By Riley McDermid
New USDA guidelines for the definition of what it means for products to be organic went into effect on Oct. 21, creating a specific federal standard for how products that wish to be marketed as organic must be grown, processed or raised. Prior to the USDA’s new statute, a product sold anywhere in the U.S. with as little as 1 percent of its ingredients comprised of organic material could claim to be an “organic” product to consumers.
Now, any product imported from other countries or grown in the U.S. that wants to use the label “organic” must follow strictly worded guidelines and be free of conventional pesticides, GMOs and radiation. To carry the USDA official organic stamp, the product must contain at least 95 percent organic ingredients; animals whose meat is labeled as organic must be raised under organic management, with no growth hormones or antibiotics; organic meat, dairy, fish and poultry products must come from animals fed a 100 percent organic diet; and the land on which organic food or meat is raised must be free of sewage or petroleum-based fertilizers.
“Organic had become a marketing tool and that was a little confusing. In a nutshell, no one really knew what it meant. These new guidelines establish criteria that let the consumer know that whether they buy something in New Mexico or Florida, if it says ‘organic’ on the label, they will know it’s been produced the same way,” says Joan Shaffer, public affairs specialist with the USDA.
Organics are currently the fastest growing sector of agriculture in America. With a growth rate of 20 percent annually, the industry of growing, raising and selling organic products is big business nationwide.
Although the broad swathe of chiropractic care and philosophy about food and nutrition (which covers a multitude of different approaches to healing the body) has no specific stance on organic foods, some chiropractic nutritionists say that food with no chemicals is always a good thing for the body.
“In the sense that chiropractors as a whole are interested in things ‘natural’ and a lot of people who have gone into chiropractic are from fields with backgrounds in natural health, then having the healthiest, purest foods possible lines up with that,” says Dr. Paul Goldberg, natural hygienist, clinical nutritionist and professor of nutrition at Life University. “Natural hygiene is a result of looking for the actual case of disease, and part of that is eating foods free of herbicides and pesticides. In that respect, those foods are important.”
The new organic seal will appear stamped on the specific product or on display material around the product, and will indicate which part of the product is organic. If the product is not at least 95 percent organic, it may still be labeled “made with organic materials” if it contains at least 70 percent organic ingredients. If the percentage is less than that, the product may only identify particular ingredients as organic in the product ingredient list, not on the label.
The USDA is serious about this “truth in labeling.” If businesses market their products with the word “organic” without being full compliance with the new USDA standards, they can be fined as much as $10,000. Smaller farmers whose income from organic products is less than $5,000 annually will not have to be certified but will still be subject to fines if they do not comply with the USDA rules.
Certifying organic foods is not a new concept. States like California have been doing it for years, establishing in-state registries for organic farmers that required producers to comply with statewide guidelines for organic foods. Under the new USDA standards, state agencies will be in charge of enforcing the federal rules through their individual branches of government. The certification process is voluntary, but farms that opt not to participate may not use the word “organic” in marketing any of their products.