National Pork Producers Council spys on sustainable-agriculture organizations.

Pigs in sheep's clothing

The National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) has spent $ 48,000 in mandatory member contributions to monitor groups that oppose the accelerating consolidation and concentration of hog farming. According to internal NPPC documents leaked to Alan Guebert, an agricultural journalist from Illinois, the council hired the PR firm Mongoven, Biscoe and Duchin in 1996 to investigate six family-farm and sustainable-agriculture organizations, many of whose members fund the NPPC each time they sell a hog. John Stauber, editor of PR Watch, describes Mongoven, Biscoe and Duchin as the pre-eminent "spies for hire" of the PR industry. In the early '90s, the firm mounted an extensive covert operation against consumer advocates who opposed the FDA's approval of Monsanto's bovine growth hormone. Despite appearances to the contrary, NPPC spokesperson Charles Harness told Guebert, "This is not an enemies list." -J.B.

From In These Times, March 17, 1997. Joel Bleisfuss' email: via In These Times at itt@igc.apc.org

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