What does "Natural" mean anyway?

The American Agricultural Law Association, on its Ag & Food Law Blog, recently wrote on the topic of "natural" labels on food:

"Consumer Reports National Research Center released a poll revealing that 59 percent of consumers check to see if they are buying “natural” products even though there is 'no federal or third-party verified label for the term....'"

Moreover, Consumer Reports indicated that more than 80 percent of consumers think that the labeling of food as natural should connote that the food is free of artificial ingredients, pesticides, and genetically modified organisms.

So far, the FDA has chosen not to exercise its authority to define "natural."

Consumer Reports is currently seeking signatures for a petition to the FDA requesting that the FDA prohibit the use of the term "natural"on food labels.

Neil Pederson, J.D expected 2015, William Mitchell College of Law.

"Natural" Orange Juice

I drink orange juice every day, but I am not a fresh-squeezed connoisseur.  So it was with some interest that I read reports that those "Not-from-concentrate" orange juices are not so close to fresh squeezed after all. But does that mean they're not "natural"?
According to Alissa Hamilton, author of Squeezed: What You Don't Know About Orange Juice, that fresh orange juice is de-oxygenated for long term storage.  This process deprives the OJ of its flavor, so flavor packets are added when it is reassembled.  The flavor is made from real oranges.  According to a short article also by Hamilton,

"When the juice is stripped of oxygen it is also stripped of flavor providing chemicals. Juice companies therefore hire flavor and fragrance companies, the same ones that formulate perfumes for Dior and Calvin Klein, to engineer flavor packs to add back to the juice to make it taste fresh. Flavor packs aren’t listed as an ingredient on the label because technically they are derived from orange essence and oil." 

So the question I started with -- is this natural? There is no definition of "natural" for food labels, but there IS litigation about it.   From the Associated Press:

Lawsuits slam 'natural' claims from OJ to chips, by Jessica Gresko

WASHINGTON — Orange juice maker Tropicana markets its brand as fresh from the grove, but a series of lawsuits nationwide claim the company's juice is so heavily processed it shouldn't be called "natural."

In approximately 20 lawsuits, the first one filed in New Jersey, lawyers claim the company adds chemically engineered "flavor packs" to its juice, making it taste the same year-round. On Thursday, lawyers came together in Washington to argue before a panel of judges about where the lawsuits should be heard as a group. . . .
keep reading 

Posted by Donna M. Byrne, William Mitchell College of Law