I'm a geek. I really like learning about things, researching, analyzing and coming up with best practices (as they say in policy). As such, I have no trouble spending a lot of my free time examining who I buy from. Last week, for the first time ever, I bought half a gallon of milk from Straus Family Creamery, a local creamery who seriously practices healthy farms. From their waste management to pasture raised cows to the classy glass bottles, this was one of the only websites that answered all my questions. And I had many.
But too often, I'm fooled by websites. For instance Tom's of Maine, whom we trust our teeth with, is actually owned by Colgate. Odwalla is Coca-cola and to compete, Pepsi bought Naked Juice. See this article for more shockers!
Like when Food, Inc included Walmart in their story, I'm on the fence about whether or not sustainable principles can be kept in the hands of faceless corporations only concerned with the bottom line. Like I said in the beginning, it's not the fact we eat meat that puts us into environmental crisis, but instead the sheer amount of it. Usually when things go bigger, it outgrows the natural system and externalities are pushed onto the environment to maintain a profit.
And while I don't mind people making a profit, I absolutely abhor that they may be making 2x the amount just by slapping organic onto the label. When one giant food conglomerate grows food conventionally next door to its giant organic field, the difference becomes negligible (except perhaps in pesticides). See Micheal Pollan's "Behind the Organic-Industrial Complex." While that difference is enough for others to pay 2x as much and call it a day, I'm not exactly sold. Although I certainly understand why they would stop at labeling- who has time to go through confusing advertising and purposeful misrepresentation? Sometimes, even if you do the research, the results are murky.
I want to trust in what I buy, I want to trust that they are doing the best they can. Nobody has to be perfect, except the Straus's who even agonize over the added weight of using glass for increased transportation emissions vs. being able to reuse glass containers 8x before recycling them. And for that, I gladly chose them over Silk (Conagra), Horizon Organics (Dean Dairy Co, largest dairy in the world) and even Clover Farms and Organic Valley who are non-local farm co-ops. This time, unlike a year ago, I didn't recoil in pain, I gladly paid 2x as much. Because that's the kind of trust I want to buy behind.
Hey,
ReplyDeletehaven't checked in here in a while. Some pointers (quick zinger is that you trust too much :P):
You might want to check in with the Cornucopia Institute's Dairy Survey (which gives detailed evaluations, as well as a quick-glance ratings in "cows", that you ought to enjoy) before believing everything Straus farms says on their website. Your point about "Usually when things go bigger, it outgrows the natural system and externalities are pushed onto the environment to maintain a profit" certainly seems to apply.
Here's an extensive quote from the Straus rating:
As one of the first organic dairies in the West, and well respected, events at Straus Dairy since the initial publication of our organic dairy scorecard have been troubling.
The vast majority of all organic dairy farmers around the country, and the groups that represent them ... and the Organic Consumers Association, among others, all came to a consensus regarding new rules at the USDA designed to require and ensure genuine, season long grazing of ALL organic dairy cows. However, Albert Straus, Straus dairy owner, testified publicly against the rulemaking.
Appearing on a panel, at a symposium sponsored by the USDA on pasture, in State College, Pennsylvania, Mr. Strauss complained that he would be unable to graze his animals, even at the very low minimums proposed, because of the climate. Other dairy farmers from California on the panel challenged his contention and suggested that maybe he needed to reduce the size of his herd so it was compatible with the amount of pasture acreage he had available.
It's troubling that Straus dairy would lobby against rulemaking that would help crack down on the giant corporate dairies that have been skirting the law.
In addition, with great fanfare, Straus Dairy announced that they were generating electricity on the farm from animal waste using a methane digester. The only problem with this technology is… it only works financially when you have lots of manure collected from cows when they are in confinement. A steady supply of manure is needed to run these systems that require hundreds of thousands of dollars in investment. You can't run them effectively when your cattle are depositing their own manure, as fertilizer, out in your pastures.
Straus Dairy milks their cows three times a day unlike almost every organic dairy in the country that finds it challenging enough to move cows in and out of pasture, milking twice a day. This is consistent with running a high-production dairy operation which is very hard on the health and longevity of the cattle but produces more milk.
With that said, we still buy Straus for the time being, mostly because of the glass container. Clover organics is actually fairily local, gets a better overall rating (with the only part of their ratings that gives pause being "Reproductive hormones used: Occasional oxytocin use"), but I don't want to be throwing away paper half-gallon containers two to three times a week (we drink a lot of milk, as you might imagine). Organic Valley also gets a better rating than Straus.
In any case, it's good to be aware of these things.
Good magazine did a great visual piece on which giant corporation owns your favorite tiny organic food brand, which popped up on BoingBoing over two years ago, so it may need to be updated.
Awesome comment, filled with sources, I love it!
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the ratings for Organic Valley (1115), Clover (1050) and Straus (995), I still think I came to the best conclusion. I had already read that Straus didn't 100% pasture raise their cattle due to difficult climate, it's disclosed on their own website. Furthermore, I had read about their lobbying efforts which is very unfortunate considering I really dislike monetarily supporting groups that lobby. While I'm rather concerned with the size of their herd based on this survey, if they are interalizing the externalities (with the methane generator), then it seems "moo" to me. Finally, some of the analysis of the score directly contradicts the numerical scores. For instance, "Straus Dairy milks their cows three times a day unlike almost every organic dairy in the country that finds it challenging enough to move cows in and out of pasture, milking twice a day. This is consistent with running a high-production dairy operation which is very hard on the health and longevity of the cattle but produces more milk." Yet the "Health and longevity of cows" sub score is a perfect 100.
If we further break down Straus' score of 995, you'll see they lost the most points for not disclosing how they raised their cows and thus, unverifiable raising process (15/200). Presuming that the above information is correct, let's pretend they get 150/200, docking them 30 points for keeping the cows off pasture 3 months of the year and another 20 for not disclosing on time. Now they easily beat Clover (1145 > 1050). Although in SF, you can compost the Clover cartons (it's on the compost flyer itself!).
As for Organic Valley, which does score highly, they aren't local by any means. Which pretty much boots them out of the contest for me. Unfortunately this dairy survey doesn't give any score for that, which is understandable at a national level. And Straus, scored correctly could easily beat their score as well. Ultimately, it's beyond my speculating ability as to why they didn't respond to repeated email/phone/mail, but I have put in one myself and we shall see how it goes! Hope you keep in touch more, it sounds like we've developed many of the same spending habits.