Ben & Jerry’s will no longer state on its packaging that the milk and cream used in its ice cream comes from “happy cows.”
That’s (a little) good news for consumers who have been misled for years into thinking that all of the milk and cream in Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes from dairy farms where cows contentedly frolic outdoors. It doesn’t. In fact, Ben & Jerry's uses milk from conventional, industrial factory farm-style farms.
Ben & Jerry’s ice cream packaging will continue to use the brand’s cartoon image of a cow—depicted outdoors, on a green pasture, under a big blue sky. According to the lawyers representing Ben & Jerry’s parent company, Unilever, the cows “did not look happy to begin with.”
We’ll let you be the judge of whether or not Ben & Jerry’s cartoon cows look “happy.” But to be clear—no matter how much fun the media is having with this happy cow narrative—Ben & Jerry’s deceptive marketing tactics are serious business.
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Organic Consumers Association (OCA) today issued the following statement upon learning that Ben & Jerry’s will no longer claim on product packaging that its ice cream comes from “happy cows”:
"The removal of misleading ‘happy cow’ claims is a victory for consumers and an indication that Ben & Jerry’s can’t back up those claims,” said OCA International Director Ronnie Cummins. “But this is just one small step toward more honest representation of the Ben & Jerry’s brand. OCA will continue, through our own ongoing litigation against Ben & Jerry’s and its parent company, Unilever, to push for Ben & Jerry’s either to live up to its remaining marketing claims, or to remove all claims that have no basis in fact.”
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Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc. has dropped the claim that the milk for its ice cream comes from "happy" cows. The word that the cows may not be contented comes in the company's response to a federal consumer fraud lawsuit. That case, filed in October, alleges the Vermont ice cream maker misleads the public about how its farms treat their animals and protect the environment.
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Iowa dairy farmer Francis Thicke believes that keeping calves with their mothers is the most humane and healthy way to start them off. He has also determined that weaning them after three to four months is the best practice. Around that age, he acknowledges with a chuckle, “they start turning into juvenile delinquents. They won’t come when their moms call. They run around in gangs. And they get high on grass.”
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At Art Schaap’s dairy farm in Clovis, New Mexico, sprinklers draw from deep wells to water green fields of sorghum and corn. Near the milking barn Schaap built almost three decades ago, glossy black-and-white cows lap water from a pipe.
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In recent years, the business started by two friends in a converted Burlington gas station has faced criticism over its own production methods, including a pair of lawsuits accusing the longtime ice cream purveyor of misleading consumers about just how humane its products really are.
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It’s been more than a year since we sued Unilever’s Ben & Jerry’s for misrepresenting its ice cream brand as “humanely sourced” and “environmentally responsible.”
The lawsuit followed our announcement—more than two years ago—that many popular Ben & Jerry’s flavors tested positive for residues of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller.
What’s happened since? Through our attorneys, we’ve continued to push for Ben & Jerry’s to stop misleading consumers.
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Got organic milk?
There are plenty of reasons to drink it.
And there are lots of organic dairies producing—with real integrity—authentic nutrient-dense organic milk, including raw milk.
Unfortunately for those organic dairies and for consumers, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Organic Program (NOP) lets some very large dairies get—and keep—organic certification, even though they don’t play by the rules.
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Any mention of factory farm corporations usually conjures up names like Tyson, Cargill, Koch Foods, JBS, Perdue and, more recently, retailer-turned-factory-farm, Costco.
Some consumers will also think names like Monsanto (now owned by Bayer), Syngenta (now owned by ChemChina) and DowDupont—the companies behind the massive amounts of GMO grains grown to feed imprisoned animals.
Even fewer consumers, however, will think “Big Pharma” when they hear the words “factory farm.”
Yet, the pharmaceutical industry plays an integral role in industrial factory farming.
Giants like Bayer and Elanco want us to think they’re in the business of “animal health.” But what they’re really doing, is pushing drugs—on farm animals. And as the recent news of Elanco Animal Health’s proposed $7.6-billion acquisition of Bayer Animal Health reveals, a dizzying number of relatively recent spin-offs is leading to monopolization in the world of “Big Farma.”
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Should Vermont keep throwing money at cleaning up the state’s polluted waterways—without providing funding for preventing future pollution?
Vermont’s Clean Water Board is taking public comments through September 6, on the board’s priorities for funding the cleanup of Vermont’s waterways.
You can submit comments in writing here.
Better yet, deliver your comments in person at the board’s public hearing, 10 a.m. Thursday, August 22, at the National Life Building, Winooski Room, in Montpelier.
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