Produce section of a supermarket in VA. (Photo by Ken Hammond, courtesy of USDA)
More companies are importing organic
products from China and other countries. But
contaminated pet food, tainted toothpaste,
and unauthorized antibiotics in fish have been
imported to the U.S. from China. Now, some people are
concerned about organic foods from China. Julie
Grant reports:
Transcript
More companies are importing organic
products from China and other countries. But
contaminated pet food, tainted toothpaste,
and unauthorized antibiotics in fish have been
imported to the U.S. from China. Now, some people are
concerned about organic foods from China. Julie
Grant reports:
When you see that round USDA organic seal on a carton of
milk, boxed foods, or bananas , it means that on some farm,
somewhere, something like this happened:
(farm inspection sound)
Inspector: “All righty. Anything under the box on the far
right.”
Farmer: “That’s the burnout. Which I haven’t used for 3 or 4
years.”
An inspector walks around looking at the greenhouse, the
barn and the fields, in the greenhouse, and in the barn. He
works for an agency that’s accredited by the USDA to certify
farms as organic. He’s making sure nothing is happening on
the farm that’s prohibited by the National Organic Standards.
But small farms like this one are no longer the norm in
organics. Organic products have become a big business all
around the world.
So people are wondering… who inspects those farms?
(store sound)
Sheila Rombach is a buyer for a small natural foods store.
Like a lot of people, she’s a little nervous about the safety of
food coming from China. Last year’s pet food scare and
poisonous toothpaste are still fresh in many people’s minds.
Rombach’s customers pay a premium for ‘organic’ foods.
She wonders how the USDA can certify that farms all the
way in China are following organic rules.
“I guess it crossed mind because of all the negative publicity
about things manufactured in China. I want to be sure that
the items grown under the organic label are truly organic.”
It’s such a concern that one large health food chain, Trader
Joe’s, is taking all Chinese imports off its shelves. Trader
Joe’s plans to have Chinese garlic, ginger, and all other
single-ingredient foods out of its 300 stores this spring.
But the U.S. Department of Agriculture maintains if it says
organic, it’s truly organic. Barbara Robinson is chief
administrator of the USDA’s National Organic Program. She
says foreign products go through the same process as those
grown here.
“So, if the product is coming from India, or the product is
coming from Australia, and you want to market in the United States – then
you need a certifying agent who is accredited by us.”
Robinson says all certifying agents accredited by the USDA
should be enforcing the same organic rules. If a product has
that little round seal, Robinson says consumers can trust it
meets the U.S.’s National Organic Standards.
But enforcing the rules isn’t always that easy. The USDA is
having difficulty making sure those rules are consistently
applied on U.S. farms. So how can the agency be so
confident about farms in other countries?
One expert on Chinese agriculture and politics says that’s a
good question. Paul Thiers is a political science professor at
Washington State University who’s been visiting farms in
China since the early 1990s.
“There is some difficulty, I think, in expecting people from
outside of China to really get far enough in and understand
what’s going on in political and economic conditions of rural
China.”
Thiers says many Chinese farms are run by the local
government. Others are run by private managers with
peasant farmers working the land.
“In some places, peasant farmers who were purported to be
part of organic production, who were on land that was
certified, couldn’t tell me what organic was, had no
conception of different production standards. And all they
said was, ‘we just sell our product to the government’.”
Thiers says at that time, five or ten years ago, farmers were
probably using chemicals, even though they were selling
food labeled organic.
Thiers expects that China’s organic farming practices are
improving, though. He says people in Chinese cities are becoming
concerned about food safety and want to buy organics. But
the USDA has to rely on organic certifiers in China. And with
the rapid growth of organic farms, no one is sure they’re
actually meeting U.S. standards.
Thiers says there is one consolation. At least organic farms
are inspected by someone. Conventional farms don’t get
those kinds of visits from inspectors.
For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.