Posted: 10.12.2010

An independent report has been released that focuses on widespread abuses in organic egg production.

The report will be formally presented to the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the October meeting of the National Organic Standards Board in Madison by the Cornucopia Institute.  Mark Kastel, co-founder of the Institute says, “After visiting over 15% of the certified egg farms in the United States, and surveying all name-brand and private-label industry marketers, it’s obvious that a high percentage of the eggs on the market should be labeled ‘produced with organic feed’ rather than bearing the USDA-certified organic logo,”

According to the United Egg Producers (UEP), 80 percent of all organic eggs are produced by just a handful of farms. Most of these operations own hundreds of thousands, or even millions of birds, and have diversified into “specialty eggs,” which include organic.

Cornucopia’s report focuses not on the size of some of these agribusinesses, but rather on their organic livestock management practices. It says that most of these giant henhouses, some holding 85,000 birds or more, provide no legitimate access to the outdoors, as required in the federal organic regulations.

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