Don't Buy 'Organic'

Of course it would be useful to eliminate the exemption for exporters, and ensure exporters abide by real organic practices in our system.  Then the regulatory requirement that our trading partners set up a similar system would ensure exporters from foreign countries meet the domestic requirements in their own countries.  Then there would be some validity to the term 'organic' and some mechanisms for accountability.

Even such a valid and accountable system would still squeeze out small domestic organic producers in favour of cross-border corporations and financiers.

And under current and proposed trade law, cross-border corporations and financiers get rights to sue if their profits are threatened.

Seeing as the Canadian Organic Regulations are law already, under NAFTA et al these corps and financiers NOW have rights to sue, so it's not likely we'll see that clause exempting exporters changed.

Consumers are stuck with non-organic 'organic' regs for now.

Have to ditch the trade deals and rewrite regs.

anyway, back to planting. 

I was going to go through the process for certification myself this year, as I've been farming that way anyway for years.

But not now that I've read Harper's Chem-Ag regs. 

I'll spend my time doing real organic farming and connecting with others who do the same.

remind,  just my own computer glitch.  i write something then don't want it wiped out if the java script isn't working.

so a moderator could shift this to whatever forum is useful- int'l or national news maybe.

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here to mention that the quotes above are explanatory quotes to the actual text of the regulation in Part Four: Interprovincial and International Trade;  Importation, Sections 27 and 28.

"27. (1) No person shall import or market a product as an organic product in Canada unless the product

(a) is an organic product under these Regulations; or

(b) originates from a country with which the Agency has entered into an agreement or an arrangement regarding the importation and exportation of organic products and the product is certified as organic, in accordance with the agreement or the arrangement, by a certification body recognized by that country.

(2) Despite subsection (1), a product originating from a country that has not entered into an agreement or an arrangement regarding the importation and exportation of organic products may be imported or marketed in Canada as an organic product if it is certified as organic by a certification body recognized by a country referred to in paragraph (1)(b) and the certification is in accordance with the agreement or arrangement referred to in that paragraph.

28. Any person who imports a product or markets it in Canada as an organic product shall be able to demonstrate, at all times, that the product meets one of the requirements set out in section 27 and shall retain the documents attesting that the product is organic."

These Sections effectively put the control over international trade in 'organic' produce with the federal government's trade 'agreements' or 'arrangements'.

As explained in the OP quotes, the federal government has exempted exporters from meeting organic standards here, and is entering into agreements with other countries with 'equivalent systems', ie) countries which allow their exporters to avoid standards.

So if a product is on the shelf from the US or Europe, or anywhere else, with a logo of that country's certifier and a logo of Canada Organic, the producer may not actually be inspected and required to engage in any actual organic practices: They can jump through the exporter exemption loophole in their host country, if they have an 'organic' trade arrangement with Canada, and get our Canada Organic label.

Many companies with a Canadian address source their products from other countries, so the only produce which consumers can be sure is organic is that grown in a given province by a producer who retains specific fields for that purpose, fields which are certified and inspected by a provincial certifier in addition to or instead of the 'Canada Organic' label.

Somehow actual organic growers will need to make it clear in their marketing materials that they aren't certified only through the Canada Organic system, as the Canada Organic label guarantees nothing.

Mad Cow Disease Case Hidden for Weeks

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/11/mad-cow-disease-case-hidd_n_494...

"On Feb 25, 2010 the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) confirmed a recent case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) commonly known as Mad Cow Disease, in a 72 month old cow...the CFIA and all other governments who knew about this latest BSE case kept it a secret from the public for almost two months.."

Seals, caribou, deer, bears, etc are pure organic and help FN communities at the same time. There should be more promotion of wild food for consumption, clothing, sport hunting/trophy hunting, all under the leadership of the local FN community.

Personally I buy almost everything organic, but not because I am silly enough to believe it really is organic.  At this point I feel it is much more important to buy organic just because then I help create a market for it.  Once a market is created that is when proper standards will come into place. Whenever I buy organic I always look into the organic body doing the certification, what their standards are and how they go about supervising the farmers who are being certified organic as well as how reliable the certification board reports are from a third party.  I know that it is a lot of work but I feel that it is worth it for me.  When I find an organic certification body that is doing the proper job then I stick with buying their products.  If there are products not available under their line I will move to other products that are certified organic but not reliable so that I can create a market.  When companies see there is a market they want to make money off of it so more companies will produce said product in organics and eventually one will do it in a reliable way and then I will stick with the company that is doing the proper job.

Organic is being said to save local farmers because a lot of the reliable organics come from farmers who, as mentioned above, are already practicing most if not all of the organic practices.  I think that if people stop buying organic than it destroys the market and there will never be proper regulation because there isn't enough money in organics for companies or organic boards to take it seriously.  I think that people need to be informed with their organic choices so they realize what they are actually buying may not be truly organic and so they can make choices that will support the more regulated organics but I don't think that people should stop buying organic all together.  

Yes, I think local farmers should be supported but I think that is a separate issue from organic.  There needs to be a market for organic or there will never be proper regulations and every time you want to buy a product you will have to research the place you are buying from rather than finding a regulation body that you can trust to do it properly.  I spend a lot of time looking into certification boards and can't imagine how much time I would spend having to look into each and every provider of food to see what their practices were instead especially living in Toronto and not having access to locally farmed foods (that I can go visit easily) or foods that aren't available in southern ontario.  Talking with farmers to find out what their practices are is not the end of the line for a truly informed consumer.  You would need to understand what the normal practices are for fertilization, pest control, free range versus organic practices etc to see if the farmer truly was doing what they were suppose to and then do more than just take their word for it - you would need to find third parties that confirm the farmer is following these practices.  This is hard enough to follow through with certification boards which would cover many different products and suppliers let alone with each farmer that you want to buy from.

People, if they are in the position to be in the luxury to have the ability to do this, have to be willing to suck it up and pay more for their groceries (though, just from a personal experience, I ironically eat less when I eat organic so I end up spending the same amount of money that I spent before just on less food - I would like to see what the science is behind that!).

I think not buying organic is a big mistake but I think people need to be informed of what buying organic really means at this stage in the market so they are not duped into thinking that we are at a place where organics are completely regulated.  It would be nice to end up there but right now it is in the process of getting there, not the destination.

Excellent comments, Refuge.  I can't say we totally agree, but I like the thought you put into what you eat.  Very thorough.

"Local" to Toronto must include just about all of SouthCentral and SouthWestern Ontario.  The distances are very short and the possibilities for establishing a local market and a local organic market are huge.

I was at a farm conference in January where a foremost organic expert\Prof was giving seminars.  Part of his commentary centered around how Ontario farmers were not capitalizing on the billions of dollars being spent by GTA eaters on organic products.

A young farmer in the crowd raised his hand and asked a question: "I can't produce my organic produce at the same cost as the imports.  So how can I sell to Toronto?"

The expert didn't have an answer. 

And that's partially my issue with these consultant type food people, in universities and colleges and on the public payroll: they do not get the primary production marketplace; many have little experience.  The media doesn't help, either, by glorifying organic and niche markets to the exclusion of a very safe and sustainable "conventional" sector.  I can't tell you the number of people I meet who suggest growing organics is a certain gold mine... and why aren't I doing it?

The Omnivor's Dilemma features the Salatin farm, Polyface.  They refer to what they're doing as "beyond" organic.  I follow some of the Polyface techniques, with regional\local differences. 

But that's the production end of things, the business side.     

I'll preface my next comments by saying farmers are often their own worst enemies, being hesitant to change, etc.

I'm not even sure what's considered a small farm in SWOnt. 

Anyhow, if proper organic standards are established and easily accessible for the public to understand, I think a move towards closed loup small farm systems could be gradually created.

The problem I ran into right away with organic chicken production (aside from Ontario's strict quota system) is that to raise an organic chicken with purchased organic feed would be astronomical.... in the range of six dollars per pound, or $13\kg.  That's my cost, not including my time.  And if I could get the chicken processed in an organically certified manner.

Now, if I could grow my own certified feed, the cost structure goes down.  I assume some farmers are doing this, or a version, because I've seen certified chicken for $4\pound, which is very reasonable... though I didn't check that farm's certification.  

So, in a sense, going back to mixed farms makes sense.  Economies of scale work against this, as in all things, however, which is why I've decided to take what works in organic and use the techniques or at least experiment with them.