Natural and organic beauty products are becoming increasingly popular. These labels lure consumers in, despite, consumers often don’t know the exact difference between the two. It is important to know that naturalistic and organic beauty differ from naturalistic and organic food. Learn exactly what’s what as we explain the all of the differences:
What is Organic Food?
Organic food is food that grows without any chemical pesticides or growth hormones used. This makes it a very healthy food choice. The Organic food system heavily regulates itself. So, before anything is labelled 'Organic' it first passes strict standards set up by The Soil Association.
They explain what organic means here:
- Organic farming doesn’t allow any synthetic pesticides and absolutely no herbicides. Farmers can use just 15 pesticides, made using natural ingredients. But only under very restricted circumstances.
- Farmers don't use artificial colours and preservatives.
- Farmers maintain the highest standards of animal welfare.
- There is no routine use of antibiotics on animals.
- All organic products are GM Free
What is Natural Food?
When it comes to Naturalistic food, there aren’t the same rules and regulations in place surrounding the labelling. Many products are saying they are 'natural'. But, it is worth checking these out, and understanding what ingredients they are actually using. Pure naturalistic foods are foods that are derived from plants or products with no artificial ingredients and minimal processing
The Food Standards Agency explains this further. Providing us with the following definition: “Natural means essentially that the product is comprised of natural ingredients, e.g. ingredients produced by nature, not the work of man or interfered with by man”. They also explain that anything Natural must also be free of GM (Genetically Modification).
What is Organic Beauty?
Like in the food industry, products that are Certified Organic have to meet certain standards. The Soil Association sets these standards in the Beauty Industry. Having this label means that the Organic ingredients this product uses grow under a strict code of cleanliness without pesticides, fertilisers or GMO’s.
What is Natural Beauty?
As in the food industry, there also aren’t any regulations for labelling a product ‘natural’ in the beauty industry. A natural ingredient is anything that is a plant, mineral, or animal by-product. Consumers can easily tell how natural a product is by looking at the
ingredient list which states in a descending order of percentages the ingredients used.
