Eggs, Nano and Milk... Oh, My! (ACTION)

by: JayinPortland

Thu Oct 07, 2010 at 15:13:19 PM PDT

A few items from Jill -

Public comments on the National Organic Standards Board's Fall 2010 Recommendations are due by Tuesday, October 12 -- one issue is NOSB's failure to recommend a ban on nanotechnology in organics. Comments can be made here.
Jill's latest piece on Alternet is up -- you can also comment by Tuesday and urge NOSB to clarify organic standards for egg operations.
Stephen Colbert segment on raw milk from last night

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Good News from the Recent Organic Standards Meeting

Recall that a few weeks ago I posted about our request to require organic lecithin be used in certified organic foods. In the past, organic lecithin was not available and therefore it was not required. There is a short list of a few such substances that are not organic but allowed in organic foods, so long as the food is at least 95% organic. Now that lecithin is available in an organic form, our request to remove conventional lecithin from the "approved" list was going to set a precedent. This was the first time any substance would be removed from the list of non-organic substances allowed in organic foods.

Well, the good news is: we won! The National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) just met and voted on whether or not to recommend to the USDA to remove lecithin from the list of approved non-organic substances allowed in organic foods. The vote was 13-1 to remove lecithin from the list. Hooray! This isn't a done deal yet - the USDA will have to take the recommendation and act upon it - but once this goes through (as it likely will), your organic chocolate bars will be made with organic lecithin!

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"Organic" Fish: A Bad Decision by NOSB

by: Jill Richardson

Wed Nov 19, 2008 at 14:30:50 PM PST

This week the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) met and decided to okay "organic" farmed fish, despite much opposition from well-respected groups like Consumers Union, Food and Water Watch, and the Center for Food Safety.

Consumers Union sums up the problem with the new standards as follows:

Fish to be fed food other than 100% organic feed-the gold standard that must be met by other USDA-certified organic livestock;
Fishmeal used to feed farmed fish from wild fish-which has the potential to carry mercury and PCBs; and
Open net cages to be used-which flush pollution, disease and parasites from open net fish farms directly into the ocean, adversely impacting wild fish supply, sustainability and the health of the oceans.

When you eat an organic apple, you can feel good that you aren't biting into a bunch of pesticides or other toxins. When you drink a glass of organic milk, you can feel good that you won't be drinking antibiotics and growth hormones. But if this recommendation by NOSB becomes a reality, you will have no such assurances if you eat a "USDA Certified Organic" fish.

While some members of NOSB admitted they were under pressure to OK this from the aquaculture industry, it's clear what American consumers want:

Just this week, a Consumers Union Poll revealed that 93 percent of Americans think that fish labeled as "organic" should be produced by 100 percent organic feed, like all other organic animals. Nine in 10 consumers also agreed that "organic" fish farms should be required to recover waste and not pollute the environment and 57 percent are concerned about ocean pollution caused by "organic" fish farms. Nearly 30,000 signatures have been collected in favor of maintaining strong standards for the organic label for fish.

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