About a month ago Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan announced that the United States had entered an equivalency agreement with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), therefore determining that each country regard as legal the other’s standards for ‘organic’ certification.
I hope you don’t mind, but I’m going to throw a few names at you.
The main facilitator on the U.S. side was Barbara C. Robinson. On June 17th, she exchanged letters with Karen McIntyre, Executive Director of the CFIA’s Agrifood, Meat, Seafood, Safety Directorate. Robinson then signed the agreement later that day along with Jaspinder Komal, the Director of the Agrifood branch of the aforementioned Directorate, making it official. Each nation’s ‘Organic’ label would be legitimate within the other’s markets.
Robinson holds two positions in the USDA; one as Deputy Administrator of the Transportation and Marketing Program. And the other Acting Director of the National Organic Program, which oversees department’s involvement in the organic industry, including the application of the USDA ‘Organic’ label.
Now the date.
Since Tuesday, June 30th, any product that has been certified and labeled ‘Organic’ by the USDA has been allowed to be sold in Canada without having to go through the numerous inspections, high costs, and tedious paperwork (a business has to present documentation of something like 5 years of record keeping) of the certification process all over again. And the same is true of Canada’s ‘Organic Biologique’ label, which you can find on the internet if you’d like to check it out. It’s not bad a circle encasing a simplistic picture of green hills lorded over by the top half of their red maple leaf in absence of the sky. In some cases both symbols will be printed side-by-side.
The 30th was not selected by a random dart throw or a blank date-box on Robinson’s calendar. The reason it was selected is, it was the day Canadian standards were officially established under their laws. So it seems the 30th was actually not a selection, as if two governments were finally able to set aside a bit of time out of their more important work lives to do some wholesome collaborating on an organics pet project. Rather, it seems more as though this agreement was a priority for which simple, but swift, action was appropriate and possibly even compulsory.
Of the majority of Americans who have not been involved with the organic backlash to conventional farming at its origin, many have been aware of and contributing to it since the sixties. It continued throughout the seventies and eighties and into the nineties with the passage of its first major legislation in the US (we out-paced Canada by almost 20 years…well, more like 7 if you take into account when our standards were actually decided).
However, when it comes to our mainstream sensibility, ‘organic’ is only a recent addition to the dictionary. Now, two out of the three governments on this continent have already initiated correspondences, had meetings, and signed agreements that will have important affects on its meaning. If nothing else, this agreement is an indication of the investment the two governments are placing into organics. Whether or not it indicates something beneficial depends on your point of view toward organic farming and how the USDA and other governing agencies operate.
Despite what appears to be a harmonious exchange on the surface, a little devil is hiding in the details. There are apparently some differences in the two sets of standards since each letter has 2 appendixes stating exceptions to the equivalency.
In the NOP’s case, products that come from animals treated with antibiotics will not be given pass in the US. And in the Canadian Organic Regime’s case, any products that include the use of sodium nitrate, hydroponic or aeroponic farming will get the equivalent treatment. In addition, it is stated in the first appendix in McIntyre’s letter that American products derived from livestock must meet Canada’s general codes, implying that some of those that meet American codes do not. Both second appendixes require that each government allow for and assist evaluation of the other’s accredited certifying agencies.
Tags: agrifood, canadian food inspection, canadian food inspection agency, food inspection agency, national organic program, organic food standards, organic label, seafood safety, secretary of agriculture, tedious paperwork