http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2004/01/monsanto-vs-milkman
Monsanto vs. the Milkman
A Maine dairy fights for the right to wear its hormone-free label.
By Susan Q. Stranahan
January/February 2004 Issue
Around the state of Maine, it's hard to miss Stan Bennett's fleet of red-and-white trucks. They're the ones with the Oakhurst Dairy logo emblazoned across the side and the Oakhurst guarantee (Our Farmers' Pledge: No Artificial Growth Hormones) spelled out in big bold letters below. That pledge is printed on every carton and jug of milk that family-owned Oakhurst, Maine's largest dairy, sells. And Bennett, who has spent the last decade inducing Maine dairy farmers to "swear off the needle," as he puts it, isn't inclined to change the wording around one bit. "We state what we are trying to do, simply and honestly," says Bennett, president and principal owner of the Portland-based dairy. "It's my right -- and obligation -- to inform [customers] of the facts."
These days, Bennett has been spending a lot of energy defending that position. Monsanto, the nation's largest (and only) producer of recombinant bovine growth hormone, rBGH, doesn't think that Oakhurst -- or other dairies around the country that have put similar labels on their milk -- has a right to tout its products as rBGH-free. Last summer, with Bennett poised to expand Oakhurst's market into the Boston area, lawyers for the St. Louis-based chemical giant struck. The company sued Oakhurst for "deceptive" and "misleading" marketing, and asked a federal court to order that the Farmers' Pledge be removed from the dairy's labels, advertising, and trucks. Monsanto's argument: The genetically engineered rBGH, which increases a dairy cow's milk output by about a gallon a day, has already passed muster with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Oakhurst's labels, contends Monsanto, might cause consumers to question the drug's safety, even though the FDA has found that milk from cows injected with rBGH is the same as regular milk and that the hormone poses no human health risks. Oakhurst's milk is the same as every other dairy's, maintains Monsanto spokeswoman Janice Armstrong: "Milk is milk. There's no scientist in the world who can tell them apart."
Still, although the FDA approved use of rBGH a decade ago, the controversy over the safety and ethics of the drug has never completely gone away. Some food-safety experts continue to argue that more research is needed to determine, for instance, if a hormone found in elevated levels in the milk of rBGH-treated cattle promotes growth of tumors. Canada and the European Union have both banned use of rBGH based on concerns that animals injected with the drug are prone to more illnesses and, as a result, may require higher doses of antibiotics. John Nutting, a third-generation dairy farmer and Oakhurst supplier in Leeds, Maine, shares those concerns, which is a major reason he refuses to use artificial hormones. "If you forced a racehorse to run 20 percent faster, that horse would eventually break down," he says. "It's much like that with a cow [on rBGH]."
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