Farmers, food processors and importers who were expecting a soft rollout of the USDA’s Strengthening Organic Enforcement rule might want to think again.

Since the March 19 implementation of the rule, the agency has uncovered several incidents of fraud in the organic marketplace, particularly involving imports, and is prosecuting offenders.

“We are certainly finding product that has been sent to the United States that cannot be sold as organic in the United States, and we are stopping that,” said Jennifer Tucker, deputy administrator for the USDA’s National Organic Program.

In addition, a grace period where distributors and others in the supply chain were granted an extension to get certified, has now expired. “We are at the point where everybody in the supply chain needs to be certified,” Tucker said.

The developments, Tucker said, already have resulted in positive outcomes, particularly when it comes to stopping illegitimate imports.

“We are now seeing up to 95 percent of NOP (National Organic Program) import certificates that are coming in are valid, which means that we really closed the gap on products coming into the United States without an import certificate,” Tucker said. “We really closed the door on illegitimate shipments.”

Tucker, along with representatives of organic certifiers John Foster and Connie Karr, and organic farmer-processor John McKeon of Taylor Farms are participating in a panel discussion on the new rules at the Organic Growers Summit, Dec. 5, beginning at 10:15 a.m. at the Hyatt Regency Monterey.

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Farmer concerns

For Taylor Farms, which imports organic ingredients for salad mixes and other products, the new rules brought several challenges, the biggest of which has been identifying and closing risks in the supply chain, according to McKeon, director of Organic Integrity and Compliance for the operation.

“You have to look at your supply chains and see if maybe there are a couple of coolers or warehouses that are handling your product that need to become certified and making sure they have the proper certifications for their facilities,” McKeon said.

It can get tricky, he added, when working with a logistics and transportation company that may be working with a broker who may be holding product at a facility that may not have the proper organic certification.

“It is nuanced,” he said. “People aren’t intentionally (out of compliance), and I think for the most part, people are catching up with the program. But it takes a while to get certified, certification isn’t cheap, and certifiers are backed up now, especially with the handling and processing inspections.”

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The Salinas, Calif., farm has also doubled down on efforts to ensure the products it imports have the proper organic certification, McKeon said. “If you are importing products from outside of the United States, that now requires a digital import certificate to accompany every load to verify current organic certification of specific products and volumes,” McKeon said. And, he said, the importer of record has to be certified.

To date, the company has invested considerably in resources to ensure it is in compliance with the new standards, McKeon said, to the tune of approximately 192 hours in administrative services to prepare for the law’s implementation. Now that the farm has a system in place, he estimates the time commitment will be scaled back, but still represent a considerable investment.

Certifier concerns

Similarly for organic certifiers, conforming to new training and auditing requirements and learning the nuances of the new rules has been time-consuming, according to Connie Karr, an associate with Wolf & Associates and an advisory consultant to the Accredited Certifiers Association.

“What has been challenging for both certifiers and growers has been learning what the new requirements are and updating their systems with organic fraud prevention plans,” Karr said.

“It is really thinking back to the potential risks within that supply chain where something could go wrong, where something could be contaminated. It is identifying where the vulnerabilities are in the system and then implementing strategies to mitigate potential risks,” Karr said. “And so, it is kind of a new way of thinking about that, and that has been challenging, especially for small farms to really think about and identify and develop this plan, but also for certifiers.”

Karr said that educational content provided by the USDA National Organic Program has helped certifiers address the standard’s additional training requirements. But, she said, “It is still an ongoing concern regarding how we continue to have new, updated, relevant training for all those staff and inspectors out in the field year to year.”

She added that certifiers are beginning to raise their fees to address the additional costs of training and the additional time involved in certifying operations, something growers expressed concern about when the new standards were announced.

“I am starting to see a lot of certifiers increasing their fees this year,” Karr said, “both because of the additional training and all the additional implementation and work required to implement the Strengthening Organic Enforcement rules.”

Tucker noted that the National Organic Program also has invested in educating certifiers in foreign countries. “Every single organic farm around the world must be inspected at least once a year,” Tucker said. “So, there is a standard inspection, plus unannounced inspections as part of investigations.

“We have a lot of training in our Organic Integrity Learning Center to teach inspectors and certifiers how to do that work effectively,” Tucker said.

She added that the National Organic Program staff has roughly doubled over the past five years, largely because of reports of fraud in the organic marketplace in 2017 and 2018. The reports led to “some fundamental changes in the program,” she said, “both through the (2018) Farm Bill but also through appropriated funding. And so, we have staffed up, both in enforcement and certifier oversight.”