Fascinating that on the same day as Michael Pollan’s cover story in the NYTimes magazine, was this article about the “Wal-Marting of organics” in the SF Chronicle’s magazine.

Although many of us tend to associate Wal-Mart with all that’s evil in corporate America, and wonder about it and other mega-supermarkets diluting the organic label, this woman believes otherwise:

“Peggy Miars, executive director of California Certified Organic Farmers in Santa Cruz, one of the nation’s largest organic certifiers, believes the benefits of big businesses’ market presence outweigh the potential negatives.

Miars said the USDA standards are strict enough (though she acknowledged ambiguities existed) that the label would remain strong, and, in addition to the environmental benefits, she said big corporations would create greater awareness, boost demand and create more markets. “If consumers who never thought much about organic foods see them at their local Wal-Mart,” she said, “they may investigate more, maybe even stop by a farmers’ market. This would increase demand and the end result is it would be good for organic.”

Read the full article here