Four months ago, The Cornucopia Institute notified Wal-Mart's CEO Lee Scott (in a private, registered letter and by email), that we had found numerous instances of improper organic food signage in their supercenter grocery stores around the country.  As readers may know, Wal-Mart is seeking to greatly expand their organic food offerings to capture consumer interest in the booming organic food sector.

We thought the problems were merely simple errors that could be easily corrected and that is why we took a low-key approach to contacting the company.  When the problems persisted for two months and the company instead chose to attack our organic watchdog group in the media, we then filed a formal complaint with the USDA, the nation's organic food regulator.  We thought that would end the consumer deception.  We were wrong.  More to follow ...  

Today we filed a formal legal complaint with the USDA asking them to investigate the sale of nonorganic food as organic at Wal-Mart grocery stores.  Wal-Mart, as many of you may know, caused quite the stir in the organic community with their announced plan this past Spring to greatly expand their organic food offerings.

The Cornucopia Institute has since been carefully monitoring this situation.  We are beginning to see that the company lacks a fundamental understanding of the workings of the organic food sector and the expectations of organic consumers.

There's more below ...

It appears we have another chicken hawk running for major office.  Mark Green, a Republican member of Congress from eastern Wisconsin is seeking a job change.  He wants to be Governor.

Today it was revealed that Green joined the Naval Reserves while in college in Wisconin.  He then was selected to join the Aviation Officer Candidate School with an initial enlistment of 6 years.  Right out of college he went to Pensacola, Fla and entered the Naval program.

Green lasted all of 5 days in the program.  What's up with that, Mr. Green?

The Cornucopia Institute has released a new report that I thought Kos readers might be interested in.  Our organization is a farm policy group working on organic and sustainable agriculture issues, and most of our members are organic family farmers.

We have been monitoring for some time the buzz surrounding the entry of Wal-Mart into organics.  Our concern is that they will squeeze suppliers (farmers) and destroy the financial lifeline that organics has tossed the family farm community.  

Furthermore, we have been investigating whether or not the company will partner with those that are working to weaken organic standards in the name of profit.  Well, our fears appear to have been realized.  (more below)

Having noted the controversy swirling about the Slate piece on Wal-Mart, Whole Foods, and organics, I thought I would call attention to a new study just released by The Cornucopia Institute. Now in the interest of full disclosure, I would like to note that I am the co-director at Cornucopia, a nonprofit farm policy research group dedicated to the fight for economic justice for the family-scale farming community.  

Our study is particularly relevant to those consumers who are searching for quality, wholesome food produced in a sustainable and ecological manner by family farmers. It can be found at www.cornucopia.org.  

Our scorecard allows consumers to see which brands represent those values and which brands are using the rising tide of factory farm produced milk that threatens to wash family farmers off the land in a downward price spiral.

Bon Apetit

- Will Fantle

even downgraded today.  ha ha.

http://cbs.marketwatch.com/tools/quotes/quotes.asp?siteid=mktw&symb=sbgi

ESPN, the radio, has an online poll on who won last night's debate.  Kerry is ahead at the moment.  Yes, I listen to this station, I enjoy Dan Patrick and Dibble, but when they get to talking politics they lose me.  They generally seem to be of the view that it doesn't matter who wins (although the hosts trend repuklican most of the time).  Let's show them what we think about the debate and the future of our country.  And don't forget, the talk about the poll results constantly during the afternoon show and lots of "manly men" are alledgedly listening.  Here's the link:  http://espnradio.espn.go.com/espnradio/index