Organic milk vs. nonorganic milk

A look at the gains and losses of a switch to organic milk

By ERIC BARTELS

Pamplin Media Group, Mar 11, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (7 Reader comments)

Organic vs.nonorganic

What is the most essential food we eat? Meat? Vegetables? Think harder. What was the first thing you were ever fed? That’s right. Milk.

Now, Oregonians are insisting on the highest level of purity from the first food to sustain them. Milk is the fastest-growing segment of the organic food market, according to Carl Cadonau Jr. of Portland’s Alpenrose Dairy.

The Department of Agriculture defines organic milk as having been produced by cows not treated with antibiotics or bovine growth hormone. The animals must have access to pasture, and their feed must be grown without pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

Local economics

Oregon is no slouch as a dairy state, producing 277 million gallons of milk in 2006 with sales of more than $325 million. That’s a lot of jobs.

The trend here and elsewhere has been the consolidation of dairy production into fewer, larger farms, but consumers have stepped in. Their demand for organic foods has been a boon to Oregon’s smaller producers.

More than 65 farms in the state produced organic milk in 2006, up 50 percent from four years earlier. With the better margins that organic dairying offers, a smaller herd can make for a viable business, one that pays relatively high wages.

Advantage: Even

Health risks

This is where it gets contentious.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture strictly controls the sale of milk from cows treated with antibiotics. Organic farming detractors say antibiotics are essential for animal health, fighting zoonotic pathogens like salmonella and avian flu, and that federal regulations are enough to ensure that levels of antibiotics in milk are acceptable.

Virtually every Western nation has outlawed the use of recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH or rBST), which stimulates milk production. The U.S. has not, with defenders maintaining that the additive poses no threat. Nearly all Oregon producers have stopped using the additive.

Proponents of organic say organophosphates used in chemical fertilizers have been linked to a variety of woes, including cancer and fetal abnormalities. Others dispute the findings.

You’ll have to decide whom to trust on this one. We say …

Advantage: Organic

Sustainability

The primary aim of organic farming is the removal of chemical fertilizers, toxic pesticides and genetically engineered additives from the food supply chain. Consumer advocates who see organic farming as a fad based on spurious claims say maximizing food production is the ultimate sustainability effort.

The sad downside is massive meat recalls, fish-killing manure spills and the discomfiting specter of genetic modification.

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