ADD YOUR NAME! Stop 'Big Organic' dairies from ‘cow flipping.’

Dear Supporter,

Good news! The National Organic Program (NOP) is revisiting a proposal that would help organic dairy farmers who play by the rules. How? By making it harder for organic imposters to cheat the system—and ultimately cheat consumers.

The proposal is called the Origin of Livestock rule. But we call it the “cow flipping” rule.

The NOP needs to hear today from consumers: It’s time to close the “cow flipping” loophole in organic dairy that lets the biggest farms produce dirt cheap “organic” milk using dirty tricks.

SIGN THE PETITION: Tell the National Organic Program: No more cow flipping! Finalize the Origin of Livestock Rule and close the loopholes that let Big Organic dairies cheat family farmers and consumers.

TAKE ACTION

black and white dairy cow in a factory farm CAFO feed lot

Here’s the deal. Under organic regulations, certified organic milk must come from cows that have been continuously managed under organic practices since before birth.

There's one exception, under the Origin of Livestock Rule, which allows conventional dairy farmers who want to transition to organic to bring their entire conventional herd under organic practices. Once the cows have been managed organically for one year, the milk from those cows can be certified organic.

The Origin of Livestock Rule was intended to allow farmers to make this transition once.

But some organic certifiers are “interpreting” the rule differently—and allowing dairies to continually transition, by taking calves out of organic management (because it costs less to raise them conventionally) and then transitioning them back to organic when they’re old enough to be milked.

In other words, “flipping” them out of organic, then back into organic.

Conventional dairy farmers have been in crisis for awhile now. Largely because industry consolidation—the big getting bigger—has made it hard for family farmers to compete against factory farm dairies that benefit from economies of scale.

Organic dairy farmers used to fare better, because they could charge a premium for certified organic milk.

But then consolidation hit the organic dairy industry, too. As Big Organic got Bigger, they started cutting corners—and undercutting the prices that authentic organic dairies had to charge.

Now, both conventional and organic small dairy farmers are being forced to sell farms that have been in their families for generations.

As for consumers, they’re getting an inferior product, produced by factory farm-style organic dairies that skirt the rules.

It’s time to clean up organic dairy by setting—and enforcing—the same high standards for all organic dairies, large or small.

TAKE ACTION

Thank you!

Alexis, for the OCA team.

P.S. To help support this, and other campaigns, please consider making a donation to OCA. Nearly 80 percent of our support comes in the form of small donations from individual donors. Thank you!