Industry Portfolio: Organizing and Outlining

Organic foods in United States: Organic equals to healthy?

Organic food is a popular concept in recent years. It represents foods that are produced by methods of organic farming with limited modern synthetic inputs, such as synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers1.

Organic food market has a huge market potential. In accordance to Organic Trade Association (OTA), an association includes grower, shippers, processors, certifiers, distributors, importers, exporters, consultants, retailers, and other supportive of organic agriculture and trade, the total sales of organic food in U.S. grew from 6 billion in 2006 to more than 26 billion in 2010. Compared to the growth rate of total food sales in 2010, which is 0.6%, the growth rate of organic food is up to 7.7%2. Furthermore, the certified organic acreage reached more than 4.8 million acres in 2008, which includes 2,665,382 acres of cropland and 2,160,577 of pasture3. Over a thousand members are now in OTA.

Customers tend to purchase organic food, though the price of organic food is higher than conventional food4. The motivations of buying organic food are vary from individuals. Some believe that organic food has a higher level of quality; some are willing to pay more for organic products because of they are environmentally friendly5; some try to avoid toxic pesticide, fertilizers, antibiotics and genetic modified organisms (GMO’s) 6. Currently, 78% of U.S families are buying organic food and 40% percent of those families tend to buy more organic food than before7.

Laws and regulations towards organic industry are evolved rapidly because of the increase public concerns and debates related to organic food. In the United States, the national organic standard is defined by USDA, the United States Department of Agriculture. The National Organic Program (NOP)8 of the Agricultural Marketing Service, which is under the authority of USDA, is the authorized enforcement