USDA considers new exceptions to organic foods

Posted on May 18th 2007 12:00PM by Maggie Vink

Filed Under: Alternative & Green Health, Nutrition & Supplements

The USDA has proposed changes to the standards that qualify food items as USDA Organic. The proposed changes would add 38 ingredients to the list of synthetic and non-organic substances that are allowed. The new ingredients include non-organic versions of intestines for sausage casings, hops for beer, fish-oil, gelatin, coloring agents, and produce coating agents. The USDA maintains that these exceptions are necessary as the ingredients in question are not commercially available in organic form.

The Organic Consumers Association has issued a reply objecting to a number of the proposed additions to the allowable list. If you don't want non-organic casings on your organic sausage or non-organic hops in your organic beer, you can sign a petition. The USDA is accepting public comments until May 22, 2007.

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Tags: Organic, Organic Consumers Association, Organic food, OrganicConsumersAssociation, OrganicFood, USDA

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Sheila Linderman 5-20-2007 @ 2:12PM

Before anyone signs that petition, they should know that the proposed rule is the direct result of the Harvey v Veneman lawsuit, inch which Harvey--who was backed by the OCA and others--contended that if a non-organic agricultural ingredient was to be included in a product labeled as organic, that ingredient would have to be listed on 205.606. This proposed rule includes that list, which is by no means exhaustive, and the result of tremendous work on the part of petitioners and the NOSB, so that products that were previously labeled as organic--meaning that they were already composed of at least 95% organic ingredients with no prohibited ingredients--could continue to be labeled as such. Those whose non-organic agricultural ingredients did not make it onto the list will have to be labeled as "made with." The real problem, here, is that the MW category only requires 70% organic ingredients. There is nothing to force the processors of those products to continue to use those "extra" 25% organic ingredients, which is potentially disastrous for the organic industry. I urge all readers to get all the facts before signing the OCA petition.