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Monsanto Sues Dairy in Maine Over Label's
Remarks on Hormones
By DAVID
BARBOZA
July 12, 2003
Email this story.
CHICAGO,
July 11 In another sign of how contentious food labeling issues have
become in recent years, the Monsanto Company has sued a small milk
producer in Portland, Me., over the labeling of its dairy
products.
Monsanto has accused Oakhurst Dairy Inc. of
engaging in misleading and deceptive marketing practices by carrying
labels that seem to disparage the use of artificial growth hormones
in cows.
Monsanto is the maker of the only major artificial
growth hormone, Posilac. It has been on the market since 1994 and is
used in about a third of the nation's nine million dairy
cows.
The company, which also pioneered the development of
genetically modified crops, says its product was approved for use by
the Food and Drug Administration. It also says that the Oakhurst
labels suggest that milk that comes from cows treated with
artificial growth hormones is somehow unsafe or lower in
quality.
Since they were introduced nearly a decade ago,
artificial growth hormones have come under vigorous attack from some
consumer groups, organic farmers and other critics because of
concerns that they are harmful to cows, that they make cows produce
milk that is chemically and nutritionally different from natural
milk and that they could induce higher rates of cancer in
humans.
Many scientists, however, say those claims are
largely fabricated and fictional. And Monsanto says its product,
which is intended to bolster milk production, is derived from a
natural protein produced in cattle.
Still, consumers have
grown concerned about the use of the artificial hormones, which are
banned from the market in Canada and the European
Union.
Oakhurst Dairy and other New England dairy producers
say that years ago they responded to consumer concerns by labeling
their dairy products free of artificial growth hormones. Indeed, the
state of Maine says that for dairy producers to use the state's
quality seal of approval on their packages, the dairy processors
must receive signed affidavits from dairy farmers who have pledged
not to use artificial growth hormones on their
cows.
Oakhurst's products carry the state's quality seal, and
the company's milk cartons say, "Our farmers' pledge: no artificial
growth hormones."
Stanley T. Bennett II, the president of
Oakhurst Dairy, a family-owned company with sales of about $85
million a year, said today, in a telephone interview: "We don't feel
we need to remove that label. We ought to have the right to let
people know what is and is not in our milk."
Other New
England dairy producers say they use similar labels.
"In
Maine and Vermont our farmers agree not to provide us with milk from
cows treated with artificial growth hormone," said Lynne M. Bohan, a
spokeswoman at HP Hood, a large, privately held regional dairy
distributor based in Chelsea, Mass.
And Ben & Jerry's
Homemade, the popular ice cream maker in Vermont, also carries a
label on every pint of ice cream that says its farmers pledge not to
use artificial growth hormones.
"We've been vocally opposed
to bovine growth hormone for a long time," said Lee Holden, a
spokesman for Ben & Jerry's, now an independent subsidiary of
the giant food maker Unilever. "One of the concerns is the health of
the cows, but also there's the effect on family farmers."
But
Monsanto, the maker of agricultural seeds and chemicals, has a
reputation for responding strongly to critics of its biotech seeds
and its artificial growth hormones.
The company has been
pressing government officials in Maine to get Oakhurst to change its
labels and tone down its marketing. On July 3, Monsanto filed its
suit against Oakhurst in the United States District Court in Boston,
seeking an injunction preventing Oakhurst from using the
labels.
Monsanto says not only are the labels misleading to
consumers but also that there is no way to distinguish between milk
that comes from cows treated with artificial growth hormones and
milk that comes from cows not treated.
In a statement
released after the suit was filed, Monsanto said that "these
misleading representations directly disparage Monsanto's Posilac
bovine somatotropin product and the milk from cows supplemented with
bovine somatotropin."
The National Dairy Council also says
Monsanto's Posilac drug has been "repeatedly proven safe," according
to Regan Miller Jones, a dietitian with the trade group.
The
Center for Global Food Issues of the Hudson Institute has also
become concerned about what it considers misleading dairy
labels.
While officials at the center have not taken issue
with the Oakhurst labels, Alex Avery, director of research and
education at the center, said: "There's a whole lot of upheaval in
the dairy industry because of different claims. People are confused
and this is harmful to the dairy industry. You see labels that say
no pesticides, no antibiotics, but all milk has tiny traces of
pesticides. There are even tiny traces of DDT."
The center's
new slogan to stop milk producers from marketing with misleading
health slogans is not as catchy as "Got Milk?" but it's just as
simple: "Milk Is Milk."
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