An organic claim is any claim that describes a product as organic, or the ingredients used to make a product as organic—for example, ‘100% organic’, ‘Made using organic ingredients’ or ‘certified organic’.  Every day, [Australian] consumers are faced with myriad labeling claims, all designed to influence purchasing decisions. These claims might be about where a good is made, the type of ingredients it contains or the way a good is manufactured.  Organic is one such claim. Products labeled as organic generally attract a premium price compared to those produced using artificial fertilizer, chemicals or pesticides and non-essential food additives or processing aids. Because organic produce is becoming more popular, some businesses may be tempted to promote their goods with an organic claim. Sometimes, the claim will be made but not substantiated, while in other cases unscrupulous operators will make the claim knowing it is untrue but looking to take advantage of consumer preferences.

Read more: http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/907148

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Common commercial skin care products may increase users’ risk of contracting skin cancer, according to a paper by researchers from Rutgers University and published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology. Researchers had originally been planning to study whether topically applied caffeine could reduce people’s risk of skin cancer. The researchers intended to apply caffeine to mice by dissolving it into a skin cream, but first wanted to make sure that any cream they used was actually neutral for skin cancer risk. So they applied four commercially available creams to the mice, and discovered that all of them increased the mice’s risk of developing skin tumours known as squamous cell carcinoma. Read the full story: http://www.naturalnews.com/025845.html

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