Amendment would bestow ‘organic’ label on fish

BOSTON – A fish born wild in a pristine environment, growing freely until it’s large enough to get snared in a fishermen’s net might make a tasty meal, but it can’t be an “organic” one.

Current law forbids wild fish from carrying the commercially coveted label, even as the aquaculture industry studies how to raise “organic” fish that will never see life outside a pen.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” said Dave Lackey, a spokesman for U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine.

The law could change under an amendment that passed the Senate last week as part of its fiscal year 2003 supplemental budget, and caught the organic food industry off guard.

The amendment, sponsored by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and co-sponsored by Snowe, allows “all wild seafood to be certified or labeled as organic.”

The budget is under negotiation with the House.

Barbara Stevenson, a Portland, Maine, fishing boat owner, said the change could boost seafood sales in markets that crave organic products, and strike a blow for common sense.

“It’s pure stupid to have to remind people that wild fish are organic,” she said. “It’s something you shouldn’t have to do. But the world has gotten so weird, it’s necessary.”

But the Organic Trade Association is against labeling wild fish organic. Holly Givens, a spokeswoman for the Greenfield, Mass.-based organization, said the name simply doesn’t fit.

“Organic” is not a synonym for “natural,” Givens said, adding that the label is backed by specific standards for growing food, feeding and monitoring livestock and protecting soils that have been developed over several years and are impossible to apply to wild fish.

James Riddle, secretary of the Natural Organic Standards Board, said the amendment caught the organic food industry off-guard because there was no public call for it. He added that the entire law is being reshaped to suit a powerful special interest – in this case Alaskan salmon fishermen.

“In no way would I say that wild is a bad thing,” Riddle said. “It’s just different.”

Organic fish are sold in parts of Europe, but no standards have been developed in the United States.

If the amendment is approved, federal officials would begin drafting the change to the Organic Foods Production Act, with input from the public and organic foods and seafood groups – an unprecedented and likely confusing task, Riddle said.

The NOSB and OTA have previously indicated a willingness to apply the organic label to farm-raised fish because their diets can be monitored – an important requirement for organic livestock that’s impossible with any wild sea life.