The United States Department of Agriculture 1 for organic food products. The requirements come more than 2 after Congress ordered the development of such rules.
Currently, different state and 3 establish organic food requirements in the United States. Each group uses its own rules to decide what products may be called organic.
Organic food is one of 4 in American agriculture. The Agriculture Department estimates that American farmers sold 5 worth of organic food last year.
Farmers who grow organic food 6 to increase their crops or to control insects and disease. Many people believe that eating organic food is 7 than eating food produced with chemicals. Some people 8 pay more for such food products.
9 says there are more than 10 in the United States who grow food organically. Most of them produce only 11 food. Yet, the number of organic farmers is 12 of about 12 percent each year.
The new requirements set rules for what food products 13 . For example, at least 95 percent of 14 called organic must be organic. 15 will be permitted to 16 "made with organic ingredients" if at least 70 percent of their materials are organic.
In addition, a state or private agency approved by the Agriculture Department must document which farms or businesses 17 organic foods.
The rules bar the use of genetic engineering, the process of changing the genes of living things. They bar the use of waste products to 18 to fertilize organic food. They also bar treatments with radiation to kill bacteria on food products.
Farmers and food companies have 18 months to start obeying 19 . Americans will begin to see the effect of the rules in their local stores by the summer of 2001.
Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman 20 . He called them the strongest and most complete organic food rules in the world.