At Zen Earth, we proudly participate in both the USDA Biopreferred Program as well as the EPA Cleangredients Database. But what are these programs, and what do they mean for our customers?
One of the major goals of the USDA Biopreferred program is to provide consumers with the ability to identify products that are “biobased”- meaning that they have been derived from plants and other renewable agricultural, marine and forestry materials. All Zen Earth products bearing the USDA Certified Biobased product label represent chemicals that have a third party verified amount of biological ingredients, thus providing an alternative to conventional petroleum derived products. The Biopreferred program is largely concerned with sustainability of ingredient sourcing, and can provide valuable insights into creating more sustainable ingredient streams.
Unfortunately, in our opinion, the Biopreferred program often doesn’t do enough because it can’t, on it’s own, do anything to differentiate between responsibly sourced materials and materials obtained from unethical practices, such as slash and burn farming. Arguably these practices are causal in terms of significant environmental damage, cancelling out any real benefit. To combat this, Zen Earth works with a number of programs to ensure to our products are sourced sustainably. To provide our customers with this peace of mind, we are participants in the U.S. EPA Cleangredients database.
Cleangredients is the definitive database of market-ready chemistry that meets the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Safer Choice Standard. All Zen Earth products listed in CleanGredients have been verified by independent third-party experts to contain formulations to pass the EPA’s Safer Choice Standard, a standard designed to safeguard both human and environmental health. This means that all Zen Earth products containing the Safer Choice Label represent a manufacturing initiative resulting in increased safety for humans and the environment.
Our goal is to look at the future of green chemistry from the perspective of minimizing harm at every opportunity. This means generating products that do the work required of them, with rapid windows of bio-degradation, working effectively and user safety profiles that meet cosmetic grade requirements, and material sourcing that equates to minimum impact.
Our products are transported as non hazardous goods and are greater than 90% Zen Earth Green certified using the criteria outline above. We are continually striving to provide greener performance chemicals that meet certifications for sustainability and quality safety. At Zen Earth, it is critically important that we help industries transition from toxic, hazardous chemical use to a user model that benefits from green, clean and safe-to-use products without sacrificing performance.
For more about the USDA Biopreferred program, visit https://www.biopreferred.gov/BioPreferred/
For more about the EPA Cleangredients Database, visit https://www.cleangredients.org/