Large dairy farms increasingly enter organic business in the US
10 August 2018
The trend in the US dairy industry has been toward fewer but larger farms since the 1980s. At that time, organic milk was available only at farmers markets, specialty grocers or small-scale dairy farms selling to a local cooperative. Nowadays, organic dairy products are widely distributed by mass retailers, such as Costco, Target, and Walmart. And much of this organic milk comes from large scale dairies with thousands of cows. One of such dairies, Aurora Organic Dairy, the industry's largest supplier to grocery chains, states that those people who believe organic food should come only from small producers are inaccurately portraying large scale organic production. The 26,000-cow company, which has nine barns in Colorado and Texas with each ranging from 900 to 4,400 cows, manages 12,000 acres (4,856 hectares) of organic pastureland and strictly adheres to the guidelines of organic dairy production, placing animal welfare and sustainable production as top priorities of its business strategy.