USDA Organic Standards
The 'NEW' Real Foods

Yes, you can call me a conspiracy theorist, but isn't it an amazing coincidence that just when the FDA is trying to sneak in substantial changes to US health issues policies, the USDA gives us mere DAYS to comment on their plans to allow outlandish ingredients in certified organic foods?

Here is the heads-up from Rima Laibow, director of the Natural Solutions Foundation:

"Health and health freedom, like liberty, require constant vigilance. And activism. Now is the time. Again.

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), like the FDA, continues to slash away at clean, healthy food, and this time the public comment period has been reduced to an absurd 7 days.

Under the USDA proposal, thirty eight new "ingredients" will be added to the National List. Only products which have been added to that list may be added to organic products and do not have to be noted on the label.

These changes were announced recently and the public comment period was limited to a totally irresponsible 7 days! That period ends May 22, 2007.

I just got home from international traveling (attending a Codex meeting in Canada and lecturing in Sana Fe) not too many hours ago and found this information in my email inbox. I knew that you would want to take action on this right away. Although the time is very short, it is a matter of health importance to you and your family to defend your food supply from the dangerous USDA.

USDA Wants More Non-Organic Ingredients in "Organic" Foods

The USDA serves its food industry masters very well. The drug companies have embarked on a global campaign to degrade food quality. It's name is Codex Alimentarius. Like the drug companies, the Agribiz realizes that the worse the quality of your food supply, the more money they make and the thinner your margin between optimal health and illness. Their partners in this tragedy are the drug companies who know full well that the worse your food, the better customer you will be for drugs, chemotherapy and other highly profitable ways of managing illness which is, after all, their business.

Codex is a drug initiative (recently endorsed by the Indian drug makers association, for example) and the FDA, which increasingly acts as if it were a marketing arm for Big Pharma, declared decades ago (October 11, 1995, to be exact) that it will give preference to Codex standards over American ones. Codex has degraded Organic standards and the USDA is following right along. You can read the changes for yourself in the National Organic Products list at http://thefederalregister.com/d.p/2007-05-15-07-2388 .

Is This What You Mean By "Organic"?

Although the Agribiz (including beer) companies (which so often violate organic regulations) have been given months to lobby for the changes in these proposed regulations. By contrast, the general public has been given 7 days. These changes will, like Codex, degrade your food and eliminate your right to know what is in that food. (The US, by the way, consistently points out in Codex meetings that Consumers' Right to Know issues have no place within the Codex context although one of Codex' three mandates is to protect the health of consumers.)

Among the Big Agribiz friendly changes:

* Conventional hops (sprayed with pesticides, treated with herbicides and even, perhaps, genetically modified will be allowed in "organic" beer. Anheuser-Busch is reported to be lobbying hard for this one, by the way.

* Conventionally raised animals (treated with antibiotics, growth hormones, fed genetically modified feed, concrete, newspapers, chicken parts and bones, slaughter house waste, etc., and subject to mad cow disease (as organic herds are not) will provide their intestines for "organic" sausage casings.

* Fish oil (a wonderful dietary supplement) which has never been characterized or standardized would be permitted, allowing sub-standard oils from farm raised, chemical laced, cancer-ridden fish or poorly processed, mercury rich oils from ocean-dwelling fish would be added without further purity requirements. All fish oils are definitely not created equal. The proposed standards makes them that way, however.

* Food colorings which may have synthetic, genetically modified, chemical or allergenic components will be permitted.

* Ingredients like organic Lemon grass, Rice Starch, Beet Juice & Whey Protein Concentrate are available in sufficient quantities to allow stipulation that only organic grades be permitted. The new regulations allow non-organic ingredients to be used without label notification despite the availability of these organic ingredients.

Action Steps To Protect Organic Standards -- and Your Health

Step 1. Send your public comment letter to the USDA by clicking here (http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/healthfreedomusa/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=11431) to the USDA. Please do not delay. The Public Comment Period ends May 22.

Step 2. Notify your entire circle of influence that the UADA has once again threatened their health and their health freedom and ask them to use the link provided to send their comments. Send a brief introduction in your own words and forward this email to your contacts.

Step 3. Ask your contacts to notify THEIR contacts of the urgency of this request.

Step 4. If you or your contacts are not already on the mailing list for future Health Alerts, Please sign up on our home page, www.HealthFreedomUSA.org and urge your contacts to do so, too."

Now, on to more positive news:

We are looking forward to a "re-set" (that means remodeling in retail terms) the first week of July.

We are taking bids on carpentry and electrical work, so if you know (or ARE) a contractor, especially one who'd be willing to work partially on barter, please contact Sherri at Real Foods: 830-833-2483.

For the carpentry work, we will be needing a new checkout stand for the cash registers (yes, that's PLURAL), along with some counters for the kitchen area, a "cart corral," and a slat wall unit.

The drawings are nearly completed.

On the electrical work, we will put up the conduit, but we need a licensed electrician to actually pull the wires.

We want to get as much as possible completed in advance, so we only have to be closed a week to put it all together.

Meanwhile, there are new, low energy-using, full-spectrum light fixtures on their way to us now, and Todd Oyler has graciously offered to install them for us (Thanks, Todd).

Our new cash registers are to be shipped tomorrow (Monday) and so should be here sometime this week. My goal is to have all the store's products entered in the next couple of weeks, so we can go ahead and start using one of the new registers even before the remodel.

So if you don't see me out in the store, assume I'm in the back doing data entry :-)

We have some great new products at Real Foods; worth taking a look.

For those of you with joint problems, I found something that is guaranteed to work, even if glucosamine hasn't helped. It's called Flex-Now, and if it doesn't absolutely improve your joint flexibility and comfort, they will REFUND your purchase price directly.

There are testers at the counter for our new lavender skin care. Hummingbird Farms, an organic lavender farm west of Johnson City has created some outstanding products with the essential oil they distill themselves. Yummy!

We got a peach of a deal on (Tropical flavor) EmergenC. As Summer is upon us, care needs to be taken against heat exhaustion. Vitamin C in general is great in the heat, and EmergenC is even better because it also has electrolytes and B vitamins with the C.

$12.99 for a box of 36 packets. Tropical only.

That'll have to be enough for now- I'm off to buy a freezer for the kitchen.

Sherri And the Gang at Real Foods Market

Real Foods
410 Fourth St
Blanco, Texas 78606
830-833-2483
http://www.real-foods.net