Milk: To label or not to label?
There’s a battle taking place on U.S. grocery store shelves that most consumers don’t know about: Monsanto, the St. Louis-based agribusiness company, is again petitioning the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to prevent sellers of organic and sustainable milk from listing their products as rBGH- or rBST-free. Monsanto claims that these labels letting consumers know what’s NOT in their milk are misleading. But who is misleading whom?
Monsanto doesn’t tell consumers that rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone), in addition to increasing milk production in cows, can lead to bovine health problems (such as painful mastitis which infects cows’ udders) and in turn force producers to increase antibiotic use on dairy farms. And there is evidence to suggest that rBGH can cause cancer in humans.
The debate over whether to label or not has been raging ever since bovine growth hormones were introduced in the 1990s and manufacturers like Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and others wanted to assure consumers that their dairy products didn’t contain rBST or rBGH. And despite Monsanto’s assertions that consumers don’t need labeling, a March 2007 poll found that 80 percent of consumers do not want milk containing rBGH.
The entire European Union, as well as Australia, Canada, Japan, and New Zealand, have all banned use of rBGH, leading food advocacy groups to question whether Monsanto (and, depending on its response to Monsanto, the FDA), thinks U.S. consumers don’t deserve the same information as in other parts of the world.
Interested in staying away from rBGH? Buy organic milk or, even better, milk from a farmer you know at a farmers market. (In the U.S., check out Local Harvest for a list of farmers markets and community supported agriculture (CSA) groups in your state.)
Comments
Who's watching the hen (milk) house?
There has definitely been a "revolving door" between industry and the FDA for many years. The agency needs to be reformed and sufficiently funded to prevent food safety problems and protect consumers from unwanted additives, like rBGH, in their food.
But you're absolutely right, by seeking out and supporting local food we can let industry know that we don't want their corporate agriculture. Another good resource to learn more about these issues is Sustainable Table http://www.sustainabletable.org/.
Monsanto has way too much power in this country
Weren't some of the current top FDA officials previously employed by Monsanto? We need real regulatory agencies, but with the current administration, what we get is the fox watching the hen house. Just watched a great, and eye-opening film called "The Future of Food." (You can rent it at netflix.com.)
Also, I think CNN is doing a special this weekend by Sanjay Gupta on the subject of the safety of our food. The milk, the spinach, the wheat gluten in both pet food and served to our food... it is pretty scary. Eating local and organic has never been more important.