The Tangled Web of the Organic Industry

My wife and I joined the Park Slope Food Co-op, the largest food co-op in the nation, about a year ago. Recently I came across an interesting graphic in their July 3rd newsletter on the Organic Industry Structure, a complex web of corporate ownership of organics companies, many of which started as independent. I tracked the graphic back to its source with Dr. Phil Howard, Assistant Professor
Community, Agriculture, Recreation and Resource Studies (CARRS), at Michigan State University. At his site I found even more fascinating graphics that are worth sharing (with his permission) for those interested in organic food and corporate America.

First off, let me start with a digression into "why organic?" I was a latecomer to the organics movement because in the beginning many claims made about organics were dubious. But, as the industry developed and my knowledge of it grew, I began to realize the worth of organic food. My first decision to lean towards buying organic was with meat for one simple reason. Most non-organic meat producers at the time used massive amounts of antibiotics in animal feed, a gross misuse of antibiotics that has contributed to the rise of antibiotic resistant bacteria, a serious health hazard. Organic meat USUALLY is raised without antibiotics, and by now some non-organic meats are raised without antibiotics, so really you have to look to see if your meat is specifically labeled "raised without antibiotics" to be sure. But we found organic meat more reliably raised without antibiotics and actually to be of much higher quality than the average store bought meat. The only kind of meat that is generally of better quality is kosher meat, which is of high quality, but I checked, and antibiotic use is not specifically forbidden in kosher meat.

From organic meat we noticed organic produce is often higher quality than non-organic. Or, more to the point, non-organic produce in NYC is generally horrible, while organic produce varies from horrible to great.

But the truth is there are other environmental and health benefits to organics. Not ALL such benefits claimed by the organics industry are real, but many are. The Union of Concerned Scientists recently printed an article on this that I refer readers to for details. Here I quote only the intro paragraphs, but the article goes into some detail:

Amid recent food safety scares and a growing interest in healthy living, increasing numbers of consumers are opting for organic foods. While there is no doubt that organic produce is better for the environment because it is grown without synthetic fertilizers and pesticides (which can deplete the soil and pollute both our air and water), the science has not been clear on whether organic foods are more nutritious than their conventional counterparts—until now.

This spring, The Organic Center (a nonprofit that promotes organic farming) released the most comprehensive comparison to date of the nutritional quality of organic and conventionally grown produce. The authors reviewed the findings of nearly 100 published studies on this topic and carefully matched 236 pairs of measurements for 11 specific nutrients in both organic and conventional fruits and vegetables. The organic produce was nutritionally superior in 61 percent of the cases.

You can learn more about the benefits and basics of organics elsewhere on the Union of Concerned Scientists website.

Another advantage of organics used to be that the growers, distributors and retailers that dealt in organics were generally independent, smaller businesses rather than megacorporations whose business practices are often despicable. Not all small companies are good and not all big companies are bad (e.g. Costco has a great reputation on all fronts as a company...and are cool to shop at!). But as a really good first approximation, patronizing smaller, independent businesses is more beneficial for America and working class Americans.
But the success of the organics industry has led to an expansion and absorption by corporate America into the organics business. This meant that some popular brands of organics were put out by some pretty nasty companies. I was pretty disappointed to find out that Unilever now owns Ben and Jerry's, for example.

Professor Howard has put together some very revealing graphics to illustrate what companies own what organic brands and what brands remain independent. I cannot reprint all of the information he has, so I urge readers to explore his site. You can also find the documentation and citations for the graphics on his site. (NOTE: you may have to click on the links to see the details)

I want to start with the simplest graphic: the independent organics companies. These are generally the best companies you can find both for quality and in terms of good corporate citizenship:



Applegate Farms is a particularly good source for organic meat, for example, and they remain independent. Golden Temple is, it seems, a religious organization, so keep in mind you are supporting their religious efforts as well as their very admirable social efforts.

The next graphic shows some of the brands that were acquired or introduced by big corporations:



Again, Ben and Jerry's (not to mention Breyers) being owned by the rather bad Unilever is somewhat disappointing. I also find it interesting that Campbell's (generally a reasonably responsible company) still pretty much owns the same companies I remember it owning back in the 1980's: V-8, Prego, Swanson's. In the decades of restructuring, buyouts and the like, Campbell's seems to have kept itself intact.

And here is a broader indication of who owns what, aside from the independent companies he shows in the first graphic:



So Dagoba, one of the tastiest brands of chocolate if you like REALLY dark chocolate, is owned by Hershey's, best known for some of the wimpiest of American chocolates. Hain has always been a large player in this industry...and a very misleading and controversial one. Conagra is notorious as a bad corporate citizen which has been boycotted by labor and Democratic organizations for years.

Whatever your views on corporate America, it is pretty important to know what companies you are buying from and what company you are supporting.

In another graphic Professor Howard shows the big chain store acquisitions...mainly the expansion of the Whole Foods Empire. Whole Foods is a place I avoid because I find their quality highly variable but their prices generally way high. Trader Joe's is shown as remaining independent throughout and is a store I highly recommend if there is one in your area.

Now, leaving organics aside for a moment, here is a graphic showing the four top companies in each of 8 agricultural sectors:



This is important for several reasons. First, going back to antibiotic use in animal feed, the fact that a company like Tyson and Purdue has been convinced by organizations like Union of Concerned Scientists to start limiting or phasing out antibiotic use (remains to be seen how far this will go) turns out to be a major thing since they are two of the four top poultry producers. Second, look at the soybean industry. It is 71% dominated by three companies. This is an example of why farmers are always in poor financial straits. The fact that so few companies serve as the market for most products made by farmers gives those few companies an edge in setting prices...to the detriment of both farmers (who can barely survive off what they get) and consumers (who pay more than they should). This has led to a perpetual farming industry in crisis, something that wind power can help as more and more farmers opt to include some wind generators on their property which can provide them with more income than farming.

These are the graphs that I find most interesting on Phil Howard's website. But he has a lot more (including an interactive graph of Multi-State Microbial Food Contamination Epidemics in the US, 1993 to 2008, that is rather alarming). Check it out!