Organic program steps up testing

11/13/2012 10:12:00 AM
Coral Beach

However, the National Organic Program received test results from only 13 certifiers in 2011, indicating tests were done at less than 1% of the 30,000 operations certified as organic that year. Six of the 13 reporting certifiers in 2011 were based outside the U.S. where tests are mandatory. According to the NOP, there are 112 certifiers recognized by the USDA to audit growers in the U.S. and other countries.

“The final rule expands the amount of residue testing … by clarifying that sampling and testing are required on a regular basis,” the notice states. “This action will help further ensure the integrity of products produced and handled under the NOP regulations.”

Based on submitted comments, the NOP officials decided to allow tests conducted for causative reasons to count toward the 5% minimum. All test results must be kept by certifiers for at least three years and must be available for public review.

However, the revised rule eliminates the requirement to report all test results. Effective Jan. 1, only results that “are in violation of (Environmental Protection Agency) or FDA requirements must be reported to the appropriate state health agency or foreign equivalent.”

The periodic testing is not limited to finished products. The revised rule states tests can be done on soil, water, waste, seeds, plant tissue and processed product samples.

Certifiers have the flexibility to test for a range of prohibited and excluded methods, including, but not limited to, pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, and genetically modified organisms. Certifiers that handle 30 or less operations in a year are required to do periodic residue testing on at least one of the operations.

Comments (1) Leave a comment 

In order to prevent cheating, all testing in the organic industry must occur prior to harvest. There’s little point wasting time or money testing post-harvest.

The reason is that with the exception of genetically-modified organisms, almost everything else that's prohibited in organic production dissipates and eventually becomes undetectable over time. Whether it’s herbicides, pesticides, hormones, improperly-composted manure, or the big-money-maker: synthetic nitrogen, only an unannounced inspection and field test will deter fraud and gross negligence. After all, Olympic athletes are tested before and during the games, not after.

As for the cost being $500 per test, I must strenuously disagree. I performed broad-spectrum field tests on organic crops when I was an active IOIA organic inspector for as little as $125. Surely a certifier recognized by the USDA to audit organic farmers and processors will be able to get as good or better a price.

On that note, instead of ADDING organic field testing to the existing system of record-keeping and record-checking - which costs upwards of $2,000 up-front per-farm - field testing should REPLACE record-keeping and record-checking, and thereby bring down the cost of organic certification.

Lastly, there is still the outstanding issue of "royalties" being collected by USDA-accredited certifiers. How can we expect companies that oversee the USDA National Organic Program to be objective if they stand to collect 1-3% of a farmer's GROSS revenue from each transaction they certify? Organic field testing must be carried out by independent inspectors, not by certifiers which have a vested interest in pushing more product to market.