NOP

• 3.2.10 Brief Info NOP (17.02.09)
• Standard Inspection Program

 Brief information about NOP

 1.      What is NOP?

The National Organic Program (NOP) is part of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). After sev­eral years of discussions between organic market stakeholders, the National Organic Standard  came into force in 2002. The standard can be viewed at www.ams.usda.gov/nop/NOP/standards.html (then choose "Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR) Website").

2.      Who needs to be NOP certified?

Any grower or handler, who wants to sell organic products on the US market, must be certified ac­cording to NOP by a USDA accredited certifier. Also your suppliers of organic ingredients must be NOP certified. The only exceptions are:

• Smallholders with less than 5,000 USD annual turnover from organic sales, who sell their prod­ucts directly to the consumer (this is not relevant for producers outside the USA).
• Retailers
• Operations, which handle agricultural products containing less than 70% of organic ingredients, or only identify some organic ingredients on the information panel. Products from these companies cannot be used as organic ingredients in NOP certified processed food.
• Operations, which only handle packaged organic food (§ 205.101).

3.      Some general issues, which distinguish NOP from the EU Regulation on organic farming, and from other organic standards

• NOP gives high priority to the organic farm's or company's own responsibility: In an organic manage­ment plan (called by NOP "organic production and handling system plan") the operator describes and defines procedures to assure the organic integrity (§ 205.201). As a first step the certifier checks, whether these procedures are compliant with NOP, and whether they are really implemented. CERES has adopted this same approach also for EU and JAS certification.
• The term "conversion" or "transition" does not exist in NOP. Farm management prior to organic certification is treated under "Land requirements" (§ 205.202). Land to be certified according to NOP must be managed according to the standard, and must not have received prohibited sub­stances during 3 years before the first organic harvest. Conversion period needs not to be super­vised by a certifier (see also our "Brief Information Crops").
• NOP is very strict concerning treatment of animal manure (§ 205.203). Manure must be subject to composting at high temperature during at least 2 weeks, during which the material must be turned a minimum of five times. Raw manure may be applied only 4 months before harvest (in case there is a possible contact with the edible part of the plant), or 3 months (if there is no contact risk with the edible part).
• NOP requires "buffer zones" between organic and conventional fields, whenever there is a risk of contact with prohibited substances (pesticides, fertilisers) (§ 205.202). CERES, however, applies this rule also for EU certification (see our "Policy on Buffer Zones").
• Rules for organic livestock production (§ 205.236 through 205.239) are strict, allowing only organic feed, and restricting purchase of conventional animals. After allopathic veterinary treatments, ani­mals and their products can no longer be considered organic for their remaining life period. On the other side, rules for livestock hous­ing and living conditions are much less detailed than, e.g., in the EU Regulation (see also our "Brief Information Animals").
• Labelling requirements for multi-ingredient food products are somehow different from the EU Regulation and JAS. On the one hand, there is a "100% organic" category. On the other hand, even on products with less than 70% organic ingredients, reference can be made to "organic" for single ingredients on the information panel (§ 205.300 through 205.305, see below N° 4, and also our "Brief Information Processing").
• Use of inputs, additives, aids, and ingredients is regulated by "The National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances", for crop and livestock production, handling and storage (§ 205.600 through 205.606). For fertilizers and plant protection products, the general rationale is:
  • Nonsynthetic substances are allowed, unless they are prohibited
  • Synthetic substances are prohibited, unless they are explicitly allowed.
• Special attention has to be drawn to the fact that for plant protection substances used in organic farming, not only the active ingredient, but also all inert ingredients have to be qualified as “of minimal concern” according to the list no. 4 of the US-Environmental Protection Agency (see the list under: http://www.epa.gov/opprd001/inerts/inerts_list4Aname.pdf and http://www.epa.gov/opprd001/inerts/inerts_list4Bname.pdf).
• Also for other materials used in organic farming or food processing (e.g. commercial fertilizers or food processing aids), the producer is obliged to always provide complete information about the composition of the respective material, including preservatives, carriers, solvents, and any kind of additional substances, which the material may contain, for whatever purpose, so that the certifier can assess compliance of such materials.
• Guidelines for smallholder group certification are given in a recommendation published by the National Organic Standard Board (NOSB) in 2002 (http://www.ams.usda.gov/nosb/FinalRecommendations/Oct02/GrowerGroups.pdf)

4.      Labelling requirements

5.      Special Issues of the NOP Certification Procedure

• For general information on the certification process, please see our "Brief Info Steps to Organic Certification"
• The Organic Management Plan (OMP) has to be submitted, before the onsite inspection takes place. It has to be updated annually.
• The NOP draws special attention to the fact, that operators get a receipt for samples, which may be taken, and that he/she is immediately informed about testing results.
• NOP certificates are valid until being revoked, suspended, or surrendered. In order to make sure, that only valid NOP certificates are used, and to comply with § 205.504 (b) (5), CERES publishes the list of valid certificates at www.ceres-cert.com, without any further details. In case an operations wants to discontinue (temporarily or definitely) with NOP certification, it should formally "surrender" the NOP certification. Otherwise, CERES has to "suspend" it. Suspended certifications can only be re-instated by the USDA, not by the certification body.
• Please be informed, that you can withdraw your application at any time. You will be liable for the costs of services provided up to the moment of withdrawal (§ 205.402 c).

6.      Complaints, Penalties (§205.662)

Complaints:Please be informed that any operator, whose certification has been suspended by CERES may submit a request to the USDA-NOP Secretary for reinstatement of its certification. The request must be accompanied by evidence demonstrating correction of each noncompliance and cor­rective actions taken to comply with NOP.

Other complaints related to the certifier have to be addressed by writing to the Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) of the USDA. For further details on complaints, please see § 205.680 and 205.68.

Penalties: According to §205.662 a certified operation or a person responsibly connected with an op­eration whose certification has been revoked will be ineligible to receive certification for a period of 5 years following the date of such revocation, except, that, the NOP-Secretary may reduce or eliminate the pe­riod of ineligibility.

In addition to suspension or revocation, any certified operation that:

(1) Knowingly sells or labels a product as organic, which is not in accordance with the NOP require­ments, shall be subject to a civil penalty of not more than $10,000 per violation.

(2) Makes a false statement under the Act to the Secretary, a State organic program's governing State official, or a certifying agent shall be subject to the provisions of section 1001 of title 18, United States Code.

7.      Emergencies, Temporary Variancies

In § 205.672, the NOP defines "emergencies", under which government institutions can grant certain exemptions to basic NOP requirements. "Government", however, only refers to the US government, not to governments of other countries. The same is true for seeds, which receive chemical treatment due to government regulations (§ 205.204 (a)(5)): This only refers to the US government. Seeds, which are treated chemically due to state law in other countries, may not be used under NOP.

In case of natural disasters, exceptions from certain requirements related e.g. to fertilization, crop rotation, seeds, etc. are possible. For further details, please see § 205.290.

8.      Confidentiality

CERES will handle confidentially all information obtained during the certifica­tion process. This is part of our certification contract. However, we have to inform the USDA annually about the certified operations.

Standard Inspection Program  for NOP

All relevant aspects have been integrated into the general Standard Inspection Programs of CERES. Please shift to the respective area of operation in order to study the Standard Inspection Programs there:

•     Crop Production

•     Mixed and Parallel Production

•     Animal Husbandry

•     Wild Collection

•     Beekeeping

•     Producer Groups

•    Processing

•     Export

•     Import