December 11, 2013

 
WhiteWave Foods to acquire Earthbound Farm worth US$600 million

In an attempt to capture a greater share of the growing organic sector of the food market, WhiteWave Foods plans to buy Earthbound Farm, the largest organic produce brand in the US, worth US$600 million.

Earthbound Farm was the producer behind the 2006 spinach E. coli outbreak that sickened more than 200 people and killed three. Following that outbreak, the company redesigned its food safety practices to become an industry leader in growing safe produce, developments highlighted in a Food Safety News article from February 2012.

WhiteWave owns a number of dairy brands, including Silk, Horizon Organic, and Land O'Lakes.

"With Horizon Organic and Earthbound Farm, WhiteWave will now provide the two most popular gateways for consumers to enter into the organic category – produce and dairy," said WhiteWave CEO Gregg Engles in a statement.

Critics of WhiteWave are not as optimistic about the purchase. The company does much to stretch the definition of "organic" food, said Mark Kastel, senior farm policy analyst at agricultural organisation the Cornucopia Institute.

Kastel said that, after buying the Silk soy milk product line, WhiteWave converted the brand's 100% organic products to virtually no certified organics, replacing the "organic" claim with "natural."

Kastel added that the chief executive officer of WhiteWave Gregg Engles knows as much about vegetables as he knew about dairy when he orchestrated a global feeding frenzy in that market to build Dean Foods.

WhiteWave said it did not expect the acquisition to significantly affect operations at Earthbound Farm, which would continue operating under its own brand name.