Sany Woo's : Organic Info

Showing posts with label Organic Info. Show all posts

July 22, 2011

How Do I Know if a Food is Organic?

Before you buy organic products, you need to know whether they are genuinely organic.

One of the best ways to find out is to look for the organic certification logos and the word "organic" on product labels.

Here are some guidelines on how to differentiate the labels according to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) standards.

100% Organic:

The product has been made using pure organic ingredients. The manufacturer has also processed, packed, handled and transported the product in full compliance with the USDA standards for organic agriculture.

Organic:

This product contains at least 95 % organic ingredients (excluding water or salt). It is eligible for the organic label provided the remaining 5% of the ingredients are not commercially available in organic form, and not produced using specifically prohibited methods (i.e. irradiation).

Made with Organic Ingredients:

The product labeled "Made with organic ingredients" must contain between 70% - 95% organic ingredients, excluding water and salt. As many as three of the organic ingredients in the content may be listed on the front of the package

Product with less than 70% organic ingredients:

The label on this product will be allowed to list the organic items in the "ingredients" panel only, and the term "organic" may not be used anywhere else on the package.

One common misconception is that "natural" equals "organic". While "natural" usually indicates foods that have been minimally processed or without added artificial ingredients, it does not address the way that food is grown.

January 29, 2011

Organic Facts

Here's more organic facts and what other terms mean legally:

Organic fruits and vegetables were grown without synthetic pesticides, synthetic fertilizers or sewage slude and haven't been genetically engineered and irradiated.

Organic beef and chicken come from animals that weren't the offspring of cloned animals. They were raised on 100% organic feed, were never given growth hormones, antibiotics or other drugs and their meat was never irradiated.

Organic milk comes from animals that, for at least the past 12 months, were fed 100% organic feed and weren't given antibiotics or growth homones like rBST. This organic fact alone gets me to drink organic milk.

Organic eggs come from hens that were fed 100% organic feed and were never given growth hormones or antibiotics.

Organic seafood doesn't mean a thing, since USDA hasn't defined the term.

Cage-free eggs come from hens that were not confined to cages and that may or may not have had access to the outdoors. They're not necessarily organic.

Free range or free roaming poultry have access to the outdoors, but for no minimum time. They're not necessarily organic. Cage-free poultry doesn't mean anything, since most chickens grown for meat are kept indoors (but cage-free) until they're transported to slaughter.

No hormones administered can appear on beef labels if the producer can document that the animals were raised without hormones.

Hormone-free is an illegal claim, since all animals produce their own hormones.

No antibiotics added can appear on a label if the producer can document that the animals were raised without antibiotics.

Natural (or All Natural) meat or poultry products contain "no artificial ingredients and are no more than minimally processed." They're not necessarily organic, though some supermarkets try to make them appear to be.

Source: www.live-the-organic-life.com

May 30, 2010

Organic Certifications

Before buying organic products, you have to make sure that they are genuinely organic.

One of the best ways to find out if the organic products are genuinely organic is to look for organic certification logos on the product packaging.

Here are some of the important certification bodies around the world that ensure the production, storage and processing of organic food are done within strict guidelines.