FREE ORGANIC FOOD TESTING AND CERTIFICATION

 

FREE ORGANIC FOOD TESTING AND CERTIFICATION

When I was working as a Commissioner of the Philippine Year 2000 Commission (Y2K), I was troubled by the fact that many companies were already claiming that they were already compliant, even if there was no technical or legal basis for them to support their claims. Realizing that it was a threat to national security to allow such a free-for-all of claims, I proposed to the Commission to adopt the testing standards of the British Standards Institute (BSI), because at that time, we did not have the time and resources to develop our own standards. Fortunately, the Commission approved my proposal, and the rest is history.

Fast forward to today, I may no longer be in government, but I am still concerned (actually alarmed) about the fact that many companies are now claiming that their products are organic, even if there is no technical or legal basis for them to support their claims. Like “being a legend in their own mind”, they are saying that their products are organic, either according to their own imagination, or perhaps according to their mother.

To solve this problem, I propose that we adopt a national standard that is based on an existing standard, like the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) standard, for example. This is a very important and urgent matter, because many products are now flooding the market, with their distributors claiming to be selling organic quality. By the way, being organic does not automatically mean hygienic. IKE SENERES/03-30-2024

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