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GOURMET NEWS JUNE 2018 www.gourmetnews.com NEWS & NOTES 8 Animal Welfare Continued from PAGE 1 OFPA that "conflicts with every prior ad- ministration's approach to rulemaking under the OFPA and the National Organic Standards Board." "We welcome the critical support of our friends in the animal welfare community in standing up against the Administration's at- tack on this important organic standard," said Laura Batcha, CEO and Executive Di- rector of the Organic Trade Association. "In USDA's attempt to kill this fully vetted final regulation, they've taken a radical depar- ture from conclusions reached over more than 20 years of rulemakings regarding or- ganic livestock care, and have assumed an aberrant view that has no historical basis or legal justification." The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is North America's oldest humane organization with roughly 2.7 million supporters nationwide. The An- imal Welfare Institute is a non-profit char- itable organization dedicated to reducing animal suffering caused by people, and has sought to improve the welfare of farm ani- mals since the early 1950s. The Organic Trade Association is also challenging USDA's assertion that it does not have to consult with the National Or- ganic Standards Board (NOSB) — the ad- visory board to the National Organic Program established by OFPA — before withdrawing the regulation. "The organic standard-making process established by Congress requires consulta- tion with the National Organic Standards Board to make or amend existing organic standards," said Batcha. "The day the Or- ganic Livestock and Poultry Practices final regulation was published, it became the regulation of the National Organic Pro- gram. Withdrawal of this regulation re- quires NOSB's consultation and review." The Organic Trade Association said that USDA continues to flagrantly disregard and refuse to consider the overwhelming sup- port from the public for the organic animal welfare rule. "USDA knows the public overwhelm- ingly supports the implementation of the Organic Livestock and Poultry Practices (OLPP) regulation. Indeed, in its announcement to withdraw the rule, USDA noted that out of the 72,000 comments it received, over 63,000 op- posed the withdrawal of the final rule, and that only 50 supported its withdrawal," said Batcha. "But despite the clear evidence of the public sentiment, USDA is acting against the will of the public, and the will of the organic sector." The Organic Livestock and Poultry Practices final rule was published on Jan. 19, 2017, after more than a decade of ex- tensive public input and a thorough vetting process. Before the final withdrawal, the government had attempted six times – ei- ther through the rulemaking process or through court filings — to delay the imple- mentation of the rule. The regulation addresses four broad areas of organic livestock and poultry prac- tices: living conditions, animal healthcare, transport, and slaughter. Most importantly, it stops the use of "porches" from being al- lowed in organic poultry production and requires producers to give their poultry ac- cess to the outdoors. The Organic Trade Association filed its lawsuit against USDA last September over the department's delays in the implementa- tion of the OLPP regulation. The lawsuit argues that USDA violated the Organic Foods Production Act by failing to consult with NOSB on the rollback of the final or- ganic standard, and unlawfully delayed the effective date of the final livestock stan- dards developed by industry and in accor- dance with the established rulemaking processes. The suit also argues that USDA issued its repeated delays without the re- quired public process, and that USDA ig- nored the overwhelming public record established in support of these organic standards. Those arguments still stand. Since the filing of the lawsuit, support for the legal action against USDA has grown. A host of organic stakeholders rep- resenting thousands of organic farming families, organic certifiers and organic pol- icymakers – along with leading retail brands and groups speaking out for mil- lions of consumers — have supported the suit as declarants harmed by the USDA ac- tion. The declarants include George Siemon, CEO of Organic Valley/CROPP Cooperative; Gina Asoudegan, Vice Presi- dent of Mission and Innovation Strategy for Applegate; Jesse Laflamme, co-founder of Pete & Gerry's Eggs; Robynn Schrader, CEO of National Co+op Grocers; Kyla Smith, Chair of Directors for the Accredited Certifiers Association (ACA); and Tom Chapman, Chairman of the National Organic Standards Board and Direc- tor of Ingredient Sourcing at Clif Bar & Company. In addition to the lawsuit's co-plaintiffs, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) filed a separate law- suit on Jan. 12 against USDA for withdrawing the Organic Livestock and Poultry Prac- tices regulation. HSUS is the largest animal protection group in the country with some 10 million members. "Support for our lawsuit is rapidly grow- ing," said Batcha. "Being organic is a choice, and all of our organic stakeholders — from farmers to retailers — work hard every day to voluntarily abide by organic standards. They want clear consistent stan- dards. Consumers want clear consistent or- ganic standards. We call upon the government to act responsibly as the stew- ard of our federal organic program. That is what the organic community wants, what consumers expect and what the law man- dates." GN Shared Values Create Customer Loyalty BY LORRIE BAUMANN There's a dollars and cents case to be made in favor of talking to your customers about issues of social justice, food safety, animal welfare and environmental sustainability. Grocers who know how to do that well are in better position to build relationships with shoppers that they want to meet at the checkstands. Consumers are no longer asking just the simple questions about price, taste and convenience to preface their grocery pur- chasing decisions, according to David Fikes, Food Marketing Institute Vice Pres- ident for Communications and Con- sumer/Community Affairs. They're now often bringing more complicated questions with them on their shopping trips, includ- ing broad concerns about where a food product was produced, whether the animal was humanely treated, whether workers were treated fairly and had safe working conditions and where the ingredients came from. Not every consumer asks all of these questions, but most of them are asking at least one or two."What's interesting is that, if you look at animal welfare, some of them are coming at it from health and wellness, and some of them are coming from concern for the animals," Fikes said. "When over half of your shoppers are coming with these questions, if you're going to establish trust, if you're going to expect loyalty from them, you need to meet them at the point of shared values." Understanding this and acting on it is key to establishing customer loyalty, ac- cording to Fikes. FMI has concluded, in a 2017 report on "U.S. Grocery Shopper Trends" co-authored by the Institute and the Hartman Group, experts on demand- side trends in the food and beverage indus- try, that retailers who communicate with shoppers about safety, health and wellness and ethics are well positioned to build trust and loyalty. Shoppers want retailers to do more than just make them feel informed – they want to shop at a store that seems open and hon- est and that shares their values. They be- lieve that the foods they eat influence their health and wellness, and today's shoppers "increasingly see being more closely con- nected to their food as an antidote to the ills caused by a food system that seems out of balance," according to FMI. They know they can shop wherever they want, and they believe that their decisions about where and how to spend their money are meaningful. "There's research out that is pointing at the point that consumers feel they have more power in how they spend their money than in how they vote," Fikes said. "That's why we urge our grocers to be clear and to communicate about their val- ues, about where they stand on these is- sues, so that when consumers are doing their research, they can espouse what the company values are." Retailers can demonstrate that they're open, honest and trustworthy by helping customers find out what's in a product and where it came from. They can show that they impose strict food safety standards on suppliers, follow Fair Trade practices and earn their reputation for selling high-qual- ity goods. Shoppers also like product guar- antees and reasonable return policies, and they expect to know about it from their grocer when a food safety issue results in a recall, according to the FMI research. Shoppers don't necessarily want all this information about their grocer's values force-fed to them, but they want their gro- cers to be open in their answers to these questions as they're asked, according to Fikes. "Transparency is not simply a busi- ness negotiation; it is also about relation- ship building," he said. "You are sharing openly and honestly and, this is key, you are answering the questions they have, that they are able to find answers they want. That doesn't mean telling them everything you want them to know. It means paying attention to what they want to know and answering those questions." Shoppers also expect their grocers to be proactive and accountable. Those qualities can be demonstrated by quick action when there's a product recall and accepting re- sponsibility for making it right when there's a problem with a product. Consumers also want to see fair treatment for employees up and down the supply chain, according to Fikes. "There's a great halo of accountabil- ity and loyalty that can be had if your store has the reputation of treating employees fairly," he said. "They [shoppers] sense whether or not an employee enjoys work- ing there and whether they're being treated fairly." It's still uncertain whether online retail- ers are being held to these same standards, and FMI has research that will be coming out in the Institute's 2018 trends report that will be delving into that question, Fikes said. While we wait for that, he has some advice for all grocery retailers: "In the age of skepticism, where people are skeptical of big business and their motives, we have to break that down and let people know that our business is comprised of people who share the values that they share," he said. "The only people that folks seem to trust are family and friends and people who share their values. You've got to lead with the shared values to establish the rapport." GN

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