What if Organic Standards Were Bioregional and Written by Real Organic Farmers?

Once these large agri-food corporations gain positions of influence they will quite naturally attempt to remove any existing impediments to further industrialization. In addition, they will attempt to eliminate competition by creating complex regulatory requirements that smaller producers cannot meet — or can’t meet as efficiently. This is nothing new. Adam Smith wrote in the Wealth of Nations, ​“The usual corporation spirit, wherever the law does not restrain it, prevails in all regulated companies. When they have been allowed to act according to their natural genius, they have always, in order to confine the competition to as small a number of persons as possible, endeavoured to subject the trade to many burdensome regulations.”

We see this tactic most clearly in the new FDA Food Safety Modernization Act. The new standards make it very difficult for farmers who are large enough to represent a competitive threat to the large agri-food corporations to compete. The paperwork burden in the current USDA organic program is another example. We can expect this tactic to be embedded in or emerge from any new organic certification program proposed or promoted by the large ​“organic” agri-food corporations. New standards that are developed and promoted by grass-roots organic farmers have a much better chance of increasing the overall integrity of organics, as well as increasing the difficulty of organic industrialization. Their priority is more likely to be organic integrity than economic efficiency.

I personally would prefer national organic standards that included only those practices that are appropriate, meaningful, and enforceable at the national level — such as allowable and non-allowable inputs and materials. This would allow elimination of paperwork associated with the unenforceable portions of current USDA standards — making the program more accessible to smaller organic farming operations. I would also prefer organic ​“add-ons” or ​“real organic” programs that are defined, organized, monitored and enforced at the local or bio-regional level.

The organic bioregions should be small enough to allow the integrity of the bioregional labels to be ensured through personal relationships. These bioregional organic programs could be administered by cooperative organizations with memberships that include the certified organic producer and boards of directors with representatives of local consumer and citizens groups as well as producers.

Additional standards regarding authentic organic production practices — such as employee working conditions and wages, animal welfare, and relationships with the local community — could be designed to fit the specific ecological, social, and cultural environment of the bioregions. Standards defining the social and ecological integrity of the bioregional organic labels could be enforced through peer evaluations during periodic visits to organic farms by other organic farmers and community members chosen by the cooperatives.

Organic farms could also be required to be open to the public for visits by local customers or anyone in the surrounding communities. Requirements for organic certification could be clearly posted on the farm. Employees and visitors could be encouraged to talk with the farmer about any concerns and to report potential unresolved violations to the cooperative.

Obviously, a bioregional organic certification program would result in a proliferation of organic labels. In fact, that would be the primary intent of the program. Authentic organic production should reflect the ecological and social diversity of the environment within which the farms function. The nation is not uniform or standard, and thus, any set of uniform standards cannot define a system that is truly organic.

As with basic human rights, advocates of organic food production should work to define a common set of minimum enforceable standards that apply nationally — perhaps internationally. Again as with human rights, individual farmers and bioregional groups of farmers should be encouraged to raise their organic standards well above the national minimums. The resulting organic food markets might not be as economically efficient, at least in terms of costs of production, but they would have the ecological, social, and economic integrity of authentic organics.

(“Perspectives on Organic Standards” was first published on John Ikerd’s blog and is reposted on Rural America In These Times with permission. For information about John’s work, or to subscribe to his blog, click here.)