The Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) National Organic Program (NOP) is pleased to announce the posting of a new draft guidance document: “Calculating the Percentage of Organic Ingredients in Multi-Ingredient Products (NOP 5037).”
The NOP published in the Federal Register today a notice to inform that the draft guidance “Calculating the Percentage of Organic Ingredients in Multi-Ingredient Products (NOP 5037)” will be available for public comment, effective tomorrow, December 6, 2016.
Although the USDA organic regulations establish labeling categories for organic products based on the percentage of organic ingredients in the product, certifying agents have interpreted the requirements for calculating the percent of organic ingredients differently.
The draft guidance clarifies the standards for calculating organic percentages for finished products, including multi-ingredient products that contain ingredients that are actually composed of more than one ingredient.
The draft guidance, which will help farms, businesses, certifiers and other stakeholders to implement the USDA organic standards consistently, supersedes “NOP Policy Memo 11-9,” dated October 31, 2011, which is now obsolete.
The publication of the notice along with the posting of the draft guidance initiates a 60-day public comment period which ends on February 6, 2017.
The draft guidance is available in the NOP Handbook, Section J, at the base of the table of contents. All are invited to provide comments before the deadline. If you would like to comment, please do so via regulations.gov.
