HealthDay News — Chances are you’re seeing more and more produce and meats marked “organic.” No longer just staples in health-food stores or at farmers’ markets, organic products are increasingly found in traditional supermarkets.
The U.S. organic food industry surpassed $10 billion in consumer sales in 2003, according to the Organic Trade Association, which estimates the market has grown 17 percent to 21 percent each year since 1997.
Exactly what can you be assured of getting if a product is marked organic — and what are the pros and cons?
“Organic means the agricultural product from livestock or crop has met certain standards,” said Joan Shaffer, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which regulates organic standards.
If meat, poultry, eggs or dairy products are labeled organic, they must come from animals given no antibiotics or growth hormones, according to the USDA. Organic produce is made without using “most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation,” the USDA says.
If a label says “certified organic,” it means the agricultural products have been grown and processed according to USDA’s national organic standards and then certified by one of the USDA-accredited certification organizations.
The certifying agent reviews applications from farmers and processors for certification eligibility, explains the USDA. Then, qualified inspectors perform annual onsite inspections to be sure the growers comply with standards. The standards spring from the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990, passed by Congress to establish national standards.
The USDA does not make any claims that organically produced food is safer or more nutritious.
Ryan Zinn, a spokesman for the Minnesota-based Organic Consumers Association, said organic foods are safer and healthier.
“We can’t say organic foods are totally free of pesticides, because there is some pesticide [residue] in the ground water,” he said. “But there’s really a lot of emerging evidence to suggest that organic foods are higher in nutrients.”
A study published in 2004 in the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry compared organically and conventionally grown yellow plums, finding that ascorbic acid, vitamin E and beta-carotene levels were higher in organic plums. But some other nutrients, including quercetin, a bioflavonoid, were higher in conventional plums, the researchers found.
Some pesticides, Zinn said, have been tied to health problems. For instance, methyl bromide has been linked with cancer, he said. “All these pesticides that have been used aren’t going to kill you outright,” he added, “but the cumulative effect is not good.”
But not everyone is convinced that organic automatically means healthier or pesticide-free foods.
“Organic farmers use pesticides, too; they have to,” said Alex Avery, director of research for the Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Food Issues, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank.
“They call them botanical products” instead of pesticides, Avery added. For instance, he said, some organic farmers use pyrethrum, a derivative of the chrysanthemum plant.
Avery also claims there may be an increased risk of food-borne illness from organic food, due to the use of manure or compost. He cited a study, published in 2004 in the Journal of Food Protection, that found that organic samples from farms that used manure or compost aged less than 12 months had high rates of E. coli bacteria.
On one point all sides agree: Be prepared to pay more for most organic foods. “Expect to pay 15 to 20 percent more for organic dairy,” Zinn said, and two to three times more for meat.
More information
To learn more about organic foods, visit the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
SOURCES: Joan Shaffer, spokeswoman, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C.; Ryan Zinn, spokesman, Organic Consumers Association, Little Marais, Minn.; Alex Avery, director of research, Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Food Issues, Washington, D.C.~HNUT~
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