Organic standards developed mainly within the organic community, and largely by organic farmers and gardeners and small groups of activist ‘consumers’. Gradually other groups became engaged in the standard-setting process, for example, processors and special interest groups, such as animal welfare groups, social activist groups or environmental groups. Through regulation, governments also became active, getting engaged in several different roles. The government has the role of balancing the interests of different groups, to ensure that they are all fairly represented and considered. This can be a very useful role if performed correctly, especially in regard to ensuring marginalised groups are included in deliberations. The government, which has access to considerable expertise from within, can also provide technical expertise in matters of standards.

Governments, often, use their regulations to manifest their power over the sector. This is achieved in many ways, for instance by making certification bodies accountable to the government and by setting standards that are not grounded in organic traditions. It is unfortunate when regulations are driven by this desire to assert power. The organic sector has little to gain from this kind of regulatory approach. Ultimately, it has little value for the government as well. The kind of very heavy-handed regulation that the Chinese government has introduced (see TOS 131) is likely to drive many stakeholders out of the organic market place, in a similar way that the Japanese regulation did some ten years ago. Clearly, governments have both the right and obligation to take action if blatant fraud is prevalent in the organic market place, which seems to have been the case in China, but this can be done in many ways. Preferably it is carried out in a partnership with the sector rather than as a dictate from the government.

Governments are also stakeholders in the standards process, influencing organic (and other) standards in pursuing public interest goals, goals that are normally not pushed by any of the key parties. Such goals could be the development for the public good, such as improved biodiversity. It could also be about avoiding public ills, such as pollution from the handling of animal manure. Increasingly, organic agriculture is promoted as an option for mitigating climate change. And there are some reasons for this. Organic agriculture uses less energy than its non-organic counterpart, mainly because of the avoidance of nitrogen fertilisers, thus causing less carbon emissions. Organic agriculture also maintains or improves soil organic matter compared to non-organic systems, thus causing less carbon emissions and it can even work as a substantial carbon sink.

But these broad statements are expressions of average performance; they don’t mean that all organic farms are good for the climate. Not all of them use little energy; some use fossil fuel for heating greenhouses and some use massive amounts of energy for pumping water or simply for intensive mechanical cultivation. Some organic farms do not work as carbon sinks, for example, intensive row crop cultivation is likely to be harmful for soil organic matter.

The strength of organic farming is that it is multifunctional, that is, it performs many different services at the same time, like a Swiss army knife – a popular multifunctional tool. But that also means for any particular issue seen in isolation, there will be a better tool. And here there is an inherent danger or challenge. For the market place it is, perhaps, enough to make average statements, but when talk turns to economic compensation for a certain service, e.g. carbon sequestration or biodiversity conservation, it is not satisfactory to talk about average performance. By emphasising one aspect of the many sides of organic systems we may lose sight of its other valuable traits. This is a predictable risk when public compensation is introduced with the specific purpose of providing a particular ‘environmental service’ and if standards are tailored to provide that particular service. This effect can already be seen in the various private sector initiatives to make climate standards.

The future for the organic sector is more in making the tools mutually supportive rather than increasing the size of the individual tools. This requires systems thinking rather than a narrow focus on one parameter. But the standards, with their increasing level of detail, don’t foster systems thinking at all. And the work of government administrations rarely does as well, as each department has its own very limited responsibility. What to do?

Gunnar Rundgren

There are reasons to congratulate the European Union and the United States for their bilateral agreement for recognition of each other’s organic regulations as being equivalent.

The US/EU bilateral agreement is not only good news for the two parties, but also for the organic sector as a whole. Not only is the agreement applicable to the two regions, it is also valid for products that are imported into either of the two areas and then re-exported (with slightly different conditions for the two jurisdictions). So indirectly almost all production is covered by the scope of the agreement. The European Union already had some experience with equivalence, having walked down a similar path with other countries and having found that it works. The United States had only previously tried it with its very close neighbour, Canada. Considering the American tendency to unilateralism as well as the very vocal activist groups always ready to cry wolf (which in this case normally means allegations that the USDA is selling out organic to corporate interests) this agreement was certainly a big step for the United States.

One could hope that private standard setters could also adopt this way of thinking. However, as their business is to differentiate themselves from the public sphere the chances for that are rather slim. IFOAM has gone halfway. On the one hand, it has fully embraced the concept of equivalence by means of the Family of Standards, on the other hand, its main seal of recognition, IFOAM Accreditation, is based on compliance. There are certainly reasons why IFOAM should contemplate how it will orientate itself in this new landscape.

This EU/US agreement will most likely have a more far reaching effect than most people realise. Through this agreement, together with the agreements with Canada, some 90% of the global organic market is tied together.

At a recent Global Organic Market Access (GOMA) conference, representatives for the EU and the USA could be heard saying that there are small differences in their standards and that the equivalence process also will lead to harmonisation. We can already see this. For example, the US is considering withdrawing approval of use of Chilean Nitrate, an input the EU does not allow.

Changes in both regulations will most likely work both ways. While some standards that are not ‘strict enough’ will be raised, in the long run, countries where producers are subject to much stricter standards than the imports will argue that it is unfair and ask for an easing of the standards. The European Union has a prescriptive standard that bans parallel production, a rule totally missing in the USA. This is a control arrangement based on the assumption that the risk for fraud is much higher if the same farmer has both organic and conventional production. It was never a rational standard, and it was never applied to traders and processors, where risks are much higher. So now that the EU, de facto, accepts parallel production, it is hard to see how such a standard can survive.

The United States system is largely based on the intent that imported products fulfil every detail of the National Organic Program (NOP). Practitioners have long known that this is not possible, e.g. composting regulations and group certification used in other countries do not always conform to NOP rules, and the NOP is aware of this. With the USDA now accepting the biggest organic production area in the world based on equivalence, it seems even harder for it to uphold a strict interpretation of compliance.

When the US introduced its system of direct approval of certification bodies, many saw it as a positive example – and without doubt it was a step forward. But the system that the EU has developed with direct approval of certification bodies based on equivalence goes a lot further to accommodate the needs of the global organic sector. First, by being based on equivalence and not compliance, and secondly and equally importantly, by being based on a rather open regime for supervision and surveillance that does not insist on redundant accreditations and control visits. The USDA, on its side, has expanded its direct control of certification bodies outside the US, with drastically increased costs as a result. The United States should take the next step to allow products to flow freely around the globe.

Gunnar Rundgren

The Organic Certification Directory 2012 is published and available for download in PDF here (2.1MB).

The online directory is being uploaded and will be announced on this website when it is available.