Consumers and companies alike have recently evolved a new green conscience. Large stores are well stocked with products that are marketed as ‘green.’ In this cacophony of all that is ‘green,’ ‘organic,’ or ‘sustainable,’ are there green pet food choices, and if so, how can we judge the quality of such choices?
The answer is simple. Green Seal confirmed what common sense suggests: namely, that “organic certification is the most credible label for human and pet foods, also in respect to any green claims.”
So what is it about certified organic pet foods that make them not only healthier for your pet, but also environmentally friendly or ‘green?’
First, you should know that only *USDA certified organic* pet food claims are regulated and enforced by both the Federal government and USDA-accredited organic certification agencies; any organic claim that comes without USDA certification can be used in the pet food industry without restriction, and is not verified by an unbiased third-party. As a State compliance officer at CDFA (California Department of Food and Agriculture) wrote in 2008: “It is buyer be ware of any pet food product that does not show that it is certified by one of the National Organic Program (‘NOP’) certification agents.”
USDA certified organic pet foods (i.e., those with the ‘USDA organic’ seal) currently follow the same standards that are applied in the organic certification of human foods. This means that USDA certified organic pet foods are free of most synthetic ingredients or ‘processing aids’ (many of which are, to some degree, toxic), as well as ingredients which have been grown using sewage sludge, synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, or genetic engineering technologies (i.e., genetically modified organisms, or ‘GMO’).
USDA organic certification also assures that no toxins (e.g., herbicides, fungicides, pesticides, sanitizers, detergents) were used during the manufacture or storage of either USDA certified organic pet food products or their individual ingredients.
Any given USDA certified organic pet food is certainly a green choice. But organic certification alone doesn’t make a pet food healthy. A pet guardian still needs to consider the ingredients that are included in a pet food, as well as how these ingredients were processed in the first place. The best ingredients are of human-grade quality, are minimally processed, and are appropriate for the type of pet the food is designed for (e.g., no grain or gluten for dogs and especially obligate carnivores such as cats).
Although ‘green’ packaging may help to minimize the negative impact of a pet food on the environment, green packaging alone doesn’t make a non-USDA certified organic pet food ‘green.’ It is worth mentioning here that most green packaging is being imported from Asia, which means that energy consumption for shipping would negate virtually all of the environmentally positive benefits of, for example, packaging made from recycled materials. In the end, the best green packaging choice is to simply avoid excess packaging and, at the same time, avoid diminishing the quality and integrity of the product. Of course, this seems like an obvious point, but does no-frills packaging look alluring enough on a store shelf to convince a consumer to buy a green (and hopefully healthy) pet food product?
In choosing pet foods that are both USDA certified organic and green, the only thing that counts in the end is the good judgment of an informed consumer.
***Dr. Heidi Junger is a Ph.D. zoologist who started her own pet food company, Onesta Organics, Inc. in 2005, when she realized that most available, so-called ‘convenience’ (i.e., commercial) pet foods were poor choices for the health of pets and the planet alike. The shocking lack of healthy pet food choices became particularly obvious to Dr. Junger over the course of more than a decade, as she and her husband adopted numerous animals rescued from laboratories and homes. Onesta Organics is the first—and still the only—pet food company in the USA that is both USDA certified organic and Green America-approved.
