The Natural, Organic, Whole Foods industry needs something like the UL. If this doesn’t happen in the natural, organic, whole foods industry very soon we are headed for serious trouble.
For those who are unfamiliar with the UL (Underwriters Laboratories Inc.) it is a private business that specializes in testing and qualifying products and equipment in the private sector. The buying public has grown to rely on this service. For example if you produce a product and wish for your product to be approved by UL you must submit and pass the UL standard. The UL stamp of approval is highly coveted and means it meets a very high quality requirement. The UL approval is more desired than government approval and means something much better to those who are ranked as an approve product submission. Let us suppose we had a natural, organic, whole foods underwriter seal of approval (NOWFU) this would be self regulation.
Returning to the UL, if you design and build a product and choose not to pay for the UL testing you are not made into a criminal for not doing so. The natural, organic, whole foods (NOWFU) could do the same. By contrast you will undoubtedly be severely chastised if mandated FDA involvement were “required” and you did not kiss their shoe of submission. On the other hand when it comes to the UL, the customer is the final authority and many shoppers won’t buy a product unless it has the UL label on it and we see the UL label on products every day. These are good products built with high standards but there is no threat, banishment, jail or fines if you do not have one. Your only punishment may be that you do not enjoy as much business as you would like. Imagine having something like this in the natural, organic, whole foods industry. This could clean up the business without any government regulation.
We must observe that private persons and private enterprise is better at regulating itself. We must study and apply this principle to the natural, organic and whole food business because if more layers of government are added the result is less responsibility by the citizenry and lower quality of service by government. The reason for this is that when government regulations are imposed people stop looking to be responsible for themselves because they perceive that someone else who is more qualified is doing that for them. Nothing could be further from the truth in which case we are suffering under a self imposed deception on a national basis. There are a few want-to-be natural, organic, whole foods business that could be improved by this type of self imposed commercial regulation. Government regulations are designed to eliminate competition and create monopoly not protect anyone as we have seen. What we need is more companies and more competition in the natural, organic, and whole foods industry to cause prices and product to be more competitive.
Competition is, by its very nature, self regulating where monopoly is not. Test this for yourself the next time you want to know something about a product or service. Do this in the natural, organic, whole foods business or the furniture business. All you have to do is ask two competing companies to evaluate the other companies product or service and they will explain all about their benefits and point out all the defects of the competition. On the other hand if only one company made a product you wanted (monopoly) then the product or service would be described by its maker as the best, safest and the most perfect product to meet all needs when in fact much more may be desired. When there is no competition there will be no “better mouse trap” or better natural, organic, whole foods.
Applying this to the natural, organic, whole foods industry, we must observe that the FDA will disallow our claims and claiming for itself “perfection” by its own authority. Therefore natural, organic, whole foods are declared to be bad by the FDA because they are “not tested and approved” to be good. It doesn’t mater that the use of nutrients and supplements or organic, natural or whole foods will not interfere with most prescription drugs. In fact nutrients and supplements will often times reduce the number of side effects and improve bodily function. It doesn’t mater because it is not about healthy it is about control and monopoly and protecting monster business that does not need protecting.
Darrell Ross / CEO / Senior Editor
Harvest Source Whole Foods Journal
Senior Editor & CEO, Harvest Source Whole Foods Journal
Darrell W. Ross is a Graduate of Idaho State University with a BA in Art. A consummate energetic business man for over 40 years in a broad diversity of family business ranging from Construction, Excavating, Tree Service, Federal Contracting, Real Estate, Property Management, Retail, Organic Whole Foods Distribution, and Publishing. Darrell is very happily married to Marcia his wife of 39 years and mother of their six Home Schooled children and currently resides in Burley, Idaho with Marcia and their two youngest Zachary and Caroline.
Tags: Darrell Ross, government regulation, Natural, natural organic whole foods, organic foods, Self Regulation, Whole Foods, whole foods industry
