Market Farming

["Del Williams" <delannw AT dlogue.net>]

October 16, 2002
A Definition at Last, but What Does It All Mean?
By MARIAN BURROS


AFTER 30 years of ridicule, indifference and sometimes downright hostility
from the government, the organic food movement has triumphed over the
bureaucracy. Starting Monday, all foods labeled "organic" must comply with
rigorous national standards that the movement has sought for years.

The standards, issued by the Agriculture Department, replace a patchwork of
organic certification programs. They apply to food production, processing
and labeling, and require any company marketing products as "organically
produced" to be certified. For customers squinting at labels, the rules will
finally spell out the differences between "100 percent organic," "organic"
and "made with organic ingredients."

You would expect pioneers of the grass-roots organic movement to be dancing
in the streets. And many are, because, as they note, every acre converted
from conventional to organic farming means a reduction in the toxic
chemicals that can end up in the ground, air, water and food supply.

"I'm very excited and relieved," said Katherine DiMatteo, executive director
of the Organic Trade Association in Greenfield, Mass., which led the effort
for federal standards. "It's hard to believe that something won't stop it
from happening."

But others are wondering if their victory will have unintended consequences,
such as putting organic farmers out of business. Some organic farmers fear
the costs of complying with federal standards, and the paperwork, and will
not seek certification. But a bigger worry is the growing competition from
industrial organic operations.

Organic food, once sold as shriveled produce in stores watched over by
hippies in Birkenstocks and beads, has become the fastest-growing sector of
the food industry, generating about $10 billion a year.

The new standards will make it easy to sell organic products overseas. As a
result, agribusiness has already hopped on the organic bandwagon; it has, in
fact, taken over a number of large organic producers. For example, Mars
Inc., the M&M's candy company, owns Seeds of Change. Grimmway Farms, a giant
conventional grower of carrots, bought Cal-Organic, the nation's largest
organic produce company. Pillsbury markets organic flour, and Tyson Foods
has introduced organic chickens. Archer Daniels Midland and Procter & Gamble
have dipped their toes into organics, too.

As big businesses buy smaller organic producers or start organic divisions,
some people see the organic sector going the way of the family farm. Brian
Halweil, a researcher who specializes in food and agriculture at the
Worldwatch Institute in Washington, said the squeezing out of smaller farms
by bigger organic players is already under way. "In agriculture, as with
other industries, size brings substantial marketing and distribution
advantages," he said.

Mindful of this, many organic farmers have found a new niche. "Locally
grown" is taking on the aura of goodness once reserved for "organically
grown."

Locally grown has become so important that even leaders of the organic
movement, when they must choose between local conventional produce and
organic food from distant places, buy local. It is more important, they say,
to support local agriculture than to eat organic food.

Bob Scowcroft, an organic pioneer and the executive director of the Organic
Farming Research Foundation in Santa Cruz, Calif., said he always buys local
"because you must keep agricultural vitality around your community in
place - that's what food security is all about."

Ms. DiMatteo generally chooses local as well. "We have to support our local
economy and the preservation of the rural characteristics of the area," she
said. "There is public benefit to having farming systems close by, and we
are losing farm communities every day. I definitely would urge customers to
buy local and those farmers in organic to market themselves as local."

She said that a new federally required label showing the country of origin
should make consumers aware how far some produce travels. Typically, the
trip from farm to plate is 1,500 to 2,500 miles, and consumes vast amounts
of energy.

To protect themselves from agribusiness, small organic farmers are expanding
farmers' markets to increase direct sales and forming co-ops to sell to
restaurants, schools and smaller organic retailers.

And organizations like the Marin Organic Certified Agriculture program in
Marin County, Calif., and Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture in
Amherst, Mass., are learning how to market and advertise local products,
whether organic or not.

"We have to educate the public about the value of locally produced," said
Peter Martinelli, an organic farmer in Bolinas, Calif., who is working with
the Marin program, which has developed a label to mark local products. The
Amherst group has been running a public awareness campaign since 1999 and
produces a guide listing 140 participating farms in western Massachusetts.
Mark Lattanzi, the guide's coordinator, said the farms' sales have increased
10 to 40 percent since the program began.

Mr. Scowcroft said he was not yet worried that industrial farming will edge
out smaller producers. "Nevertheless," he said, "we need to keep an eye on
the family farmer to make sure the resources, however little, are devoted to
expansion of farmers' markets or community-supported agriculture."

And he is excited by the organic explosion, whatever the source. Large
growers are selling organic products to retailers who "we never thought
would utter the word," he said, adding: "Frankly, they are bringing it in at
prices many organic farmers cannot achieve. Wal-Mart is carrying a
phenomenal amount of organic food right now and introducing it to customers
who have never seen that word before."

It is the kind of good news that makes some people nervous.



Copyright The New York Times Company