Green Food Labels

When it comes to food, the environmentally conscious often use the terms, ‘organic' and ‘sustainable' in their discourse. These terms are commonly used these days to imply that a food product is healthy and eco friendly. What do they actually mean though?

If a food is labelled ‘organic', it is food that has been grown without the use of pesticides, fertilisers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge, herbicides, antibiotics, bioengineering, hormones or ionising radiation. Meat, poultry, eggs and dairy foods are said to be organic if they derive from animals that have been fed 100 percent organic feed products, have received no antibiotics or growth hormones and which have had access to the outdoors. Farmers who produce organic foods use renewable resources that conserve the soil and water for future generations. Moreover, any company that handles or processes such food on its way to the grocery store must also be certified organic.
Foods are labelled ‘organic' if they are either 100 percent completely organic or are made from at least 95 percent organic ingredients. If you see the phrase, ‘Made with organic ingredients' on a label, it means that the food in question contains at least 70 percent organic ingredients, but is not allowed to have the familiar ‘organic' seal on its packaging.
The other term often used in tandem with organic is ‘sustainable.' Sustainable lifestyles encourage eating foods grown locally using sustainable agricultural methods such as using food-growing techniques that don't harm the environment, are seasonal and which preserve agricultural land. Sustainable practices are also humane to animals, pay growers fairly and support local farming communities by distributing their food through farmers' markets and other venues.
Although these two terms are often used in conjunction with each other, they do not always necessarily go hand in hand.  For example, an organic tomato that you buy might not adhere to sustainable principles if it was grown organically but shipped all the way across the country to your home.
Some other interesting terms and labels to look out for on products labelled ‘organic' and ‘sustainable' are:

Cage-Free or Free Range
Seen on eggs or poultry products, these two terms can be misleading or unreliable. “Cage-free” implies that the birds were not housed in cages, however this is still no guarantee that they have had access to the outdoors or were even able to roam freely. 

Bird Friendly or Shade Grown
When you see this on coffee bags, it means that the coffee beans were grown under trees that provide shade for the coffee and a habitat for migratory birds. Coffee grown out in the open under the hot sun is cheaper but requires more pesticides and chemical fertilisers to make it grow.

Grass-Fed or Open Pasture
This label signifies that the livestock received a diet of natural forage outdoors, however sometimes cows are fed grass while they are indoors or in a pen or only for the first few months of their lives. So ‘grass-fed' can, but doesn't always, mean ‘pasture-raised' or ‘open pasture.' Pasture-raised animals can roam freely outdoors and can eat grass and other plants.

Natural Foods
This term generally means that a given product has no artificial ingredients or preservatives and that meat or poultry has been minimally processed and is free of artificial ingredients. Natural foods are foods that have been minimally processed and which remain as close as possible to their whole, original state. Organic foods however, have even more rigorous standards to adhere to, and therefore not all natural foods are organic foods.

Fair Trade Certified
This label on coffee, chocolate, tea, rice or sugar, means that the actual farmers involved in its production received fair market prices for their products.