(1) ‘Growing medium’ means a material used as a substrate for root development, in which plants are grown;

(2) ‘Mineral growing medium’ means a growing medium totally composed by mineral constituents;

(3) ‘Soil improver’ means a material added to soil in situ whose main function is to maintain or improve its physical and/or chemical and/or biological properties, with the exception of liming materials;

(4) ‘Organic soil improver’ means a soil improver containing carbonaceous materials whose main function is to increase soil organic matter content;

(5) ‘Mulch’ means a type of soil improver used as protective covering placed around plants on the topsoil whose specific functions are to prevent the loss of moisture, control weed growth, and reduce soil erosion;

(6) ‘Organic mulch’ means mulch containing carbonaceous materials derived from biomass;

(7) ‘Constituent’ means any input material that can be used as an ingredient of the product;

(8) ‘Organic constituent’ means a constituent composed by carbonaceous materials;

(9) ‘Product family’ means the range of products composed by the same constituents;

(10) ‘Annual output’ means annual production of a product family;

(11) ‘Annual input’ means the annual amount of materials treated in a waste or animal by-product treatment plant;

(12) ‘Batch’ means quantity of goods manufactured by the same process under the same conditions and labelled in the same manner and is assumed to have the same characteristics;

(13) ‘Bio-waste’ means biodegradable garden and park waste, food and kitchen waste from households, restaurants, caterers and retail premises and comparable waste from food processing plants;

(14) ‘Biomass’ means the biodegradable fraction of products, waste and residues from biological origin from agriculture (including vegetal and animal substances), forestry and related industries including fisheries and aquaculture, as well as the biodegradable fraction of industrial and municipal waste.