USDA LOUISVILLE MEETING CANCELED DUE TO CEASEFIRE IN ORGANIC WAR CAUSED BY FEDERAL SHUTDOWN

Contact Mark Kastel at 608-625-2042 for an immediate release on October 11, 2013. Federal shutdown puts an end to the organic battle; a USDA organics conference in Louisville is canceled. Organic activists ranting against the Obama administration’s and industry’s power grab http://www.cornucopia.org/2013/10/usda-louisville-meeting-canceled-fed-shutdown-forces-cease-fire-organic-war wi: Farmers and consumers who rely on the US Department of Agriculture to monitor the legality and integrity of the organic business are among the latest victims as collateral damage mounts and congress continues to stand in the way of a continuing resolution to finance the federal government. Congress established the National Organic Standards Board (nosb) in a special regulatory framework (http://www.ams.usda.gov/amsv1.0/ams.fetchtemplatedata.do?template=templateq&navid=nationalorganicprogram&leftnav=nationalorganicprogram&page=nosbhome&description=nosb&acct=nosb). The purpose of the NOSB is to advise the USDA Secretary on policies affecting the organic industry and, in particular, to supervise and carefully review any synthetic or non-organic material or ingredient used in organic farming and food production for approval. Furthermore, the NSF evaluates the permitted compounds that sunset, as the organic materials rule mandates that materials be reassessed every five years. The semiannual NOSB conference that was supposed to take place in Louisville, Kentucky, during the week of October 21 has now been postponed. In an email sent out on October 1st on behalf of the National Organic Program, Miles McKeevoy threatened to cancel the meeting unless a budget was in place by Thursday, October 10th at 5 p.m. eastern standard time. With the deadlock in Washington, progress in managing the organic industry, enforcement, and oversight have all come to a screeching halt, said Mark A. Kastel, senior agriculture policy analyst at the Cornucopia Institute, located in Wisconsin (http://www.cornucopia.org/). The organic trade association (http://www.ota.com/index.html), a lobbying group for agribusiness interests, and public interest groups that support farmers, consumers, environmentalists, and cooperative retailers, have been at odds with each other over the years as the organic industry has grown to be a $30 billion industry. The most recent controversy is on the USDA’s attempt to seize control by unilaterally altering the requirements for approving synthetic and non-organic components used in organic products. Congress established a diverse 15-member NOSB with a minority of corporate agribusiness representation when it approved the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990. Furthermore, the laws demand a two-thirds majority for decisive votes, such as reapproving a synthetic substance for use in organics after it expires, in an effort to drive industry supervision toward agreement. Barry Flammer, the former chairman of the NOSB and the chair of the policy development subcommittee for four years, said that the usda has now turned the entire sunset process on its head. Revised during the last several years, the board’s policy and procedures manual calls for a thorough sunset review, which is starting to appear in the choices. The recent move by the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP) disregarded both the Organic Act and the board’s standards. Crucially, the NOP published an edict in the federal register (http://69.175.53.6/register/2013/sep/16/2013-22439.pdf) requiring a two-thirds vote to remove a material instead of requiring a super-majority of the board every five years to continue using a synthetic in organics, flamm explained. This was done without first consulting the NOSB, as required by law. James Riddle, a highly esteemed former head of the National Organic Program, offered his thoughts on the USDA’s unilateral policy change. the use of synthetic substances in organic production and processing is an exception, not an entitlement, the riddle said. For drugs on the national list to be renewed, the NOSB must vote in favor of a decisive positive vote. Substances expire after five years if the NOSB does not vote in favor of them decisively. The Cornucopia Institute profiled what it called a corrupt relationship between large agribusinesses that had invested in organics and usda officials in a report titled The Organic Watergate (http://www.cornucopia.org/2012/05/the-organic-watergate-advocates-condemn-corruption-and-usdas-cozy-relationship-with-corporate-agribusinesses-in-organics-2/). The investigation revealed the presence of skewed technical evaluations of artificial materials evaluated by the NOSB, as well as the appointment of agribusiness executives to positions designated by Congress for farmers, scientists, and other impartial stakeholders. We brought the fraud and deceit in the process to light. the outcome was a change in direction for the NOSB, which has been more cautious in keeping some synthetics out of the organic production stream, according to codirector of Cornucopia Mark Kastel. Since the publication of that report, the NOSB has voted to stop using tetracycline, an antibiotic used to control fireblight on apples and pears, due to concerns about its potential effects on human health and the environment. It has also rejected petitions for the use of several synthetic preservatives that were proposed for use in infant formula and unnecessary additives like sugar beet fiber (likely made from gmos). the ota and its members (whitewave, kellogg’s, smuckers, safeway, etc.) have seemingly lost control with the process at the national organic standards board, said kastel of cornucopia. in response it appears that the usda is changing the rules of the game making it virtually impossible to remove synthetics from use in organics, flamm said. in an article on the site (http://organicmattersblog.com/2013/10/01/get-behind-your-national-organic-program-stop-the-lies/) Melody Meyer, the vice president of policy and industry relations at United Natural Foods, Inc. (unfi) and the recently elected board chair of the OTA, had a distinctly different opinion about the proposed sunset amendments by the USDA. The gusto and vigor the program [nop] delivers to our growing industry is something she urged for support of, but she also dismissed the concerns raised by public interest organizations as bogus and lies. The Cornucopia Institute is worried about the USDA’s power grab, and they are not alone. A number of the most well-known public interest advocates in the organic sector have swiftly responded by strongly denouncing the procedural changes at the NOSB. An online petition against the US Department of Agriculture’s power grab has amassed over 11,000 virtual signatures thanks to the efforts of the Organic Consumers Association. In remarks opposing the shift in organic governance, several well-known proponents of organic farming, such as Consumer Union, Food and Water Watch, Beyond Pesticides, and Center for Food Safety, have expressed their opposition. The stakeholders who genuinely care about the integrity of the organic label, and the principles it was founded upon, are not going away, declared Kevin Engelbert, a certified organic dairy farmer from New York and another former nosb member. The usda might have received a temporary reprieve with the cancellation of the nosb meeting this month in louisville. The NOSB no longer has the authority to investigate conflicts of interest from board members and technical advisors who have business ties, as a result of the USDA’s publication of the organic watergate report. The US Department of Agriculture has declined to abide by the NOS annotations, or requirements, that regulate the use of synthetic materials. One example is the prohibition against the use of the additive carrageenan in organic infant formula, which has been shown in independent studies to be harmful to health and is prohibited by other international regulatory bodies. The USDA has come under fire from the Cornucopia Institute for supporting business interests in enforcement proceedings. The United States Department of Agriculture approved a loophole that permits the use of small porches, which can only hold a small percentage of birds, as a legal substitute for outside access after it was discovered that massive factory farms were putting chickens in buildings—up to 100,000 birds at a time—and failing to provide them with access to the outdoors as required by organic law. Flick, the previous chairman of the NOSB, said that the institutional bias at the USDA, in favor of biotechnology and industrial-scale agriculture, needs to stop at its national organic program. it should not take a court challenge to have political appointees and civil servants uphold the statute passed by congress to protect farmers, ethical business participants, and consumers, engaged in organic commerce. -30- The Cornucopia Institute is a charity dedicated to study and instruction in support of the ecological and sound business practices that underpin organic and sustainable agriculture. The Cornucopia Institute conducts research and investigations on agricultural and food problems in order to provide family farmers, consumers, good food movement partners, and the media with the necessary knowledge. related articles: sunset, government shutdown, USDA, and NOSB