That is the Question.
Our newly purchased farm was certified organic for the last three years by the previous owner who raised mixed vegetables. Now that we're (mostly) settled in, I'm ready to start planning my own vegetable production for 2013. The question becomes whether or not to apply for organic certification.
In the past, I've generally been skeptical of organic certification, as I thought of it as just another label that became increasingly meaningless the more one looked into it. For instance, huge commercial growers in California produce monocultures of "organic" crops that require inputs of toxic "organic" pesticides. My bent was toward producing vegetables grown organically, but without the certification, relying on direct interaction with customers to communicate the cultural practices. I also( don't like getting shoehorned into a narrowly defined set of rules that tell me what I can and cannot grow.
(As an aside, organic certification for livestock is a whole other can of worms that I won't tackle in this post).
I have received some advice that led me to believe it might be worth keeping up the certification. For example, there is a growing infrastructure for food distribution in the area that will only accept certified organic produce (eg Puget Sound Food Network). Some sort of certification standard makes sense when moving beyond direct marketing because consumers lose the connection to the farmer and need to be assured their food is meeting a minimum quality standard. Secondly, we are going to be running the Chuckanut Farmstand at the farm, this year, and we'll likely catch a lot of tourist traffic traveling Chuckanut Drive. It would be nice to be able to advertise our produce as "Certified Organic". Lastly, we're likely going to go to a single farmer's market this year, and for the same reasons, having that certification makes some sense.
After thinking all this through, I actually went to the WSDA Organic website and started reading about certification. I already knew that I couldn't just transfer the certification from the previous owner to myself, so I'd have to apply for a new certification--at a cost of $470. The certification would also take 3.5 months. Our goal for this year is to keep our costs to an absolute minimum, and $470 seems like an awfully large chunk of cash--probably more than 10% of our sales of organic produce for the year. Luckily, I read that I can market my produce as "organic" (but not certified organic) if I do less than $5000 in gross sales this year and follow all the rules and guidelines for certified organic producers. Next year, we could choose to pay the fee and get certified if we expect to grow our gross sales considerably or find that certification has a significant benefit.
We haven't made a final decision, but we'll need to decide soon. The 3.5 month window puts us past July 1st if we start the certification process right now.
Our newly purchased farm was certified organic for the last three years by the previous owner who raised mixed vegetables. Now that we're (mostly) settled in, I'm ready to start planning my own vegetable production for 2013. The question becomes whether or not to apply for organic certification.
In the past, I've generally been skeptical of organic certification, as I thought of it as just another label that became increasingly meaningless the more one looked into it. For instance, huge commercial growers in California produce monocultures of "organic" crops that require inputs of toxic "organic" pesticides. My bent was toward producing vegetables grown organically, but without the certification, relying on direct interaction with customers to communicate the cultural practices. I also( don't like getting shoehorned into a narrowly defined set of rules that tell me what I can and cannot grow.
(As an aside, organic certification for livestock is a whole other can of worms that I won't tackle in this post).
I have received some advice that led me to believe it might be worth keeping up the certification. For example, there is a growing infrastructure for food distribution in the area that will only accept certified organic produce (eg Puget Sound Food Network). Some sort of certification standard makes sense when moving beyond direct marketing because consumers lose the connection to the farmer and need to be assured their food is meeting a minimum quality standard. Secondly, we are going to be running the Chuckanut Farmstand at the farm, this year, and we'll likely catch a lot of tourist traffic traveling Chuckanut Drive. It would be nice to be able to advertise our produce as "Certified Organic". Lastly, we're likely going to go to a single farmer's market this year, and for the same reasons, having that certification makes some sense.
After thinking all this through, I actually went to the WSDA Organic website and started reading about certification. I already knew that I couldn't just transfer the certification from the previous owner to myself, so I'd have to apply for a new certification--at a cost of $470. The certification would also take 3.5 months. Our goal for this year is to keep our costs to an absolute minimum, and $470 seems like an awfully large chunk of cash--probably more than 10% of our sales of organic produce for the year. Luckily, I read that I can market my produce as "organic" (but not certified organic) if I do less than $5000 in gross sales this year and follow all the rules and guidelines for certified organic producers. Next year, we could choose to pay the fee and get certified if we expect to grow our gross sales considerably or find that certification has a significant benefit.
We haven't made a final decision, but we'll need to decide soon. The 3.5 month window puts us past July 1st if we start the certification process right now.
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