Click
here to subscribe to the Sustainable Food News.
U.S. organic milk sales jumped 14 percent to $899 million for the year ended April 21, according to ACNielsen.
Within the overall milk category, organic dairy milk refrigerated sales increased just over 17 percent to $569.8 million. Overall milk sales fell 2 percent to $11.6 billion, the market research firm said. The statistics covered U.S. food, drug and mass merchandisers, not including Wal-Mart.
Organic baby food sales surged nearly 24 percent to $121 million. Total baby food sales were up almost 4 percent to $3.7 billion. Organic baby juice sales skyrocketed to $2 million from $89,872.
According to preliminary findings from the Organic Trade Association’s 2007 Manufacturers Survey released earlier this month, sales of organic baby food posted a 21.5 percent gain in 2006.
U.S. organic food sales totaled nearly $17 billion in 2006, up 22 percent over previous year, OTA reported.
Organic foods’ share of total retail sales of food and beverages was about 3 percent, up from 1.9 percent in 2003 and approximately 2.5 percent in 2005. Sales in 2005 were $13.8 billion.
About 31 percent of overall organic sales in 2006 were through mainstream supermarkets/grocery stores, and 24 percent were through the leading natural food supermarket chains such as Whole Foods, Wild Oats, and Trader Joe’s.
Another 22 percent of all organic sales were tthrough independent, small chain natural grocery stores. Foodservice sales still represent a small fraction of total organic sales at 3 percent of overall organic product sales, OTA said.
Sales of fresh fruit and vegetables grew about 7 percent in 2006, while dairy products (including yogurt) showed gains of 27 percent.
Organic beef sales grew about 13.5 percent from a very small base, which is impressive given that overall beef sales are fairy flat growing at around 3 percent.
Although still a small part of total organic food sales, sales of dried fruits and vegetables outpaced the growth rates for many other organic food types.