If you want to sell seeds or garden produce, in an established market, then you have to be USDA certified Organic to use that word on your label. Home gardeners do not seek out USDA certification, because it is expensive, and there is an annual bill to be paid, it is not a one time deal. I can't say if the air pollution from the nearby factory is an issue-it depends on what the factory is doing, and what is going up the smokestack. Sulfur dioxide, for example, has an odor, and makes the rainfall more acidic, but it is not generally harmful to garden plants. If you live near a lead processing plant, there will be lead dust, and that is a dangerous and persistent pollutant. You really have to know what is going on inside the factory to understand the smokestack issue.

Organic seed sourcing is a bit of a "so what" as it is. It's nice if you want to support certified organic farming and seed supplying sources, but for the most part the genetic information and tissues in a seed don't care how it was grown. Unless you apply systemic pesticide/herbicides on your plants you're not going to find any non-organic type residues/chemicals/etc in your seeds produced by your plants. Organic seed is a nice way to support suppliers who share your beliefs rather than having some inherent benefit of quality of seed. I buy from these kind of sources when it's cost effective (or close enough...I'll throw an organic seed supplier a few extra dimes, no problem).

Technically, you can't sell your seeds as organic...and really technically you can't even call them organic as defined by law...but if you're giving/trading seed and you tell others you grew them organically/naturally...then no one's going to care about that technicality (including the government), and you're telling the truth, anyway.

Influence of air pollution mostly effects soil pH...plastic leaching is nothing to worry about in such small amounts a garden will have in it compared to the soil that can complex anything it may leach (if at all). Neither of these would effect a home garden growing organically or a certified organic farm.

Manure from a GMO food eating animals is used very frequently on certified organic operations. While residues of GMO feed may be found in that manure, there's no way for it to make it's way into another plant. Genetic information isn't going to be passed via non-sexual contact. Heck, for the most part any of that residual GMO information found in partially/fully digested grain you're adding to soil is unbound, unstable, and soon to be broken down amino acids over time which soil microbes will digest and further break down.

This post was edited by nc-crn on Sat, Feb 2, 13 at 2:18

It is not just the factories near you that are your air pollution problem. Much of that travels thousands of miles in the air and comes down on us with the rain and snow. Some municipal water is treated with flouride and chlorine, and some are treated for pH. To know what might be in your water you need to know about your system and how it is, if it is, treated. We have municipal water systems here that get the water from wells and there is no treatment other then some chlorine is injected to control bacteria while others have the full filtering system.

Due care in selecting your source of animal manure is necessary, not only because of the antibiotics many animals are routinely fed but because they may also have been fed hay that was sprayed with an herbicide that is very persistant. It is very difficult for us to avoid Genetically Engineered foods because they are not labeled so we have no way of knowing where they are. If your source of manure is a factory "farm" then you most likely will be using manure contaminated with unnacceptable materials.
Whether to use plastics is highly debateable. Plastic is made from non renewable resources and the stabilizer used in some is a suspected carcinogen and that can leach out in certain circumstances. Much of the plastic lumber is supposed to be made from recycled plastic and is therefore supposed to be more environmentally acceptable except I fail to see how something that was not good initially is now okay.

Organic certification is needed if you are going to be selling on excess of $5,000.00 per year of organic labeled materials, food, seeds, etc. If you do not exceed that dollar amount there is no restriction on your use of the organic.

I'm not looking for certification, I was just thinking it would be difficult to make any truly natural crops since everything is poisoned and wasn't sure what gardeners meant by organic. I think the factory is the sulfur type based on smell. I know our tapwater tastes terrible, like chemicals, and mineral water (sourced as real) comes in plastic.

I think just tilling in crop residue bout' does it for me.

This post was edited by TheMasterGardener1 on Sat, Feb 2, 13 at 12:17

Pollution, and a poisoned environment, is all around us but we can limit our exposure to those by adding organic matter to our soil which can help.
Keep in mind that the some of the bottled water is from municipal sources and be careful of those touted as pure mountain water because there are animals in those mountains that do things in that water you don't really want to think about. That is why when I was a Boy Scout back in the 1950's we were taught to always boil our drinking water.