“Would you like an Organic Fair TradeTM coffee withyour Egg McMuffin, Ma’am?”

Fantasy? Not if you wander into any one of 658McDonalds scattered across the Northeastern UnitedStates. Transfair USA and Oxfam America have welcomedthe fast food giant’s decision to serve Newman’s OwnOrganic Coffee.

“We are excited about this regionallaunch, and we hope to see it spread across thecountry,” said Seth Petchers, coffee program managerfor Oxfam America. But is having a 100 per cent Organic FairTradeTM coffee with your Big Mac really a sign ofvictory for the organic movement?

Rebecca Kneen, co-owner of Crannóg Ales, a certifiedorganic farm and micro-brewery in BC’s OkanaganValley, concedes that if organic and fair tradestandards are being met, there will be some benefit tofarmers but hastens to add that “this is a tiny actionin a company that pollutes massively, has obscenehiring practices and labour relations and devaluesfood.”

The Big Boxes of the new suburban landscape are goingorganic. “We are particularly excited about organicfood, the fastest-growing category in all of food,”said Wal-Martâe(TM)s CEO Lee Scott at a recent shareholdersmeeting, according to The New York Times. Loblaws’President’s Choice Organics line has expanded beyondorganic produce to include organic chicken noodlesoup, frozen entrees and cookies.

Even products that look so wholesome that one imaginesthey were made in a local hippie’s kitchen often carrya multinational logo. Phil Howard, a postdoctoralresearcher at the Centre for Agro-ecology andSustainable Food Systems, notes that according to oneestimate, 40 per cent of the packaged organic foods on theshelves of natural food stores are produced by some ofthe biggest companies in the world.

Kellogg owns Kashi, a supplier of organic whole graincereals. Kraft has bought out Boca, a maker of organicsoy burgers. The corporate interest in organics goesbeyond food to include things like organic cotton andorganic seeds. Select Wal-Mart stores now sell alimited line of organic cotton supplies for yoga, bathand baby.

M&M/Mars has bought Seeds of Change, anorganic seed company. “Many organic seed varieties arenow available only through a giant seed company calledSeminis, which earlier this year was acquired byMonsanto,” reports Howard.

The corporate takeover of organics can be seen as botha success and a failure for the organic movement,believes Howard. “On the one hand, the acreage devotedto organic production, without synthetic pesticides,increases every year to meet the market demand. On theother hand, some of the ideals of the organicmovement, which was in a large part a response toindustrial agriculture, have fallen by the wayside.”Organic agriculture increasingly resembles the global,industrial agriculture system it was created tocombat, says Howard.

Kneen agrees. “Even though a 50-acre field of broccolimay not be sprayed with noxious chemicals, it is stillmono-cropped, mechanically harvested and transportedthousands of miles before it is eaten.” Kneen arguesthat organic or not, industrial agriculture negativelyimpacts the environment through the loss of crop andseed diversity and fossil fuels required for largemachinery and long-distance shipping,

Organic produce — even vegetables that could be grownlocally, like garlic, potatoes, carrots and apples — is regularly trucked thousands of miles to arrive onsupermarket shelves. In fact, 85 per cent of organic food inCanada is now imported.

Howard describes whysupermarket chains (like Whole Foods in the U.S.) rarelystock local organic produce. “Whole Foods hascentralized their distribution of produce, and it’seasier for them to buy from a large-scale grower inMexico than a small-scale farmer next door,” heexplains. “The price premiums that small-scale farmersonce relied on to stay in business have been decliningas they are forced to compete with massive farms thatgrow only a single crop. These mega-farms haveeconomies of scale but externalize more costs tosociety and to ecosystems in comparison.”

Peter Johnston, a garlic farmer on Lasqueti Island inBritish Columbia, has noticed that the niche marketfor small organic farmers has quickly disappeared.“Before supermarkets began [stocking organic produce],it was bought either directly from the growers or fromhealth food stores. We sold to a couple of them onVancouver Island. These either no longer exist ordon’t carry produce anymore. The chains aren’tinterested in buying from small, local, seasonalproducers.”

Sea Spray Atlantic Growers Cooperative was formedthree years ago partly in response to the AtlanticSuperstores interest in selling organic produce. ButNorbert Kungl, whose organic farm Selwood Green ispart of the cooperative, reports that sales to theSuperstores have shrunk significantly. “When we havelocal production, they will order, but the orders arediscouragingly small,” said Kungl.

One member of thecooperative began growing large quantities of babyspinach and salad mix because the Superstore hadindicated interest in purchasing it, but by the timeit came to sell, Superstore was no longer interested.“They would not take those items because they had adeal or were in the process of a deal with PC Organicsand some large companies in California,” explainsKungl.

Kungl has learned to expect this from theAtlantic Superstore. “We know that if they can getanything as a PC Organic Product they will not havecompeting local produce in the store.”

According to Johnston, most consumers do notdistinguish between local and corporate organic foods.Johnston describes the frustrating attitudes of manyshoppers, “If it’s organic, it’s good, even if it isshipped from Mexico or Europe. The lowest possibleprice is important.”

Low prices are coming at a high cost, says Kneen,including weakening local economies, causing thedisappearance of mixed farms with diverse crops anddamaging “the entire rural fabric of Canada, which isbased on small farms and the culture and skillsdeveloped by farmers and ranchers.”

Large companies are often able to sell one organicproduct at a low price by subsidizing it with aline-up of non-organic products, thus undercutting thesmall organic producer. But according to Kneen, smallorganic producers, like Crannóg Ale’s Micro-brewery,offer the customer and the community far more than acheap product. “What we do is focused on high qualityproducts, locally sourced ingredients, supporting thelocal economy and creating as little environmentalimpact as possible throughout our entire process,”explains Kneen. “Corporate beer is focused on thebottom line.”

Small farmers are frustrated by an organiccertification process that fails to differentiatebetween the organic potato grown by a small mixed farmnext door and the organic potato shipped from anindustrial monoculture farm in Mexico. “Some of uswould like to include fossil fuel audits in thecertification process,” explains Johnston. “Not a hopewith the corporations involved though. [Withcorporations], there is and will be constant pressureto produce enough product at the lowest possibleprice.”

“Constant vigilance will be required to resistattempts to weaken the USDA standards in ways thatbenefit corporations at the expense of everyone else,”warns Howard referring to organic standards in the U.S.“Some [small farmers] have already given up on theterm “organic” to describe their values. They wouldrather explain exactly how they grew the food, or eveninvite customers to see their farm, than pay hundredsof dollars for a certification that they see as a sortof lowest common denominator.”

For the bewildered conscientious food shopper, Kneen’sadvice is unequivocal: “Buy local! Ignore corporateorganic, and buy locally produced food directly fromthe farmer or through a food co-op.”

Sea Spray Atlantic Growers Cooperative is hopingcustomers will follow advice like Kneen’s. Thecooperative is refocusing its energy away fromAtlantic Superstores towards selling produce directlyto customers. This kind of exchange can happen atfarmers markets and through Community SupportedAgriculture (CSA) boxes, which deliver boxes of freshproduce from the farm directly to consumers’ doors.

Johnston agrees with the emphasis on local. He adds,“I’d also like customers to buy basic, wholesome foodrather than processed convenience foods. Butsupermarket chains and food corporations won’tencourage this. It isn’t profitable.” When foodshopping, Johnston asks customers to stay smart. “Areorganic Twinkies really a good idea?”