Press Releases: Farming

Organic food has become big business and the largest food manufacturers have rapidly taken over the organic food sector, sweeping formerly independent businesses into large food conglomerates. An analysis released today by the national consumer group Food & Water Watch found that the farmers who grow organic crops and raise organic livestock now face the same forces of corporate consolidation that dominate the conventional food industry, with a declining number of buyers putting downward pressure on the prices farmers receive.

Iowa produces more pigs than any other state in the country. In years past, hog farming and pork processing boosted Iowa’s rural economies. But as the pork packing industry consolidated, the economic benefits of the hog sector shifted from rural Iowa to Wall Street. Today, growth in the consolidated hog industry has become a mechanism for draining value from, not adding to, Iowa’s rural economies.

Media Statement: “The facilities, known as Concentrated Animal Feeing Operations, or CAFOs, are responsible for a multitude of environmental and public health impacts and make up part of an industry that is the single largest contributor of pollutants to our nation’s waterways. The failure to follow through with a 2011 proposal to gather even simple data like locations of the facilities, number of animals contained and proximity to waterways is clearly pandering to agribusiness during an election year.”

“Specifically, the EPA announced late last week it will not move ahead with a 2011 proposal to gather even simple data like locations of the facilities, number of animals contained and proximity to waterways.

“Today, the state of Maryland became the first state in the nation to ban arsenical drugs in chicken production and took a significant step in addressing one of many issues associated with industrial agriculture.

“It is a testament to the power of grassroots organizing that this arsenic prohibition bill passed at all given the formidable opponents who fought for three years against removing the carcinogen from our food.

“Governor O’Malley’s cozy relationship with the poultry industry hasn’t helped, either. The poultry industry continues to push agricultural policy in Annapolis that pads their profits at the expense of Marylanders and the Chesapeake Bay—even though Maryland’s entire agricultural sector contributes only .35 % of the state’s GDP. We will continue to fight the industry’s attempts to block environmental regulations and reforms that would benefit the state’s farmers.”

Press Release: Emails released today by national consumer group Food & Water Watch reveal an unnervingly close and direct relationship between Governor Martin O’Malley and chicken giant Perdue. Seventy pages of emails, mostly between Governor O’Malley and Herb Frerichs, Perdue’s general counsel, illustrate the strong hold the industry has on Governor O’Malley on topics ranging from waste incineration to the lawsuit brought by the University of Maryland Legal Clinic against Perdue and one of its contract growers.

Today on the steps of New York City Hall, national, community, food, urban and labor group leaders hosted a press conference to address Walmart’s negative impact on the food system. Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter and Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union (RWDSU), spoke at the event, which also marked the release of the new Food & Water Watch report, “Why Walmart Can’t Fix the Food System,” an analysis of the rift between Walmart’s marketing claims and the true impact the company has on the food system.

Media Statement: “With a recent public letter to the dean of the Maryland School of Law’s Environmental Clinic, Governor Martin O’Malley has clearly taken a stand: he’s for polluters and against the Bay.