Forage Crisis
Green New Deal
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Conservation Programs
Vote for Workshops
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Volume 27 | Number 4
Midwest Organic & Sustainable Education Service
July | August 2019
National conference to bring together women working in sustainable ag By Lisa Kivirist
Women from across the country will gather to exchange ideas, find resources, and network at the National Women in Sustainable Agriculture Conference this October in St. Paul, Minnesota. MOSES hosts this year’s event, which serves as the only national conference that brings together farmers, educators, activists and others who are committed to women in sustainable agriculture. “MOSES is excited for the opportunity to bring together a diverse agenda focused on women connecting, leading, and working together to grow a larger movement of sustainability within the food system,” said Lauren Langworthy, Interim Executive Director at MOSES. “We’re looking forward to putting out the welcome mat for women from different regions and backgrounds as we cultivate an event for powerful peer-to-peer learning.” The event will take place Oct. 17-19, 2019 at the InterContinental Saint Paul Riverfront hotel in downtown St. Paul, Minn. Tickets are $240 for the conference and $150 for full-day intensives on Oct. 17. Single-day tickets also are available. Registration opens Aug. 1. A block of rooms at a group rate is available at the InterContinental hotel. See mosesorganic. org/wisa-conference.
WISA History Over the past decade, different organizations have hosted this national conference, known as the WISA Conference (Women in Sustainable Agriculture). The first WISA conferences on the east coast were hosted by the University of Vermont Women’s Agricultural Network (WAgN) and the Pennsylvania Women’s Agricultural Network (PA WAgN). The most recent WISA conference took place in 2016 when Oregon
cultivate
nourish
connections, friendships, support
grow!
your skills, your strengths, your self
WOMEN IN SUSTAINABLE AG
CONFERENCE
Oct. 17-19, 2019 | St. Paul, MN mosesorganic.org/wisa-conference
Extension hosted the event in Portland. Attendance runs about 200-350 women. “The WISA Conference today serves the same goal as it did when we started organizing these events over a decade ago: to provide a national forum for women
committed to sustainable agriculture to gather together and share ideas, resources and visions for the future,” explained Mary Peabody, program director for the Women’s Ag Network (WAgN) at the University of Vermont. “As the number of women farmers committed to conservation and sustainability continues to grow, it is inspiring to see the WISA Conference continue and bring more voices and perspectives to the table.” Peabody will present workshops at the October conference on negotiation and growing successful teams.
WFAN Collaboration MOSES has been organizing the 2019 WISA Conference in partnership with the Women, Food and Agriculture Network (WFAN). The MOSES In Her Boots Project has teamed up with WFAN on various projects over the years, including facilitating Women Caring for the Land sessions. “So much of our work at WFAN focuses on encouraging women to speak up and to speak out, to take on leadership positions within their communities, and to join foundational conversations to create change within the food system,” said Sherri Dugger of WFAN and a farmer herself running Dugger Family Farm in Indiana. “Conferences like WISA offer these female farmers, food producers, advocates, and activists a chance to turn inward, to take a break from the outside world, to reflect on and share the good work they do, and to find inspiration and renewed energy from a wonderful community of smart, powerful, and respected women. As the newly minted executive director of Women, Food and Agriculture Network, I feel really lucky to have the opportunity right out of the gate to participate in WFAN’s collaboration with To WISA Conference on page 6
Mandatory labeling of GMOs expected to expand market for non-GMO, organic crops By Peter Golbitz and Jacob Golbitz
PO Box 339, Spring Valley, WI 54767
The food landscape in America is being reshaped by shifting consumer preferences driven by a younger demographic that values transparency, sustainable farming practices, and humane treatment of animals. This dynamic is causing millennial and Gen Z consumers—as well as aging baby boomers who helped set the stage for these products—to seek out foods that can be identified as having been produced without toxic
synthetic pesticides or grown and processed without the use of GMOs (genetically modified organisms), antibiotics or questionable food ingredients or additives. First, there was the USDA Organic seal. Consumers who wanted to enjoy foods grown and processed without synthetic fertilizers or pesticides could simply purchase foods that carried the USDA Organic label. Next, came the Non-GMO Project Verified seal. Shoppers looking to avoid foods that contained ingredients derived from genetically engineered crops could look for products that carried the Non-GMO Project Verified label. Now, we have a new USDA labeling program about to roll out, the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard (NBFDS), that instead of identifying products that are not genetically engineered, will actually identify foods that do contain GMO crops or ingredients. For many consumers, there already has been mounting confusion about organic and non-GMO product claims: about how they’re different from one another, and in some cases, how they overlap. Now add to this a new mandatory label that uses radically different terminology and threshold levels to describe which foods contain, or may contain GMOs, and we have the makings of a major disruptive event for the food industry. And any major disruptive event that impacts food processing and marketing has the potential to have a direct impact on the supply, demand, and pricing for organic and non-GMO crops, foods, and ingredients. The development of the new rule came about after years of pressure on the USDA and FDA from consumer and environmental groups that were concerned
about the safety of consuming GMO foods and the potential negative impact of their use on the environment. These groups initiated various voter referendums focused on labeling GMOs and also pressured state legislatures to write laws requiring mandatory labeling of foods containing GMOs. In 2011, for example, the Center for Food Safety, a national nonprofit public interest and environmental advocacy organization, submitted a formal legal petition to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) asking that the FDA require mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods. Other groups, such as Just Label It and the Organic Trade Association, began to get involved in similar initiatives, and by 2013, a number of state legislatures passed the first wave of GMO labeling laws. Eventually, 54 bills were introduced in 26 states. But it was the Vermont law, passed in 2014 and which was set to go into effect July 1, 2016, that finally made a national rule more imperative. The idea of a patchwork of differing state regulations requiring the labeling of GMO foods was a nightmare scenario for the food industry. With the Vermont law pending, and after additional public input and debate among congressional leaders, the U.S. Congress passed an act, which President Obama signed into law July 29, 2016, requiring the USDA to develop a new rule that would require food manufacturers to disclose the content of genetically engineered ingredients in packaged food products. The law gave authority for the development of the rule to the USDA and required that the agency conduct a study To GMO Labeling Impact on page 8