A group of US organic farmers have launched a new organic certification scheme, which they say will visibly distance them from “the failures” of the US National Organic Program (NOP).
The Real Organic Project specifically highlights the disapproval by a significant part of the US organic community of the decision last year by the National Organic Standards Board not to exclude hydroponics and aquaponics from the USDA’s organic certification.
“I think that a lot of farmers, especially younger farmers, feel that the organic label no longer describes the way they farm, and we are trying to recapture that,” Linley Dixon, a vegetable farmer and member of the standards board of the Real Organic Project, told the Washington Post.
The Real Organic Project was formed when a group of 15 farmers and scientists from around the US met in Vermont last month. They are aiming to pilot the scheme on between 20-60 farms this summer.
“We are not trying to destroy the USDA label. Rather we are trying to save it”
Explaining its philosophy, the group says on its website: “As the USDA certification loses the meaning of organic, those who care must come together. The Real Organic Project unites eaters and farmers choosing a better way to grow food. Most of the certified farmers in the US are really organic, but some of the food sold under that label is not. As the National Organic Program struggles to maintain the strong standards intended by the Organic Food Production Act, we feel that something must be done. We want to help clear up the confusion the NOP failures have created for people trying to support traditional organic farming.”
The group insists that it is not abandoning the National Organic Program, or attacking organic farmers: “We are not trying to destroy the USDA label. Rather we are trying to save it. We have already worked for many years to build an organic label that people can trust. Without such transparency, we all lose.”
Photo: Real Organic Project, via Facebook