Organic Label Only For Foods

Personal Care Products Won't Get Its No-Chemicals Seal

(AP)  The department's reversal also is frustrating to companies that spent money and time to put the seal on their products. An Agriculture Department-authorized agent must certify a company before it can use the seal or label something "100 percent organic" or "organic."

David Bronner, president of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps, said his company spent some $100,000 to ensure that his soaps, lotions and lip balms met the standards for using the seal.

Bronner said consumers are confused by the myriad products that claim to have "organic" or "natural" ingredients. The USDA seal guaranteed his products are free of chemicals and synthetic ingredients, he said.

"Everyone in the world's making an organic claim," Bronner said. "We're not doing tricks. We actually work really hard to make real, organic ingredients. The National Organic Program is what consumers trust."

Organic means a product contains all-natural, non-synthetic substances that are grown without using conventional pesticides or fertilizer, biotechnology or radiation. And it means meat and dairy products have come from animals raised on organic feed, given access to the outdoors and never given antibiotics or growth hormones.

The Organic Consumers Association, to which Piersel belongs, is asking the Agriculture Department to take another look at removing its seal from personal care products.

The association says the reversal hurts small companies in particular, because the seal is part of a marketing program that gives them an edge. Bigger companies can't find the volume of organic ingredients they would need to make certified organic shampoo or other products, the group says.

Beyond that, the group argues that personal care products use the same ingredients as those in organic food.

"Certified organic olive oil does not magically become non-organic if it is used as a massage oil instead of on a salad," said Ronnie Cummins, executive director of the association.

Robinson, however, said the department won't change its mind again without an act of Congress. The 1990 law creating the organic program — the Organic Foods Production Act — was not intended to cover products besides food, she said.

"This is USDA — I don't know anything about the cosmetics industry, or toothpaste, or body lotions and hand cream," Robinson said.