again the best law money can buy.. Weakening of Organic Standard Is Considered

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

Weakening of Organic Standard Is Considered

February 14, 2003
By MARIAN BURROS 




 

Buried within the $397 billion spending bill passed last
night by Congress is a provision that would permit
livestock producers to certify and label meat as "organic"
even if the animals had been fed partly or entirely on
conventional rather than organic grain.

Under the provision, if the Agriculture Department
certifies that organic feed is commercially available only
at more than twice the price of conventional feed, then the
department cannot enforce regulations requiring that
livestock labeled organically raised be fed only organic
feed. 

"This is an example of someone doing an end run to
manipulate the government with disregard for the public's
wishes," said Katherine DiMatteo, executive director of the
Organic Trade Association, which represents the organic
industry. 

The provision was added to the omnibus spending bill behind
closed doors on Wednesday night with only Republicans
present. It was included on behalf of a Baldwin, Ga.,
poultry producer, the Fieldale Farms Corporation, which has
been trying since last summer to get an exemption that
would allow it to feed its chickens a mix of conventional
and organic feed. The company says there is not enough
organic feed available.

Congressional officials on both sides of the aisle say
Speaker J. Dennis Hastert added the last-minute provisions
at the request of Representative Nathan Deal, Republican of
Georgia. 

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, which
monitors campaign contributions, Mr. Deal received $4,000
from employees of Fieldale, which is in his district,
during his last campaign. Calls to the offices of Mr. Deal
were not returned. 

When Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, who
wrote the organic standards program, learned of the
last-minute addition to the spending bill he sent a letter
to his colleagues urging them to defeat the provisions.
Both he and Representative Sam Farr, Democrat of
California, plan to introduce legislation to strike the
provisions from the bill.

"This whole thing is absolutely outrageous," Mr. Leahy
said. "After years and years and years of work, to have
someone sneak it in in the dark of night and wipe it out
makes no sense. It's a poke in the eye of a lot of very
hard-working organic farmers."

Ed Nicholson, a spokesman for Tyson Foods, which is test
marketing organic chickens, said: "We opposed adding this
language to the omnibus spending bill. We think it is
important to meet the organic requirements because
otherwise it will compromise the integrity of the organic
standards." 

The organic rules, which took effect in October, are an
attempt to standardize a hodgepodge of regulations for an
$11 billion industry that has been growing at the rate of
20 percent a year for a decade.

The 2002 Farm Bill directed the agriculture secretary to
assess the availability of organically produced feed for
livestock and poultry. The report has not been released,
but information from Organic Trade Association members
indicates that organic feed is commercially available at
prices lower than those in the language of the exemption.

"I think this jeopardizes the whole organic industry in the
United States," Mr. Farr said of the provision before
Congress.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/14/politics/14ORGA.html?ex=1046326924&ei=1&en
=f652cfbc248e566f



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