When is the word “natural” misleading in advertising? That’s the basis for a lawsuit filed August 25, 2016 against General Mills, maker of the brand Nature Valley Granola Bars, who label their products’ packages with the words “Made with 100% NATURAL whole grain OATS.” The lawsuit was filed by Beyond Pesticides, Moms Across America, and Organic Consumers Association using the Richman Law Group [1] in Washington, DC, citing the District of Columbia’s Consumer Protection Procedure Act.
Glyphosate, a key herbicide chemical active in several commercial and agricultural herbicides, has been found in General Mills’ natural granola bars. Since when is a man-made toxic chemical considered natural? So, three consumer groups filed a lawsuit and rightfully so, I think.
Jay Feldman, Executive Director of Beyond Pesticides, says
Glyphosate cannot be considered ‘natural’ because it is a toxic, synthetic herbicide.
Identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a carcinogen, it should not be allowed for use in food production, and certainly not in food with a label that suggests to consumers that the major ingredient –oats– is 100% natural, when it is produced with and contains the highly hazardous glyphosate.
Glyphosate [1] is highly toxic, although it does not come under the category of an organophosphate [2]—one of the most serious types of herbicides causing central nervous system damage.
In March 2015 the World Health Organization‘s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic in humans” (category 2A) based on epidemiological studies, animal studies, and in vitro studies. [3, 7]
Zen Honeycutt, Founder and Executive Director of Moms Across America, offers this:
As a mother, when I read “100% Natural” I would expect that to mean no synthetic or toxic chemicals at all. Glyphosate is a toxic chemical that the EPA recognizes as a “reproductive effector” which “can cause liver and kidney damage” and “digestive effects.” It is unacceptable that Nature Valley granola bars contain any amount of this chemical.
As a consumer health researcher who’s written rather extensively about herbicides in my 2009 book, Our Chemical Lives And The Hijacking Of Our DNA, A Probe Into What’s Probably Making Us Sick, and in the Introduction to my newly released book, Eat to Beat Disease, Foods Medicinal Qualities, wherein I discuss how the chemical industry overtook to ‘mentor’ food growing and agricultural in the USA, in particular, I cannot impress upon consumers the underestimated importance of pesticide-free and herbicide-free food and water to maintain optimum health—but extremely vital to regaining health, especially regarding gastrointestinal diseases currently plaguing children and adults.
This National Institutes of Health website lists digestive diseases in the USA that ought to invoke a hiccup when reading how prevalent they are, even though the statistics/demographics are not very current.
Alexis Baden-Mayer, Esq., the Political Director of the Organic Consumers Association, says
Food grown with dangerous pesticides like glyphosate isn’t natural. Consumers understand this. That’s why sales of natural products are booming. Unfortunately, companies’ misleading claims trick consumers into buying just what they’re trying to avoid. This has to be stopped.
Personally, I cannot tell you how much I agree with and second Baden-Mayer’s remark!
I always consider the word “natural” a bastardization of the English language and terminology whenever it appears in advertising for any type of product being sold because processors and manufacturers, in most cases, use chemicals of some sort during production. Plus, their marketing department gurus know that the buying public is ‘hungry’ for products that don’t contain toxic chemicals or ingredients. Product labeling, in my opinion, is totally false for many products, but especially when it comes to processed foods, I’d go as far as to say it’s “mislabeling.”
Some purveyors claim they don’t use nor sell GMO ingredients, while actually not attesting to that on their labels, e.g., GMO-free label using the Non-GMO Project Verified seal [4]. How can they maintain that legally when 75 percent and upwards of processed foods [5] contain soy, corn, canola or cottonseed oil derivatives [6] that are grown from GMO-seeds as GMO field crops in the USA using Roundup® herbicide in the fields?
Even if crops are not Roundup Ready® seeds, numerous crops can be and are sprayed during what’s called a “staging” process prior to harvest using glyphosate and/or glufosinate as a crop desiccant, which I talk about in my new book, Eat to Beat Disease, Foods Medicinal Qualities. Toxic chemical residues have been found in those crops post-harvest and in the processed foods they are made into. Is that what’s happening with General Mills granola bars?
According to the Press Release from Moms Across America,
The lawsuit alleges that, when marketing Nature Valley products, General Mills misleads and fails to disclose to consumers of the use and presence of glyphosate and its harmful effects. Plaintiffs are asking a jury to find that General Mills’ “natural” labeling is deceptive and misleading and therefore a violation of law, and require its removal from the market.
Furthermore,
A study released in early 2016 finds that glyphosate can cause changes to DNA function resulting in the onset of chronic disease, including diabetes, obesity, and Alzheimer’s disease.
How “natural” do you want your food?
Natural and Non-Toxic Products. Up to 50% Off – Every Day (Ad)
References:
[1] http://richmanlawgroup.com/
[2] http://www.toxipedia.org/display/toxipedia/Organophosphates
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
[4] http://www.nongmoproject.org/
[5] http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/issues/311/ge-foods/about-ge-foods
[6] https://www.organicconsumers.org/old_articles/ge/GMonMarketUS.pdf
[7] http://www.naturalnews.com/037249_GMO_study_cancer_tumors_organ_damage.html with photos of rats tumors
Resources:
Moms Across America Press Release Aug. 25, 2016
Personal email to C J Frompovich and http://www.investorideas.com/news/2016/food/08252GeneralMills.asp
USDA: Genetically Engineered Crops in the United States
http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/1282246/err162.pdf
Catherine J Frompovich (website) is a retired natural nutritionist who earned advanced degrees in Nutrition and Holistic Health Sciences, Certification in Orthomolecular Theory and Practice plus Paralegal Studies. Her work has been published in national and airline magazines since the early 1980s. Catherine authored numerous books on health issues along with co-authoring papers and monographs with physicians, nurses, and holistic healthcare professionals. She has been a consumer healthcare researcher 35 years and counting.
Catherine’s latest book, published October 4, 2013, is Vaccination Voodoo, What YOU Don’t Know About Vaccines, available on Amazon.com.
Her 2012 book A Cancer Answer, Holistic BREAST Cancer Management, A Guide to Effective & Non-Toxic Treatments, is available on Amazon.com and as a Kindle eBook.
Two of Catherine’s more recent books on Amazon.com are Our Chemical Lives And The Hijacking Of Our DNA, A Probe Into What’s Probably Making Us Sick (2009) and Lord, How Can I Make It Through Grieving My Loss, An Inspirational Guide Through the Grieving Process (2008)
Catherine’s NEW book: Eat To Beat Disease, Foods Medicinal Qualities ©2016 Catherine J Frompovich is now available.
The only thing ‘natural’ about General Mills, Kraft, Heinz, etc. is their inclination to deceive, poison, enslave and destroy mankind.
Never understood the appeal of these. They taste kinda meh and when you open them up there’s a crumb explosion all over your lap. One more reason not to buy these I guess.
It’s about time consumers struck back at the perversion of the word “natural” by corporations that use it to sell us poison!
Decades ago I called the Food and Drug Administration to complain about the use of the word “natural” to describe potato chips I bought that had hydrogenated vegetable oil (which is about as un-natural as you can get). I was told there was nothing they could do about it because there was no legal definition of “natural”. What a crock!
I hope the court delivers a stinging rebuke to this deceptive practice!
Are you really concerned about your health while complaining about potato chips?
Using poison on our food as a dessicant is CRIMINAL.
Don’t eat it. More for everyone else. I don’t know how you were ever born, because the chemicals used during our parents and grandparents era were soooooo much worse.
There are no Round Up ready oats. You liberal organic eating hippies will he starving to death if farmers quit using chemicals, as will everyone on the planet. What’s worse, providing you buy into your own BS, eating chem tainted processed foods, or starving to death? As an agronomist I know what crop production requires, and I know chemicals very well
No, but they dessicate the crops to harvest. You should know that AgDoctor. Born and raised on the farm I know what goes on. Roundup use is rampant.
You absolutely do not dessicated oats to harvest. Look it up genius.
Probably why you left the farm. Dessicated your dad’s oat field and got fired.
Way to go Zen, Natalie and the rest of you moms!
Glad to see some folks are taking these giant (a-holes) to task.
personally I never touch anything general Mills puts on the shelf.
Another dirty little trick…a mega corporation will but out some, like Amies(for instance) and then start putting their disease causing chemicals in them.