How to Buy Smarter
Consumer advocate and author Debra Lynn Dadd recommends looking at the following indicators of a product's health and environmental integrity:
1. Ingredients: Look for terms such as "organically grown," "certified organic," "no synthetic preservatives," "no artificial colors or fragrances." Use of the word "natural" is not regulated and can be misleading. If the ingredients list contains long, unpronounceable words and/or numbers (for example, "paradichlorobenzene", or "sodium C14-16 & olefin sulfonate"), it's a tip-off they're probably chemically-derived.
2. Packaging: Great products can still come in unhealthful packages — and vice versa. Glass bottles and jars, paper and cellophane (which is made from plant cellulose) are all biodegradable, recyclable, and often reusable. Look for "made from recycled materials" (or the three-circular-arrows symbol that indicates "recycled") on packages; when you purchase canned goods, look for containers marked "lead-free." Try to avoid plastic or polystyrene. The more minimal the packaging, the better. Every day in the U.S., we send 60,000 garbage trucks to landfills.
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