The market for organic food continues to grow in response to rising environmental awareness and even in current economic downturn the industry is still growing, albeit at a lower rate than for the previous decade.

The Organic Federation of Australia (OFA) estimates that the domestic market for organic produce is now over $600M.

Demand for organic food is driven by consumer concern about chemicals food and the environment, by rising health consciousness and the increasing incidence of food allergies, by concern about the humane treatment of animals and general concern about environmental management.

Organic food appears in the media regularly and is promoted by TV chefs as tasting better and being better for the environment, and there is growing awareness that the core precept of organic growing, increasing soil organic matter, also provides the biggest and most readily accessible method for sequestering unwanted carbon out of the atmosphere.

The organic market for fruit, vegetables and grain has been growing for twenty years, slowly for the first ten and then much faster.

More recently meat, alcoholic beverages (wine and beer) and processed product have been growing rapidly.

The major supermarket chains now stock over 600 organic lines, and this figure is also growing quickly. Organic products and label also appear much more in non-specialised stores, even in convenience stores, petrol stations and theatre foyers.

Even more recently, we have seen the rise of organic cosmetics, certified organic restaurants, and the stirring of an organic fibre industry.

Significant issues for the industry are:

• Complexity of organic labelling, in particular the profusion of different organic labels and the lack of a national organic logo
• The high level of imported organic processed product
• Sections of the marketplace that remain uncertified, in particular unsubstantiated label claims, lack of retail level certification (especially for meat and restaurants) and local markets
• Lack of agreed consistent standards for cosmetics
• Persistence of some organic claims that do not comply with agreed standards, particularly for water and salt.

Attempts by the organic industry to address these issues will be greatly assisted by the release of the new Australian Standard, expected around September-October 2009.