Organic dilemma: What rules personal are?

Note posted 2/15/2005 : Regarding the recent article "Organic dilemma: What rules personal care?": We were disturbed to read the following quote from a personal care manufacturer who stated that various synthetic preservatives are permitted by the USDA in the NOP organic regulations. Their statement "We've actually been following the standards set up by USDA when the organics rule came out, using their list of acceptable preservatives; grapefruit seed extract, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate and benzyl alcohol" is in error.

The National Organic Program Final Rule reads as follows: ____________________________________________________________

The National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances 205.600 Evaluation criteria for allowed and prohibited substances, methods, and ingredients.

The following criteria will be utilized in the evaluation of substances or ingredients for the organic production and handling sections of the National List: ...
(b) In addition to the criteria set forth in the Act, any synthetic substance used as a processing aid or adjuvant will be evaluated against the following criteria: ...
(4) THE SUBSTANCE'S PRIMARY USE IS NOT AS A PRESERVATIVE. ____________________________________________________________

Curiously, another NFM article from the same issue, about the recent Arthur Harvey court decision (Harvey vs. USDA NOP/Veneman), stated "OFPA (Organic Foods Production Act) prohibits synthetic ingredients...The court ruled that most of these ingredients would no longer be allowed." Could it be any more clear? No synthetic preservatives! (And yes: those substances in the statement above are inescapably synthetic by the current NOP definition.)

It's not necessary to use chemical preservatives to make a product -- it's just more difficult and, perhaps, a bit more costly. The thousands of highly successful certified organic food products on the market provide abundant examples of this fact. As formulators and manufacturers of organic (or "organic") body care products, it is our job to find ways to eliminate synthetic chemicals. If a product can't be made without man-made synthetics -- preservatives, "fragrance" oils, detergents, etc., -- then it is, quite simply, NOT an organic product.

James Hahn and Diana Kaye
Co-founders, Terressentials

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Natural Foods Merchandiser volume XXVI/number 2/p. 36
Feb. 1, 2005

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Since the passage of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Organic
Standards four years ago, natural personal care manufacturers have struggled
to define the requirements for organic labeling on their products. Because
the National Organic Program only regulates foods, there is no national
standard for personal care products to follow. Two recent efforts seek to
change that.

The Organic Trade Association's personal care task force, formed shortly
after the implementation of the NOP, is preparing to release for comment its
draft document on organic labeling.

OTA is also participating in a new initiative by Ann Arbor, Mich.-based NSF
International to develop, with the American National Standards Institute, a
benchmark for organic personal care products. NSF's decision to create an
industry standard was prompted by directives the USDA issued last April,
which declared that personal care products could no longer use the USDA
organic label, even if they met all the organic rule's requirements for food
labeling. Though USDA later rescinded the directives, they came as a wake-up
call to the industry.

"Originally, NOP said that any nonfood product that complies with the
organic rule can invest in the whole compliance and labeling program," says
David Bronner, president of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap of Escondido, Calif.
"Rather than trying to address the abuse of the word organic, they just
decided to shut out people who were actually doing it right." NSF's
establishment of an ANSI standard‹developed by representatives of the
industry, regulatory and consumer sectors‹could serve as the blueprint for
an eventual federal regulation on organic personal care.

The OTA task force, consisting of manufacturers, suppliers, certifiers,
growers and other industry members, was established to create a voluntary
standard for acceptable ingredients and manufacturing processes in personal
care products labeled either "organic" or "made with organic ingredients."

"When the organic rule was passed, USDA said that it didn't have authority
over finished products in the personal care sector regarding the use of the
word organic," says Katherine DiMatteo, executive director of OTA, based in
Greenfield, Mass. "We worked to create an industry consensus on organic
ingredients and processes, and the first draft of a set of standards is now
ready to present to the task force for review."

OTA's task force examined virtually every process used in personal care
products to determine whether it would be acceptable in products labeled
organic. "Hydrogenation, hydrogenolysis, sulfation, alkylation,
esterification, transesterification, hydrolysis‹we looked at all these
processes," DiMatteo says. "Would they be acceptable for products labeled
Œorganic,' or only for products labeled Œmade with organic ingredients'?
What do these processes do to the raw materials? What levels of change are
acceptable in what labeling categories? The task force allowed many of these
processes for products labeled made with organic ingredients,' but only a
handful for products labeled organic.'"

Hundreds of individual ingredients also had to be examined. "We went through
all the ingredients, including petroleums and synthetic colorants,
fragrances and flavors," DiMatteo says. In some cases, whole categories of
ingredients were prohibited, including all petroleum-derived ingredients and
all formaldehyde donors.

Among the banned petroleum byproducts are parabens, used for preserving
products. Recent research has linked parabens to breast cancer, and a number
of natural personal care companies have already phased them out of most or
all of their formulations.

"It has been difficult to reformulate to get the extended shelf life
parabens offer, but our new preservatives are safer," says Angella Green,
associate brand manager for Culver City, Calif.-based Jason Natural
Cosmetics. "We've actually been following the standards set up by USDA when
the organics rule came out, using their list of acceptable
preservatives‹grapefruit seed extract, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate
and benzyl alcohol."

"Preservatives in general are a red flag for natural products consumers,"
says Tim Schaeffer, brand manager for Petaluma, Calif.-based Avalon Natural
Products. "I make a distinction between hard and soft preservatives. Hard
preservatives include the parabens and diazolidinyl urea, which creates
formaldehyde over time. Probably by mid-2005, we'll have parabens out of all
our products."

Pthalates are another controversial ingredient in natural personal care.
Pthalates, used in cosmetics to keep products like nail polish flexible,
mimic estrogen in the body and can cause hormonal imbalance. "Pthalates are
reproductive toxins and are associated with birth defects in children and
low sperm counts in men," says Jeanne Rizzo, R.N., executive director of The
Breast Cancer Fund. The organization, based in San Francisco, has organized
a safe cosmetics campaign to bring attention to dangerous ingredients in
personal care products. "Companies that are ahead of the curve on this are
going to have a tremendous advantage," Rizzo says. "People aren't going to
want their kids exposed to these ingredients." Pthalates are banned in
Europe under a new European Union directive on personal care ingredients and
will also be disallowed in OTA's voluntary organic labeling program.

Bronner sees other issues that any regulatory document must address, whether
the standards are those in the OTA draft document or in whatever ANSI
standard NSF eventually creates. "We're particularly annoyed with the
practice of putting Œorganic' in a brand name, which represents that the
product or brand is organic, even though it's not in compliance with NOP
regulations," Bronner says.

After comment, the OTA task force recommendations will go before the OTA
board for approval and eventually become part of OTA's voluntary American
Organic Standard. But many industry insiders believe that USDA may
eventually feel compelled to issue a separate regulation for organic
personal care. "This will form the basis of what we might lobby for if we
were to bring it to a government level," DiMatteo says.

ANSI standards have frequently been used as the basis for future
governmental regulation. OTA's representation on NSF's new ANSI standards
committee will ensure that the industry's own ideas about what constitutes
an organic product will be heard, DiMatteo says.

But Bronner isn't sure that USDA needs to issue a new regulation solely for
personal care. "The current NOP could be rewritten to reasonably accommodate
personal care with just a few additional lines of text," he says. "That
would be my preference, though others are in favor of either a more
substantive rewriting of the NOP or the formation of a private certification
program outside NOP, whether that's done by OTA or NSF."

It may be months before the OTA regulations are finalized, and years before
NSF develops its voluntary consensus standards. NSF has not yet named its
committee, though an initial meeting to form the committee took place in
September. Until industry-wide standards are adopted, retailers may want to
read the ingredients deck carefully and ask manufacturers about their own
standards for organic labeling. For the time being, not all organic personal
care products are created equal.

Mitchell Clute is a free-lance writer, poet and musician in Crestone, Colo.

Natural Foods Merchandiser volume XXVI/number 2/p. 36