Organic Trade Association hits back on the Wall Street Journal’s claims on organics
By Surya Zeeb
Published: October 4, 2018
Category: Organic News, The Organic & Non-GMO Report Newsletter
Ad placed in the Wall Street Journal by the Organic Trade Association
The Organic Trade Association (OTA) recently took contributors of the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) to task over a series of op-ed pieces, which target the FDA and the organic industry. The OTA noted that the articles were “misleading and derogatory attacks,” and the association published a full-page ad in the Journal—the nation’s best-selling newspaper—refuting those claims with facts about the organic industry.
“It is the mission of the Organic Trade Association to protect and promote organic, and it is our responsibility to get the facts out. It’s critically important to push back against these attacks,” noted Laura Batcha, CEO of the OTA, in a press release. “Consumers deserve to know the truth. Organic’s strength is its transparency, and organic farmers and businesses work hard every day to uphold the standards of organic and to honor the trust that we’ve earned from consumers everywhere. We will not let these charges go unanswered.”
The WSJ made a number of potentially strident claims in articles published August 5, 2018, and August 31, 2018—claiming, in the former article’s title, that “The Organic Industry is Lying to You,” written by Henry Miller, a writer who had previously been fired from Forbes for publishing ghost-written articles.
The OTA’s sponsored ad was titled: “Here’s a long list of chemicals you should never have to read.” It featured a comprehensive and detailed list of the hundreds of chemicals prohibited in organic production and processing, with a link for readers to the U.S. Department of Agriculture—which oversees the list of substances allowed and prohibited in organic.
Source: Deli Market News, Organic Trade Association
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