My Investigative Report on Dairy
I have been advocating for animals for more than 25 years, and I’ve seen some of the worst of the worst on factory farms, but what my colleague and I found at the celebrated “Certified Humane,” “Organic,” and “regenerative” Alexandre Family Farm shocked even us.
In addition to serving as Executive Director of UUAM, I also serve as Director of Education for Farm Forward. In that completely separate organization and role, I just co-authored an extensive investigative report on Organic, Certified Humane, “regenerative” dairy that might interest many of you. Our report was covered by a long-form article in The Atlantic that explicitly corroborated many of our findings.
In the first week after we shared the investigation's findings,The Atlantic reporter's tweet about the topic was seen more than million times. The problems the report and article covered are not yet on enough people’s radar, so it was exciting to see word spreading far and wide.
To write the report, my co-author and I relied on evidence provided by multiple rancher whistleblowers (who sent us hundreds of photos and videos, and whom we interviewed for more than a hundred hours), by numerous affidavits and brand records, by expert veterinary analysis, by our researching the industry, by our traveling to witness the Alexandre dairy in person, and more.
Our report describes in more detail how:
Alexandre Family Farm—a famous, widely endorsed Organic dairy farm that sells at Whole Foods and other major grocery chains, as well as to other companies marketing their products as “ethical,” “great for the animals,” “humane” etc. —routinely abuses and neglects cows, and sells diseased animals for human consumption.
Far from indicating isolated incidents, or physical abuse of a few cows by “a few bad apples,” our investigation points to routine management practices, driven from the top, that lead to systemic, egregious suffering.
Despite whistleblowers reporting animal welfare abuses to Alexandre’s certifiers, the farm retained its “Organic” certification from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and “Humane” certification from the independent nonprofit Certified Humane® program. In other words, the certifiers who purportedly ensure that animals are treated with at least some level of care instead have been enabling Alexandre’s deceptions.
Alexandre’s mistreatment of animals has been going on for at least five years. Meanwhile, Alexandre became one of the first certified regenerative dairy farms in 2021, and has been featured admiringly in the New York Times and Forbes, and on NBC’s Today Show and Food Network’s Guy’s All-American Road Trip.
Like other forms of animal agriculture, dairies have an economic interest to humanewash—to mislead the public about their welfare practices—just like the big oil companies greenwash theirs. Alexandre used its labels, certifications, and marketing to gain the trust of well-meaning conscientious consumers, who paid a price premium to support what turns out to be a fraudulent vision of a humane dairy promoting a liveable climate.
Alexandre used its labels, certifications, and marketing to provide a “halo” to companies like Alec’s Ice Cream, Serenity Kids, Once Upon a Farm, and Cheddies Crackers that source Alexandre dairy and then market their own products as “regenerative” “great for the animals,” “humane” etc.
Due to perverse incentives, some of the routine animal mistreatment we uncovered at Alexandre is likely common throughout the Organic dairy industry. The report’s appendix explores how the organizational structure of large scale dairies depress animal welfare and lead to the staggering high death rate for cows used for dairy: on average, one third of each herd, every year.
As we wrote in the report, “The ill treatment uncovered at Alexandre, until now obscured from public view by corruption and fraud, provides a window into just how profoundly and how long consumers have been misled. The apparent inability of respected animal welfare certifications to detect, let alone prevent, systemic animal abuse and neglect at the leading higher welfare regenerative dairy is just as troubling. If this is happening at Alexandre, what is happening elsewhere?”
You can read more in The Atlantic’s article, and I especially hope that you read the investigative report I co-authored that inspired The Atlantic’s article. I will warn you that these are not light reading … but the information they cover is important. Please consider spreading the word, which can be as easy as mentioning it to a friend or family member, retweeting The Atlantic’s tweet, sharing a Farm Forward video about the investigation, or sharing UUAM’s Facebook post.
I appreciate any help you might contribute to get the word out, and I thank you for caring about animals!
John
Rev. John Gibb Millspaugh
Executive Director, UUAM
