Horizon is a company that produces commercial organic milk products. They recently just announced that they are releasing a line of children’s products that are not organic, just “natural”.
WTF. Actually let me spell it out. What The Fuck.
What is the purpose of having just natural products instead of organic, when more and more people are turning to organic foods, especially in this economy when people are willing to get a little more bang for their buck. And why would you have non-organic products when you ARE an organic company already?? The Natural Foods Merchandiser has a good summary about the two new products here. (However, they seem to think its cool…whatev.)
The NFM has a great page on what “Natural” means, read it here. They state that “…there is no federal definition of what constitutes a natural product” and that “it’s no wonder consumers are jaded and confused”. The website cites a recent ad campaign for 7UP that claimed it was all natural flavors, even though it was made with high fructose corn syrup. The FDA ruled against it, then took it back. Sounds like an episode of The Nanny. And yet the FDA still has no real definition of what is natural.
In searching for more information about this, I stumbled across my old professor, Mark Crispin Miller’s blog News From Underground. He writes about politics and general ridiculousness in our country. He had a post about the new Horizon product, and a letter he received in response from one he wrote to Shelley Rogers, Director/Producer of the film WHAT’S “ORGANIC” ABOUT ORGANIC? She stated that natural milk means “antibiotics, and keep[ing] the cows confined with no assurance of pasture.” Horizon is a stupid company who is banking on the fact that they are an organic company offering an un-natural product but because they are an organic company, people will buy it. Education about food, my friends. Check out the full letter here.
You can also see more responses to these products on Marion Nestle’s blog Food Politics, the best source right now for up-to-date information of food products and regulation….well I think so at least!
