Organic Consumers Assoc Calls for Boycott of Organic Brand Parent Co. That Helped Defeat Prop 37

[proverbialwisdom]

PRESS RELEASE: (reproduced in full)

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_26621.cfm

Organic Consumers Association Calls for Boycott of Organic Brand Parent Companies That Helped Defeat Prop 37

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


FINLAND, Minn. - Nov. 15, 2012 - The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) today called for a national boycott of the popular natural and organic brands owned by 10 parent companies that donated to defeat Prop 37, the California Right to Know GMO labeling initiative.

The OCA is also calling on other consumer protection groups, and public health, agriculture, natural health, environmental and political groups to urge their members and supporters to participate in the boycott.

"Among the largest bankrollers of the NO on 37 campaign were huge multinational food and beverage companies whose subsidiaries make billions selling popular organic and 'natural' brands," said Ronnie Cummins, Director of the OCA and the Organic Consumers Fund, which donated more than $1 million to the YES on 37 campaign. "It's time to send these companies a message: Either start supporting GMO labeling initiatives, including the upcoming one in Washington State, or consumers will stop buying your products," Cummins said.

Prop 37was narrowly defeated on Nov. 6, thanks to a relentless, deceitful $46-million advertising blitz. Among the food companies that helped to defeat the measure were:

PepsiCo (Donated $2.5M): Naked Juice, Tostito’s Organic, Tropicana Organic

Kraft (Donated $2M): Boca Burgers and Back to Nature

Safeway (Member of Grocery Manufacturers Association, which donated $2M):“O” Organics

Coca-Cola (Donated $1.7M): Honest Tea, Odwalla

General Mills (Donated $1.2M): Muir Glen, Cascadian Farm, Larabar

Con-Agra (Donated $1.2M): Orville Redenbacher’s Organic, Hunt’s Organic, Lightlife, Alexia

Kellogg’s (Donated $791k): Kashi, Bear Naked, Morningstar Farms, Gardenburger

Smucker’s (Donated $555k ): R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz Organic

Unilever (Donated $467k): Ben & Jerry’s

Dean Foods (Donated $254k): Horizon, Silk, White Wave

The OCA's million-plus network of consumers, along with the 5 million Californians who voted YES on 37 and the 90% of consumers nationwide who want mandatory GMO labeling, are gearing up for the next GMO labeling battles, in Washington State, Vermont, and Connecticut. The boycott is part of a strategy to force the parent companies of organic and natural brands to side with consumers, or risk losing their brand loyalty.

The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) is an online and grassroots non-profit 501(c)3 public interest organization campaigning for health, justice, and sustainability. The Organic Consumers Fund is a 501(c)4 allied organization of the Organic Consumers Association, focused on grassroots lobbying and legislative action.

[RomneyLies]

1. I can get on board with this.

Label the GMO crap. Those companies that refuse and fight it lose my business.

And I've purchased organic products from damned near every one of those listed.

[bluestate10]

10. I have. I only buy seeds and plants from certified sustainable farm outfits when planting.

The way to force those companies to change is to stop buying their products, look for and buy alternatives. The dynamic is the very same that works to stop job outsourcing.

[AndyTiedye]

2. That's Almost All of Them

It might be more useful to list what organic products are NOT made by companies that fought against prop 37, if there are any.

[Ian David]

8. You know that Amish guy with the farm stand? He's not on the list. n/t

[AndyTiedye]

24. Too Bad Most of the Farm Stands and Farmers Markets are Closed for the Winter

[Ian David]

34. Wussy Amish won't grow crops in the snow? What good are they? n/t

[bluestate10]

12. OCA can help with that if they would produce a list of food makers that don't use genetically

engineered raw materials. Look, here I go bashing the Left again, but I wish the Left would fucking present alternatives at the same time they are fighting for what is both right and moral. Otherwise, we are left to seek out alternatives on our own, and some people won't take the fucking time to do that.

[RobertEarl]

19. Sorry, don't get your claim

bluestate says:
I wish the Left would fucking present alternatives at the same time they are fighting for what is both right and moral

What alternatives are there to what is right and moral? You desire the Left, who you are bashing again, to compromise what is right and moral, and accept that which is wrong and immoral?

[kurtzapril4]

22. I believe the person meant

to present some alternatives that are right and normal, so people know, in this instance, which companies that didn't support No on Prop. 37, in addition to protesting against what is wrong and immoral.

[Luminous Animal]

21. The brands listed do not contain GMO raw materials. What to buy is not the point.

The point is, the companies that manufacture non-GMO products also shelled out quite a bit of money to keep the GMO label off all of their brands, including their organic brands.

[Luminous Animal]

14. I believe the point is to target high-profile brands rather than take on the entire corporate

organic industry.

[Tree-Hugger]

17. Here is a list of those who endorsed PRop 37

http://www.carighttoknow.org/endorsements

[AndyTiedye]

23. The Only One On That List That Actually Sells Food is Whole Foods

[Tree-Hugger]

29. Did you actually look at that site? Because it lists over 150 retailers

In addition to farm markets, individuals farms and, of course, the companies that make foods you can buy in most supermarkets. You have to scroll past the very top paragraph.

[womanofthehills]

27. Straus Family Creamery :)

http://strausfamilycreamery.com/news-events/news/straus-family-creamery-supports-proposition-37-with-release-of-new-packagin

Straus Family Creamery supports proposition 37 and said so on their packaging.
Their organic yogurt is beyond creamy - the best yogurt I've ever had. Also their organic coffee ice cream at the top of my list with way fewer and much healthier ingredients than Ben & Jerry's.


Another brand I like is Organic Valley who supports regional dairy farmers (1617 farmers). Organic Valley made plans to shield livestock and feed from Japanese radiation exposure from Fukushima.

sustainablefoodnews.com/printstory.php?news_id=12195

You can even see who your farmers are: http://www.organicvalley.coop/who-is-your-farmer/rocky-mountain/
My favorite desert is to freeze some fruit - partially defrost it and then cover it with Organic Valley vanilla half and half.

[proverbialwisdom]

3. FoodNavigator: "Goldfish Crackers targeted in ‘natural’ lawsuit over GE soy..."

http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Regulation/Goldfish-Crackers-targeted-in-natural-lawsuit-over-genetically-engineered-soy-as-Prop-37-supporters-launch-GMO-inside-initiative

Goldfish Crackers targeted in ‘natural’ lawsuit over genetically engineered soy as Prop 37 supporters launch ‘GMO inside’ initiative

by Elaine Watson
12 Nov, 2012

While Prop 37 did not pass, the failure to disclose the presence of GMOs in foods that are marketed as ‘natural’ is still generating a steady stream of civil litigation, with Goldfish Crackers the latest brand to be targeted in a class action lawsuit over genetically engineered ingredients.

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Restricted C+P. Great article. Link from: http://organicconsumers.org/

[JNelson6563]

4. K&R

For enlightenment.

Great post!

Julie

[laundry_queen]

5. The only one I'm surprised about

is Safeway. I love O organics. ugh. I definitely back this boycott - I didn't trust the large corps when they started buying up all the small organics, and when they started their own organic fronts, and this just proves that large corporations need to be held accountable if they want to be in the organics market.

[Berlum]

6. The occult infliction of mutant GMO foodlike 'product' on the world will, in the end, prove

to be a massively ill-conceived and ultimately Ahrimanic move.

[Ian David]

7. Good luck with that. I think that's pretty much EVERYBODY. n/t

[broiles]

9. Ben & Jerry's!

[glinda]

16. Oh no!

[Cha]

11. I don't buy any of those products anyway.. Good to know

what brands have sold out to the Huge Corp.

Thanks PW!

[DollarBillHines]

26. Same here, except Safeway

Safeway is the only store in our town that sells cat litter.

[freshwest]

13. Thanks for the list. GMO =/= Organic as peeps regard it. How stupid are they?

[Berlum]

15. Big Food plays both ends against the middle

They have bought up lots of organic companies, and then worked to undermine the integrity of organic so that their regular chem-soaked products will seem less heinous.

RepubliThink.

[quakerboy]

32. Most of these parent companys have far more money

in standard foods than in organics. Just because they see a chance to make some extra cash from the organic craze doesnt mean anything.

[freshwest]

33. That's logical. But we must demand truth in labeling. Our money, our bodies.

[NC_Nurse]

18. I'm surprised about Dean Foods. Silk milks are already labeled non-GMO.

[NCarolinawoman]

20. Dean Foods (Horizon milk) is about as phony organic as you can get.

Fake, Fake, Fake! I've read about their giant feed lots and how they mistreat their dairy cows!!!

[bunnies]

25. Not a problem for me!

Ill have to find a new organic tomato paste. Easy enough. If theyre going to work against telling me whats in my food then I refuse to give them any money. Period. Fuck em.

[Raine]

28. THANKS for this list. I can't understand why so many

organic ones were against 37, it seems like it would've benefited them.

[Doremus]

31. Because, simply, they make more $$$ without it.

Much like the cattle industry made it illegal to independently test for mad cow disease. The losses would outstrip any profit increase.

Businesses don't care about anything except making money. End of story.

[roody]

30. Thanks for this post.

[proverbialwisdom]

35. Alternet op-ed: "We are witnessing one of the greatest consumer awakenings in recent times."

Link from: http://organicconsumers.org/

http://www.alternet.org/food/did-monsanto-win-prop-37-round-one-food-fight-our-lives

AlterNet / By Ronnie Cummins, Katherine Paul

Did Monsanto Win Prop 37? Round One in the Food Fight of Our Lives
November 9, 2012

It was a mighty fight. And it’s far from over.

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The real story is this. Prop 37, the grassroots-powered California ballot initiative to label genetically engineered foods in California has focused a national spotlight on GMOs, and the serious hazards that transgenics pose to human health and the environment.

It has permanently altered the national debate surrounding food safety, chemical-intensive agriculture, and sustainability. And it put the consumers' right-to-know and truth-in-labeling on the table for millions of Americans.

Prop 37 has exposed the dark side of Big Ag and Big Food, and their desperation to keep U.S. consumers in the dark about whether or not our food has been genetically engineered, a fundamental right enjoyed by citizens in over other 60 countries.

This monumental food fight has underscored how dirty money, indentured media, and dirty tricks have polluted our democratic process.

Prop 37 has brought together an unprecedented state and national coalition of more than 3000 organic food retailers and public health, faith and labor, consumer and agriculture, and environmental and political groups, with combined email lists of over 10 million people. The campaign collected almost a million signatures of registered voters to get on the ballot. It mobilized more than 10,000 volunteers and raised more than $8 million, much of that from individual organic consumers and natural health advocates from around the country, not just from California. It spawned new networks like GMO-Free USA and the 30-state Coalition of States for GMO Labeling, alliances that will help raise public awareness and money, and streamline the process of writing state GMO labeling laws.

Prop 37 has awakened a sleeping giant. It has created a statewide and national Movement with the potential to transform the entire U.S. food and farming system, part of a new political awakening in which grassroots forces have begun challenging the power of the corporate and political elite.

Prop 37 may indeed symbolize the "beginning of the end" for agricultural biotechnology and industrial food and farming, a profoundly unhealthy, unsustainable, climate-disrupting system that has dominated American agriculture for the last 60 years.

The real story is this. Prop 37 has created an unstoppable Movement...

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Prop 37 was the largest and most successful GMO labeling campaign yet, but it was not the first and it will not be the last.

In the last two years alone, 19 states have made a run at GMO labeling, either through citizens’ initiatives or legislative efforts. We’ve come a long way from the failed push for GMO labeling in Oregon 10 years ago, a campaign that barely made a ripple outside that state. We’ve put GMO labeling on the national map, and we’ve put Monsanto on notice: This movement is stronger than ever, and it’s not going away.

Activists in Washington State have already collected more than half of the signatures they need to put Initiative-522 on the ballot there in 2013. Oregon activists are eying a similar initiative in 2014. Plans are now in the works to restart campaigns in states like Vermont and Connecticut, where laws don’t provide for citizens ballot initiatives, and reignite legislative those states’ efforts to pass GMO labeling laws. Consumer support in those states is running higher than the national average of 90%, yet previous attempts to pass laws in Vermont and Connecticut those failed when legislators caved into threats by Monsanto to sue if they passed GMO labeling laws.

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[proverbialwisdom]

36. Updates.

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/339052#ixzz2FeJF0S6E

Op-Ed: Cheerios' Facebook page hijacked by anti-GMO protesters
By Anne Sewell
Dec 14, 2012

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/339270#ixzz2FeJs2vMv

Op-Ed: Pepsico's 'Naked Juice' to feel the pain after boycotting Prop 37
By Anne Sewell
Dec 17, 2012

Links from: http://www.organicconsumers.org/