Local Food: Organic milk from factory farms? A cause to pause.

“Organic” is complicated. I alluded to this earlier on, and have been approaching that label with caution, but as I do more and more research, I am losing faith in it entirely. I am beginning to become acquainted with industrialized organic foods, which after a little bit of searching, turn out to be coming from factory-farming operations and not the family farms alluded to on the packaging. Eggs and milk are some of the worst offenders (the most often cited example is Walmart’s organic milk). Latest example? Rockview Farms GoodHeart Organics and Trader Joe’s organic milk, my latest attempt at buying local, organic milk. While both adhere to the USDA standards to be certified organic, I learned from the Cornucopia Institute’s Dairy Report & Scorecard that they both scored dismally as far as adhering to the more traditionally-held organic standards.

What are traditional organic standards anyway? It can differ depending on the item, but to give you an idea, Cornucopia defines an outstanding organic dairy operation as one in which the owners have an intimate relationship with their cows, have complete control over their milk and other dairy ingredients, and return 100% of profits back to the farm family. Cornucopia rated the dairies under these criteria: ownership structure (family owned is best), milk supply (from the farm itself rated highest), disclosure of information (top scorers offered 100% disclosure), who they’re certified by, cows on pasture (and how many acres per cow and for how long per year - the more the better), cow health and longevity (low culling is best), replacement animals from organic farms (from that farm itself earned top marks), antibiotics and hormones used (none), farm support oversight (the more oversight the better), and outside dairy ingredients purchased (none, preferably).

Here’s what the survey found about GoodHeart Organics: Ethically Challenged - produce or purchase factory farm milk. Not open enough to participate in this study. "It is marketed by Rockview farms, Inc., which owns some massive industrial-scale farms that produce conventional and organic milk. Since they did not participate in this study we cannot comment on their management practices. We will endeavor again to communicate with this organization and conduct an independent investigation and hope we can secure their cooperation."

Here’s how Trader’s Joe’s brand name organic milk scored: Ethically challenged - private-label, or store-brand, dairy products are sold by grocers or distributors who have the obvious desire of wanting to grow their presence in the organic marketplace. "Unfortunately, there is an inherent limitation in private-label organic products: organic consumers tend to want to know where their food is coming from and how it is produced, and private-label products are anonymous by their nature. As a case in point, although over 80% of the name-brand organic dairy marketers responded to our survey and are rated in this report, not one of the private-label marketers was willing to tell consumers, openly, where its organic milk was purchased." (See the response I received when I tried to find out more information from Trader Joe’s about their brand organic milk on a previous post.) "We were able to determine that these brands were, at the time of our research, buying some or all of their organic milk from factory-farm sources. We conducted our research in this area through interviews with a number of industry sources and through federally maintained records. Many of these grocery chains have very little past experience in marketing organic food. Making organics more convenient and affordable to consumers is a laudable goal. We operate on the assumption that many of these marketing entities were unaware of the five-year-long controversy concerning factory farms producing "organic" milk, and that they entered into contractual agreements in good faith. Some of the inaccurate and misleading claims or images made in their labeling are likely just rhetoric that the factory-farm suppliers of milk passed on to them."

Whether you take the ethical/unethical stance on factory farms (this can be quite subjective as there are those that believe using an animal for food at all as unethical), very few people will deny that factory farms are deeply disturbing. There is a battle raging between the industrialized organic folks and the family farm organic folks, with the large-scale, corporate organic suppliers claiming that they’re filling a genuine need, and the old school organics calling foul over the watering-down of the word “organic.” I have no doubt that this conflict between the two is only going to be growing more vicious as the demand for organic goods continues to rise.

In the meantime, I am aligning myself with the traditional organic crowd as far as milk is concerned. Trader Joe’s brand organic milk (and Rockview Farms that supposedly supplies it) - at least the supplier they use for their San Diego stores - isn’t going to get the job done. My local choices are therefore nil, and I've decided to support Strauss Family Creamery after all. They scored well on the Cornucopia study, and I can purchase their products from the O.B. People's Food Organic Food Store here in San Diego.

And to play fair, I sent both Trader Joe's and Rockview Farms a letter explaining why I would not be purchasing their milk.

[Update: I heard of someone in the bay area who spoke to a Trader Joe's manager about a year ago and was told they receive their brand name organic milk from Strauss Family Creamery. This may be worth checking out for those in that area.]

Local Food: Got milk? The many paths to local, organic food

There are areas of this country where finding a local organic dairy is not a problem in the least (northern California, for instance), but San Diego is not one of those places. I'd almost given up last week when one of my leads finally came through! If you're on a similar quest for organic local items, you may like to see where this hunt has taken me. Many of these sources are good for more than info on dairies:

1. Local co-op, natural food stores, and farmers' markets. No luck. All the organic milk on the shelves comes from elsewhere in the country, and none of the farmers' markets I’ve attended have had any milk or cheese stands.

2. San Diego-specific chat sites. A query online to my fellow San Diegans at the Yelp site received plenty of people eager to help, but no leads I didn't already have.

3. Local non-organic dairies. I contacted some local dairies, Hollandia Dairy in particular, and exchanged emails with one of their salesmen. They are a family-owned operation and a San Diego mainstay, but they aren’t organic, so I kept looking.

4. Organic dairies elsewhere in the country. Going a little more afield, I contacted organic dairies around the country to see if they had any partners or contacts who run similar operations in the San Diego area (eventually “San Diego” became “southern California”). It was at this point that I became incredibly jealous of the northern California folks and the numerous organic dairy farms at their disposal. A great example of organic dairy done right is the Straus Family Creamery. I chatted with one of their salespersons, but he didn't know of any similar dairies in southern California.

5. State government. I contacted the State of California Department of Agriculture Inspection and Compliance Branch of the California Organic Program for help. No response.

6. Online directories. I used the directory at Local Harvest and the Eat Well Guide, both which allow you to search by item and location. No luck.

7. People in the know. The San Diego Farm Bureau couldn't help. I sent an email to the southwestern region Forager at Whole Foods, a newly created position that I heard about on the Whole Foods podcast. Foragers are devoted to tracking down local sources in their region for stock in their area stores. No response. A phone call to the chair of the Western Organic Dairy Producers Alliance, Tony Azevedo, did not yield any suggestions either.

8. Organic certifying agencies. I contacted the California Certified Organic Farmers Association, a third-party certifying organization that provides a directory of organic farms in the U.S. (not just California). I exchanged several emails with the San Diego/L.A. regional contact, but she confirmed that there are no organic dairies in San Diego, although there is one in Downey (near L.A.) called Rockview Farms.

Los Angeles is further than I had hoped to go, but I gave them a call anyway. They are not a strictly organic operation, although they do produce an organic line called GoodHeart Organics. According to the customer service agent I spoke to at Rockview, Trader Joe’s in the San Diego area carries their organic milk, but a call my closest Trader Joe’s came up with only Rockview chocolate milk. I tried another Trader Joe’s and spoke to someone who told me that the manifest that comes with the Trader Joe’s brand organic milk delivery says Rockview Farms on it.

I dropped Trader Joe’s corporate an email to confirm that Rockview Farms supplies their Trader Joe’s brand organic milk in the San Diego stores, but the response I received was cryptic at best:

Thank you for taking the time to contact Trader Joe's. We are sorry that we cannot forward the vendor information to you. The organic milk is a private label product sold exclusively by Trader Joe's and all recipes, formulations and contact information are kept strictly confidential, per our contract agreement with the manufacturer.

We do apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause and appreciate your understanding in this matter. Please be assured that Trader Joe's organic milk is sourced from a local dairy farm.

Thank you for your time and thank you for shopping at Trader Joe's.

Nearly a month and a half in, and my best leads turning up empty, I have decided to take Trader Joe’s word on it – and the word of Rockview Farms – that there is local, organic milk in those bottles. My biggest concern is that Trader Joe’s could switch vendors without me ever knowing. I'll just need to check back regularly with Rockview Farms to see exactly where I can buy their milk in San Diego.

Truthfully, I'd rather support companies such as the Strauss Family Creamery, but my loyalty is to the organic AND local for the time being. The search continues, and I may very well turn up a dairy closer to the Strauss example. For now, Rockview Farms will do the job.

[Update: see my follow-up post with what I found out later about Trader Joe's and Rockview Farms that made me change my mind here]