There are a lot of well-meaning people like us out there who are Certified Organic because we believe in what Organic was originally meant to portray.  Before we even went through the expense of organic certification, we were practicing organic principals. But now, an industry has been created to police what we naturally should be doing in the first place — growing and raising whole, healthy food in a humane way that is good for us and the planet.

Since the days of J.I. Rodale, Lady Eve Balfour, and Sir Albert Howard, we’ve come a long way—deviating from a path so simple, and turning it on its head.  Organic, as a way of life and a way of growing, was born out of an idea that we could not continue to deplete our natural resources and still produce healthy food.  That pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and monoculture were NOT the new and improved agriculture, but just shortcuts to profits for an industrial complex that wants us to consume, consume, consume.

So what happens when the term ‘Organic’ starts to take hold in the minds and hearts of millions of Americans (and the world)?  What is a giant food processor like Dean Foods, Kelloggs, or General Mills to do when this movement starts to slowly eat at their profits faster than you can gobble up a bag of Cheetos?  Well, they gobble up small farms and organic businesses, of course.  Acquisition.

I recently discoverd an article at The Cornucopia Institute that shows who owns what, and it’s changing all the time.  Dr. Phil Howard, an Assistant Professor at Michigan State, creates and updates his organic food business chart and tracks the big box corporations acquisitions of organic business, as well as our food chain overall.

Notice any familiar names?

The type is too small to read so here is a link to a PDF version.

In essence you are looking at a small snapshot of a much bigger picture of the ‘industry of organic’.  Not only is acquisition part of the process, but it is the deceptive pastoral image that is being sold to you. The notion that you are buying from a small, family farm business is all part of the game. Pictures of a farmhouse, an old lady with a pitchfork, cows walking gracefully through verdant, lush grasslands?  All part of the show folks.  But it is what’s behind the curtain that counts.

Do you notice any familiar names in the chart that end up in your shopping cart? Cascadian Farm, one of the founders of organic agriculture, is now owned by General Mills.  Horizon Milk – Dean Foods.  Bear Naked and Kashi – Kelloggs.  Odwalla…none other than Coca-Cola.

But these corporations have not just stopped at acquisition.  Since the USDA got involved a few years ago, and decided to turn the USDA ORGANIC label into a icon of superiority, these corporations have petitioned hard that certain ‘restricted’ elements be allowed under the label since they ‘can’t find a suitable substitute’.  I guess ‘organic’ things don’t hold up as well in a TV dinner.

And here’s a scathing little video that shows the utter failure of the Organic Certification process in arguably the largest purveyor of organic products:  Whole Foods.  Whole Foods supplies 175 stores nationwide with natural and organic products.  Unfortunately, these products and their certifiers are dubious at best.  Especially when items are coming from other countries such as China.

So, what can we do?

Buy Local
When I say buy local I mean really local.  Know your grower.  Even join a CSA.  Visit their farm, take the kids, work with them picking snap peas for a couple hours.  Shop at a farmers market nearby.  When you go there, ask the farmer where his farm is.  Sometimes farmers markets have vendors from over 100 miles away.  Depending on your taste, this might exceed your idea of ‘local’.

Grow Your Own
Even if it’s in a couple pots on the back porch, it’s really amazing how much food you can produce with a little water and a couple of bucks in seeds.  The kids love to get involved and it’s been shown that when they grow veggies, they are more likely to eat them. Since none of the states in our union are meeting the daily requirements of fruits and vegetables, and one of three of our children are obese due to the processed foods we are feeding them, it’s an easy way to educate them and introduce healthy produce into their diets.

Be Vigilant
Read labels.  Where is it from?  Is it 100% organic?  Made with some organic ingredients? Is it in season (if not, it’s probably coming from a country far away from the organic ideals)?  Don’t necessarily trust the pictures and graphics you see on the label?  If it looks too good to be true…it probably is.

Personally I would love to see a label and certification system for Locally Grown or Local.  A small badge that would, for instance, say “Locally Grown 25″ (meaning that it comes from within 25 miles of where you are purchasing it), etc.  Why the need for a badge?  I believe that the term ‘local’ is becoming the new ‘Organic’.

The not-so-distant future

My fear is that it’s already being abused.

If someone were to ask you what you thought local meant when it came to your food, most people would probably say within 100 miles or less.  The word local and locally grown is already being used in supermarkets across the U.S.  for food that is coming to one central distribution center supplied by several nearby states or even further.  It has no true definition. Local to your supermarket might even mean grown in the USA.  Most likely at a great (and unnecessary) distance.

Most importantly, we need to start realizing that we are dependent on a food chain that is connected by thousands of miles.  What if you were cut off from this source of food by a union strike or natural disaster?  What would you do?  How would you feed your family when everyone around you, thousands of people, are all cut off and seeking food as well?

Do you think I’m crazy? Check out my Transition Town post from a year ago for a reality check!

Just a few days ago, USDA agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack announced several new initiatives to assure the safety and quality of food purchased by USDA for the National School Lunch Program, stating, “Nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our Nation’s school children”.   Glad to hear it. This announcement came just two months after a scathing USA Today article declaring that fast food standards for meat are far superior to those the USDA has for meat in your children’s school lunch.  The USDA was sending chicken slated as compost or pet food to our school cafeterias!  Alarming to say the least.

President Barack Obama signs a memorandum on childhood obesity in the Oval Office. From left are, Education Secretary Arne Duncan, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, First Lady Michelle Obama, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar February 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Samantha Appleton)

One of Michelle Obama’s biggest supporters is her husband and President, Barack Obama.  President Obama signed a memorandum February 9, 2010 that establishes a task force on childhood obesity to address this growing health epidemic. The new task force is charged with developing an inter-agency action plan to solve the problem of obesity among our Nation’s children.  Within 90 days, the task force is to develop and submit to the President a comprehensive inter-agency plan that details a coordinated strategy, identifies key benchmarks, and outlines an action plan. Members of the task force include: the Secretary of the Interior; the Secretary of Agriculture; Secretary of Health and Human Services; Secretary of Education; Director of the Office of Management and Budget; Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff to the First Lady; Assistant to the President for Economic Policy; and heads of other executive departments, agencies, or offices as the Chair may designate.

I’ll be sure to keep you updated on our First Lady’s work.  We’ve been tickled from the beginning that she was carrying a torch for ‘growing your own’.  This kind of campaign is exactly in line with our own efforts here at Surf City Growers and our new organic curriculum for preK-3rd graders.  The direct link between growing wholesome food, education, exercise and nutrition for children in order to create lifelong habits of health for our nation is at stake.  Some of us argue that it’s a national health crisis of proportions we cannot fathom.

Let’s join together to stop it in its tracks.

Visit Michelle Obama’s website at LETSMOVE.GOV

Smart Program, or Corporate Greed?

Smart Choices.  We all need to make them every day.  If I am not smart enough to look both ways before crossing a street, I could be hit by an 18-wheeler (probably loaded with processed food).  Thus, I have developed the habit of looking first.  I was taught this at an early age by older authority figures who thought it was a good idea to preserve my life by showing me this Smart Choice – it is a choice of course. I could choose not to look.  I could just take into account that there is a slim mathematical chance that I can make it across an expressway if I just charge ahead without looking.  But some advice is invaluable.  Take for instance the Smart Choice Program.  Corporate food giants have recently joined forces because they are afraid that all of us, the consumers, have gotten some dangerous ideas about what healthy food really is.

So, thank goodness that there is a new website out there that offers us a searchable database for making ‘smart choices’ when it comes to diet.  With a badge that displays their mission of ‘…building healthy habits for the long term’.  Really?  Take a closer look and you will think twice.  The Smart Choices Program was developed by an alliance of over a dozen giant food conglomerates and some industry “experts”. They devised a new nutrition labeling program meant to help consumers make “smarter food and beverage choices.”

Critical to building disease, obesity and dependence

So, give it a shot.  Try doing a search on breakfast cereal.  You get results like Froot Loops®, Keebler Cookie Crunch® and Lucky Charms®.

And this label is appearing all over your local grocery as I write this.  What has the FDA and USDA done about it?   Nothing.

If you see this label, know it for what it is – an outright affront to your intelligence and a personal attack on you and your families health by some of the largest and greediest corporations on the planet.  If you want to do something about it, head to Food Democracy Now! to sign a petition to have this travesty addressed.  Without your help, labeling and deceptive marketing will continue to dominate our landscape.  Help us fight back.