Organics

Los Angeles Times: Battle over organic standards continues

"A federal battle is brewing over the definition of organic food, pitting the stalwarts in the industry, who insist that consumer confidence rests on organic purity, against government officials advocating compromise. For a $13-billion organic food industry experiencing explosive growth, the stakes are high.

Neither side is ready to give much ground.

Last week, Round 1 in the battle ended in a black eye for the United States Department of Agriculture. Under pressure from Congress and a cohesive organic food industry, USDA Secretary Ann M. Veneman rescinded four directives recently issued by her staff that would have allowed certain exceptions to the current organic food standards, established in 2002.

The idea was to clarify some gray areas in the regulations. Specifically, the directives would have added pesticides of questionable toxicity to the list of approved treatments for organic crops, allowed the treatment of organic dairy cows with antibiotics and permitted the use of fish meal, which may contain mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) or both, as food for organic dairy cows. Most troubling to the organic food industry, the USDA sidestepped federally mandated reviews.

The USDA staff is not dropping the matter there.

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standards for organic foods. The USDA is being brought into conflict with consumer groups like the Consumers Union and Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt) who authored the 1990 bill that led to the standards and who is against weakening or cutting any of the regulations.

story link courtesy of Too Many Chefs