After much discussion and debate, the standards committee charged with developing a sustainable agriculture standard reached a consensus during their inaugural meeting Sept. 25 and 26: In order to move forward, they needed to take a step back.
The committee, made up of 58 stakeholders representing diverse sectors of U.S. agriculture — including production, retail, academia and environmental and labor organizations — voted to set aside the proposed draft standard and develop a new one that would truly reflect a shared vision of the final standard.
“The draft standard is no longer a starting point. We’re starting from a clean slate,” said Dr. Jim Barrett, a professor in the environmental horticulture department at the University of Florida and interim chairperson of the Standards Committee.
Before pushing forward, committee members determined they needed to tackle some preliminary issues. The committee agreed to form six work groups charged with assessing the need for the standard; reviewing and articulating the mission, principles and scope of work ahead; collecting reference documents to inform process; reporting on potential methodologies and indicators for measuring sustainability; identifying potential funding sources and outlining outreach opportunities.
“The objective of the six work groups is to move the process forward for developing the new standard,” Barrett said. “An important part of this is defining the mission, principles and scope of the new sustainability standard.”
Many members of the committee, which includes six floriculture representatives, raised concerns over parts of the draft, including genetic engineering, organic production requirements, labor standards, the scope of the standard and the “lighting rod” question of big agriculture versus small growers and how a standard can be established that doesn’t discriminate against smaller operations, said Linda Brown, executive vice president of Scientific Certification Systems and standards committee member.
Brown described the decision to table the proposed standard as a step forward in a complex journey. “It’s a recognition that this is a very important issue,” Brown said. “We’re talking about grappling with one of the most complex subject there is: defining what sustainable agriculture is… If you had 50-plus people coming in and not feeling the need to take a step back, take a deep breath and think things through, I would have been shocked.”
The draft standard, which will be used as a reference along with other key documents, was never “set in stone or the only consideration,” she added.
The meeting marked the first time all the different stakeholders were present to begin the formal standard setting process, Brown said, and there were bound to be conflicting viewpoints. “There was some preliminary work that…needed to occur in order to coalesce as a committee. Setting [the draft standard] aside was an opportunity for the committee to go back to revisit some of the preliminary issues and needs and discussions that needed to take place before going forward and discussing the content of what a standard needs to contain.”
The decision to set aside the proposed standard does not impact the current VeriFlora certification process. “As a third-party certifier, we’re committed to continue certifying against it,” Brown said. “The VeriFlora program will also meet or exceed any final standards that emerges from the ANSI process. We want VeriFlora to mean the highest sustainability standard.”
And when the time comes to move forward with the process, growers who have gone through the VeriFlora certification program will be in a position to share “what’s really working on the ground versus just theory.”
According to American National Standards Institute guidelines, a new standard must be created by April 2010, and the committee hopes to adhere to that timeline. The draft standard was introduced in 2007, and draft standards expire in three years. However, the standard-setting process isn’t necessarily bound to that time frame, Brown said: “It’s a technicality.”
Although the committee still has a lot of work ahead of them, Barrett said he felt more confident now that real progress will ensue: “We needed to remove that part of the criticism so we could really move forward, looking at the issues that we agree upon: improving agriculture, helping the environment, helping individual farmers and businesses.”
For more information about the first Standards Committee, including the approved motions and a list of Standards Committee members, visit this website.
