondents reported receiving gifts of food at work, and 78 percent reported receiving free drug samples. More than 33 percent of doctors reported receiving monetary payments from drug companies in exchange for attending medical meetings, giving lectures or signing up patients to participate in drug tests.

The researchers also found that the number of meetings between doctors and pharmaceutical industry representatives had actually increased since the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America lobby group adopted its new code of conduct in 2002. Yet there seemed to be no apparent benefit to patients from many of these meetings.

The survey also revealed that the drug industry appears to selectively make gifts to more influential doctors. While family practitioners see the most patients, heart doctors were twice as likely to get direct payments from drug companies. Doctors who were involved in training others were more likely to receive gifts, while those who treated the poor were less likely. Female doctors were less likely to receive gifts than males.

“It appears pretty clear that industry forms tighter relationships with doctors who are really the thought leaders, the ones who are likely to affect the behavior of other doctors,” said study co-author David Blumenthal of the Institute for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital.

The researchers received responses to only about half of the surveys that they sent out, even though doctors were offered $20 for their participation.

Two other studies published recently in the journal “PLoS Medicine” found that the sales techniques used by drug companies do in fact influence which drugs doctors prescribe.

www.newstarget.com

A Minnesota disclosure law has revealed that drug companies are devoting large sums of money to many members of state advisory panels who make decisions on which drugs will be used in Medicaid programs.

The Minnesota Medicaid Drug Formulary Committee is considering a conflict-of-interest policy that requires panel members to disclose such financial relationships and refrain from voting on drugs that may pose a conflict of interest.

Without such disclosure laws — which exist only in three states, Minnesota, Vermont, and Maine — there’s no way to know whether financial ties between the drug industry and state advisers exist.

Upon examining records in Minnesota, the Associated Press found the eight-member state panel did include some ties to the industry. Namely:

John E. Simon, a Minneapolis psychiatrist, earned $354,700 from companies including Eli Lilly and AstraZeneca from 2004 to 2006 in honoraria, speaker’s and consulting fees, plus other payments ranging from $500 to $93,012.

Robert Straka, a University of Minnesota pharmacy professor, earned $78,100 in honoraria and other fees from 2000 to 2006.

Both men, and the committee chairman, maintain that the payments did not influence their committee decisions.

Still, medical ethicists say that state drug advisers should not receive money from drug companies because of their power over poor, disabled patients in the Medicaid system.

The Minnesota Medicaid Drug Formulary Committee’s recommendations to the state are usually followed. In 2006, they led $240 million in spending on drugs for 202,000 patients.

Minnesota state officials are planning to examine the Committee’s past actions for any potential bias, and will screen advisory council members for ties to the drug industry. They will also be requiring the Committee to record how each member of the panel votes.

Washington Post August 21, 2007

Dr. Mercola

The more attention that’s paid to the rampant conflicts of interest going on in local, state, and federal governments, the better. This Washington Post article clearly illustrates the kind of money being thrown around by drug companies.

The panel members in the article stated that they were not influenced by the hundreds of thousands of dollars they were collectively given. And they may very well believe this.

But there is something they have not taken into account.

Cognitive bias.

This is the term that describes your mind’s preconceived notions about reality, and its effect on the way you think and act. These panel members have received lavish gifts (money) from the drug companies, and this will impact their decisions, whether consciously or not.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is becoming infamous for its many ties to the drug industry, so it’s not at all surprising to see these types of connections on the state level too.

www.mercola.com

On August 9, Daniel Stockin, a public health professional of The Lillie Center, Inc., presented the CDC’s joint ethics panel with a detailed, formal complaint alleging unethical activities by the CDC.

According to the complaint, Oral Health Division manager William Maas and CDC Director Julie Gerberding have committed “serious and egregious” unethical actions, by not disseminating new findings about the real hazards of fluoridated water.

Stockin stated, “People with kidney disease or on dialysis should see this complaint and the report by the National Research Council on fluoride. And if you happen to be a member of the population with diabetes or HIV, you will be amazed how the NRC report contains important information you should know about – but that CDC has elected not to openly share with the public because it runs at odds with putting fluoride in drinking water.”

In a separate development, news surfaced that on the same day 600 doctors, dentists, and other professionals have signed a petition calling for a halt to water fluoridation, asking for congressional hearings on the issue.

FluorideAlert.org August 13, 2007
Organic Consumers Association August 13, 2007

Dr. Mercola’s Comments

In 2005, eleven unions within the EPA publicly called for a ban of water fluoridation, over concerns that it may cause bone cancer. And in 2006, the American Dental Association warned mothers about using fluoridated water to mix their powdered baby formula.

Now, finally, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is developing software to try to assess just how much fluoride you’re ingesting, citing new findings that cumulative fluoride intake might lead to painful skeletal fluorosis.

Yet despite long-standing, ever-mounting evidence of fluoride’s hazard to human health, the CDC still clings to its outdated recommendation to add fluoride to drinking water in order to protect your oral health. Even though it was a lie, right from the start.

The Embarrassing Truth About Fluoride

Award-winning journalist Christopher Bryson, a former producer at the BBC, wrote about his shocking discoveries in his book “The Fluoride Deception,” and I also ran an exclusive interview with him, just over three years ago. His book details far more than the dangers of fluoride — it reveals a multi-tiered effort, or as Bryson says, an abuse of power by military and industry scientists, and public health officials, to shamelessly promote fluoride to the dentistry field and the American public with little regard to the implications it would have on human health.

90 percent of the fluoride added to your drinking water is hydrofluoric acid — a compound of fluorine that is a chemical byproduct of aluminum, steel, cement, phosphate, and nuclear weapons manufacturing.

Fluoride is also the active toxin in rat poisons and cockroach powder.

It is nothing but a carcinogenic industrial waste product, passed off on the public as a “nutrient” with necessary health benefits, to benefit the nuclear arms, aluminum, and phosphate manufacturers financially, to the tune of about $ 10 billion per year. Aided, of course, by your federal health agencies, controlled by political interest.

What Can Fluoride Do to Your Health?

Fluoride, contrary to popular belief, does not stop tooth decay at all, but rather causes teeth to rot and crumble – a condition called dental fluorosis.

According to the CDC itself, about 32 percent of American children have some level of dental fluorosis, characterized by mottling and pitting of the teeth. The real percentage is probably a lot higher than that. In 1993, the National Research Council reported 84 percent of the population had dental fluorosis in areas where fluoride in the water exceeded 3.7 parts per million (ppm).

What does that mean in plain English?

It means that if your water company adds a mere 3.7 drops of fluoride in every 13 gallons of water, you have an 84 percent chance of developing dental fluorosis.

The Environmental Working Group has petitioned the National Institutes of Health to list fluoride in tap water as a carcinogen. A 1991 study by the U.S. Public Health Service found a strong link between fluoride exposure and bone cancer in boys. They found there was a 79 percent increase in osteosarcoma in fluoridated communities and a 4 percent decrease in non-fluoridated communities.

Fluoride is closely linked to osteosarcoma for these reasons:

• Fifty percent of ingested fluoride is deposited in your bones.
• Fluoride is a mitogen that stimulates bone growth.
• Fluoride is known to cause human cells to mutate.

So when fluoride is deposited into the bones, it stimulates bone growth, but not the good kind. Instead, it’s growth that damages cells at the ends of bones and causes osteosarcoma.

How Can You Protect Yourself From Fluoride?

Whereas some other chemicals added to your drinking water will evaporate, fluoride is not one of them. Even cooking, food processing, regular filtration, or digestion doesn’t remove fluoride. It just keeps going right up the food chain, accumulating in fat cells.

Therefore, the best place to start is by filtering your tap water with a reverse osmosis filter. And that includes for purposes such as:

• Washing vegetables
• Making ice cubes
• Cooking, since heat does not destroy fluoride

Please don’t fool yourself by thinking you can tell whether your water is safe or not by the way it looks, tastes, or smells. If you are receiving your water from a municipal water supply in the US the odds are that your water is fluoridated, and a simple carbon filter will not remove it.

Also remember that installing a filter to purify the water in your kitchen may not be enough. You might want to also consider adding filters in your shower and your tub, since you could still be exposed to contaminated water (which can be absorbed through your skin) when you shower or bathe.

www.mercola.com

According the results of a survey by Mambo Sprouts research services released August 20, 2007, consumers are torn between buying local and buying organic food, but in the end want both. The results show that 36.1% of natural product consumers said they would choose local produce over organic items, while another 33.3% indicated the opposite. The remaining respondents said they were unsure which to choose, but overall, consumers reported a preference for food that was both local and organic.

Respondent comments reflected three distinct motivators for purchasing locally grown food: 1) better for the environment and sustainability due to reduced environmental impact of transporting food, 2) a belief that much local produce is fresher and healthier – even if not certified organic, and 3) a general mistrust or confusion regarding organic food labeling.

“This survey revealed that consumers are definitely looking for more clarity and definition in organic product classifications,” says Matthew A. Saline, CEO of Mambo Sprouts Marketing, a multi-faceted direct marketing company that operates exclusively in the health, natural and organic products arena. Regarding the USDA Organic seal, 46.7% of respondents thought it indicated 100% organic contents, 24.8% thought it meant at least 95% organic, 16% thought it was 70%+ organic, 12% felt it meant some organic. Some consumers also expressed concerns that the USDA standards were declining or weaker than they would like.

Currently, the standard behind the USDA Organic seal indicates that a processed product is 95-100% organic. A product that is 100% organic can be labeled as such. Organic produce marked with the seal is 100% organic. Beyond Pesticides believes that a strong organic standard backed by consumer confidence is key to eliminating toxic pesticides from our food production system, and encourages its members to buy both organic and local whenever possible.

When asked what label information would most influence organic food purchasing, seven in 10 cited “All Organic” while just 25% selected “USDA Organic”. More than half said they would be more confident about buying organics if stores had their own organic food standards in addition to the USDA seal.

To facilitate shopping, consumers asked for more information. Seven in 10 respondents asked for better in-store signage while 45% thought flyers and information pamphlets would be beneficial.

Based on the findings, Mambo Spouts – an organic, health and natural foods marketing service, had the following advice for retailers marketing and advertising organic products: feature organics and local products since the consumer ideal is local and organic; improve signage signifying organic and local food products; educate with colorful eye-catching placards at the point of purchase; label products as “All Organic” when possible; and, complement in-store strategies with other marketing and educational campaigns about organic products (i.e., mailings, newsletters).

Survey results courtesy of Mambo Sprouts’ online survey taken between July 26 and July 30, 2007—850 natural and organic product consumers responding.

www.beyondpesticides.org

An intoxicated nation

We have become a nation of drug addicts — and I don’t mean illegal drugs. From the high-fructose corn syrup and caffeine in the food supply to all the prescription drugs people now believe they need because they saw them on TV, synthetic substances now dominate American medicine (and American tragedy). An estimated 30 percent of all traffic accidents are now caused by people on medication, and yet the drug companies are pushing even more drugs for yet more fictitious diseases — because, you know, there’s always a way to add yet one more pill to the daily chemical intake, right?

Over the last ten years alone, there has been a forty-fold increase in the number of children being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. That’s a 4000% rise in the number of children with this so-called “disease.” Gee, why isn’t the CDC involved? Any increase that large should be due to an infectious disease pandemic — if it were real, that is. But there is no pandemic, no outbreak, and no real cause for alarm. The 4000% increase is due entirely to clever marketing, disease mongering and the takeover of psychiatric medicine by Big Pharma.

Modern medicine is the cause of disease

It increasingly seems like the only real disease in this country is the sickness of believing in pharmaceutical medicine. It’s a kind of madness, actually: Thinking that a synthetic chemical can solve all your problems and put your life in perfect order like those actors shown in pharmaceutical television ads. I believe it will one day be viewed as a kind of cultural mass psychosis. When it comes to health, our modern world has lost its mind, and the so-called science backing it up has lost all touch with scientific reality. Modern medicine is a hoax. Science has been abandoned for marketing. Safety has been thrown out the window and replaced with profit potential. Ethics have surrendered to greed, and we have now become a nation of mind-numbed druggies who seem increasingly incapable of questioning the news, voting intelligently, or understanding anything that’s really going on in the world (such as the coming collapse of the real estate bubble and the inevitable hyperinflation of the U.S. dollar).

Here are the seven facts you need to remember about everything you’re seeing today in modern medicine:

Fact #1: 90 percent of all diseases (cancer, diabetes, depression, heart disease, etc.) are easily preventable through diet, nutrition, sunlight and exercise. None of these solutions are ever promoted because they make no money.

Fact #2: Nearly all the consumption of pharmaceuticals today is a direct result of marketing to the public and covertly bribing physicians to write more prescriptions. There is very little drug consumption based on scientific merit.

Fact #3: No pharmaceuticals actually cure or resolve the underlying causes of disease. Even “successful” drugs only manage symptoms, usually at the cost of interfering with other physiological functions that will cause side effects down the road. There is no such thing as a drug without a side effect.

Fact #4: There is no financial incentive for anyone in today’s system of medicine (drug companies, hospitals, doctors, etc.) to actually make patients well. Profits are found in continued sickness, not wellness or prevention.

Fact #5: Virtually all the “prevention” programs you see today (such as free mammograms or other screening programs) are little more than cleverly disguised patient recruitment schemes. They use free screenings to scare people into agreeing to expensive and often unnecessary treatments that enrich drug companies. Breast cancer mammography is a complete scam: The machines actually cause cancer!

Fact #6: Doctors know virtually nothing about nutrition and are still not taught nutrition in medical schools. Expecting a doctor to teach you about how to prevent disease is sort of like expecting a car mechanic to show you how to perform brain surgery. Although there are some exceptions (doctors who have taught themselves nutrition), most doctors remain so nutritionally illiterate that they have no familiarity with the natural plant-based medicines found in everyday fruits and vegetables.

Fact #7: Nobody has any interest in your health except you. No corporation, no doctor, and no government has any desire to actually make you well. Keeping you sick makes it easier for them to control and financially exploit you. Healthy, aware individuals are perceived as a threat to the tyrannical institutions now running this country, and they’ve figured out that the best way to keep a nation controlled and subdued is to drug ‘em all and keep the people in a constant state of brain fog from medications and fluoride. The only healthy, aware, critically thinking individuals I know are all 100% free of pharmaceuticals and processed foods (and watch no television, either).

Remember those seven facts and you’ll know more about health and disease than most people. And for your part, stay healthy! Work to safely get off all prescription drugs, eat a diet of natural, wholesome foods (and avoid processed foods), exercise regularly, avoid toxic chemicals in your home (throw out those toxic laundry detergents and switch to soap nuts), and toss those toxic personal care products (skin creams, cosmetics, shampoo, etc.). Stay natural, healthy and alert. Be well, and you’ll be the exception! And please, never be so gullible as to think that your government is going to “save you” with a new health care reform plan. Even if we switch to free health insurance for everyone, the whole system is still based on toxic treatments that cure nothing!

www.newstarget.com

Yesterday (aug 31) I posted shocking macrophotography pictures of processed meat products. Since then, over a quarter of a million people have viewed the photos in the first 24 hours, and word has spread all over the internet about these sick, graphic images of processed meats. I’ve already received numerous complaints of people vomiting (I’m not kidding)! More importantly, however, I’ve also received many comments from people who say they are no longer going to eat processed meat products at all. They’re either opting for fresh meats or thinking about going vegetarian. I have not yet heard from Kraft Foods or Jimmy Dean, although there’s not much they can say since these are accurate, honest pictures of the products they’re making and selling right now (the photos were not altered).

Click here to view pictures

Mike Adams
 www.newstarget.com