Startling news about certified organic coffee growers

A recent article in Salon caught my eye the other day, and I found it disturbing. It was written by Samuel Fromartz, the author of "Organic, Inc: Natural Foods and how they grew" (very informative). In the article, he described a "quiet" change made by the USDA to change the way organic coffee coops will be inspected. The change will make it more costly and time-consuming for South American and African coffee coops to obtain organic certification. This came about as a result of an infraction by a grower in Mexico. The summary can be found at the following link at the USDA website: http://www.ams.usda.gov/nop, by clicking on compliance, and then the Appeals Summaries for Sept05-Mar07. Many feel that this decision is an extreme reaction to one grower's mistake. The public (this means us!) can send a response to this decision at the USDA's NOP webpage. If we don't speak up, the availability of organic and fair trade coffee may very well be in jeopardy.