The highest standard offered by Healthy Traditions.

by Brian Shilhavy
Founder, Tropical Traditions

2016 looks to be a very promising year for our new Healthy Traditions product line.

In late 2015, Tropical Traditions stopped carrying the USDA certified organic seal on all of their own products. Replacing the USDA organic standards is a new, more rigorous standard of classifying the types of products Tropical Traditions sells to the public. It is not a new standard for Tropical Traditions, as the new logos and product standards implemented reflect our values and quality of food that we have offered to the public since we started selling products in the United States in 2002.

USDA Organic Standards Allows for Some Presence of GMOs, Herbicides, and Pesticides

We made the decision to not continue certifying our products as USDA Organic late in 2014, when we discovered that most of the USDA Organic grains we were selling to our customers had residue amounts of glyphosate, the active ingredient in popular herbicides, the most well-known being Round-up, the #1 herbicide in the world. See:

ALERT: Certified Organic Food Grown in U.S. Found Contaminated with Glyphosate Herbicide

Tropical Traditions has a ZERO tolerance level for GMOs, herbicides, and pesticides, and since the USDA National Organic Program (NOP) allows small residue amounts of pesticides and herbicides approved by the EPA for conventional crops to be present in USDA Organic certified products, we knew that we had to develop our own standards to both use in purchasing products directly from producers, as well as to educate our consumers on our own values and standards.

The Healthy Traditions Standards

Traditionally Produced is our highest standard. When you see the “Traditionally Produced” logo, this carries our Gold Label standard of traditionally produced food, far exceeding “organic” or “non-GMO” standards.

For foods to be considered “Traditionally Produced” they must have a “traditional” history in the food chain. New foods that have been introduced into the food chain in the past 65 to 70 years, since the Industrial Revolution, cannot carry the “Traditionally Produced” seal of approval.

Additionally, foods carrying the “Traditionally Produced” seal must also be traceable back to the actual producer. Foods that meet all the standards of “Traditionally Produced” that cannot be directly traced to the producer can still carry our “Healthy Traditions Approved” seal, if they are free from GMO and glyphosate contamination.

For foods that have a risk of contamination from GMO crops and glyphosate, we require each batch to be tested and return a result of “no detection” in order to carry ANY of our seals.

Learn more about Traditionally Produced products here.

GMO-tested is a higher standard than non-GMO verified or certified. We test any food that has a GMO equivalent before selling it to you, and we have a ZERO percent GMO tolerance. Other non-GMO verified or certified programs allow some percentage of GMO presence, usually close to 1%. GMO-tested, on the other hand, means we tested for the presence of GMOs, and found NONE – ZERO percent. If we find ANY GMO present, we do NOT sell it.

Learn more about GMO-tested products here.

Glyphosate-tested: Unlike the EPA and USDA organic program, we don’t like any glyphosate residue in our food at all. So the Tropical Traditions and Healthy Buyer’s Club product line has a zero tolerance level for glyphosate.

For all grains now, we test every batch for the presence of glyphosate. If we detect any residue present, we don’t sell it. We are also beginning to test other organic products besides grains. We cannot guarantee any food that has been outside is 100% glyphosate-free since glyphosate has even been detected in our rain water now. But we have no allowable limits at all, and so as we test our products, if we find any glyphosate present at all, we will stop selling it.

Learn more about Glyphosate-tested products here.

2016 Product Outlook for Healthy Traditions

After finding out in 2014 that some of our products that were USDA certified organic actually had residue amounts of GMOs or the herbicide glyphosate in them, we began a rigorous testing program to have better quality control over our products and minimize the possibility of contamination.

This meant dropping many of our product lines that we sourced from other vendors, as they were either not willing to let us test their products, or they could not assure us that the products we tested would be from the same batches we would purchase from them.

We lost a lot of sales as a result in 2015, as it takes time to develop new producers who are committed to the same high quality of standards that we adhere to in the Healthy Traditions program.

As we look ahead to 2016, we hope to soon have many products back online.

Corn and corn products have been the single most difficult product to source, and we have yet to find sources in the U.S. that consistently test free of GMO contamination. We have secured supplies of GMO-tested and Glyphosate-tested corn from some heirloom growers in remote areas of Mexico, and should soon have corn products available once again.

Other products we should soon have available in the near future, in addition to our wheat and ancient grains which are now available, include almond products, tomato products, our own Apple Cider Vinegar, and rice flour.

To see which products we currently offer via the Healthy Traditions product standards, be sure to visit the Healthy Traditions website.