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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

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NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD

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PUBLIC COMMENT WEBINAR

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TUESDAY

APRIL 20, 2021

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The Board met telephonically at 12:00 

p.m., Steve Ela, Chair, presiding.

PRESENT

STEVE ELA, Chair

NATE POWELL-PALM, Vice Chair

MINDEE JEFFERY, Secretary

SUE BAIRD

ASA BRADMAN

AMY BRUCH

BRIAN CALDWELL

JERRY D'AMORE

CAROLYN DIMITRI

RICK GREENWOOD

KIM HUSEMAN

LOGAN PETREY

KYLA SMITH

WOOD TURNER
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STAFF PRESENT

MICHELLE ARSENAULT, Advisory Committee 

Specialist, Standards Division

JARED CLARK, National List Manager, Standards 

Division

DAVID GLASGOW, Associate Deputy Administrator, 

National Organic Program

ERIN HEALY, Acting Director, Standards Division

DEVON PATTILLO, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist, Standards Division

DR. JENNIFER TUCKER, Ph.D., Deputy 

Administrator, National Organic Program; 

Designated Federal Official
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

(12:02 p.m.)

MR. ELA: We'll just start. Hello, 

everybody. This is Steve Ela, I'm chair of the 

NOSB. And I'm going to let Michelle start off here 

with some of the details and we'll go on through, 

and then we'll dive into the public comments. So 

welcome, everybody.

MS. ARSENAULT: Thank you, sir.

MR. D'AMORE: Good morning, to you, 

sir.

MS. ARSENAULT: Thank you, Steve. All 

right. So thank you for joining us for the start 

of the National Organic Standards Board public 

comment webinars and the meeting next week. If 

you're online, you should see an instruction slide. 

If you're on the phone only I can give a brief 

summary here. If you're online and having audio 

issues, you can call in on the phone. The numbers

are listed on the screen, at the top of the screen. 

And I've also chatted them in. There's several 

different numbers that you can choose from, 
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depending on your location, for better quality.

We ask that you please stay on mute with 

your video off until it's your turn to provide 

public comments. When you're called on to speak 

or maybe a little bit before, everyone got the 

schedule, so you should be able to see where you're 

coming up in the list, you can then unmute yourself 

and turn on your camera. It's optional if you want 

to be on camera. The mic and camera are both 

located, for those of you who aren't Zoom experts 

a year-and-a-half in, they're in the lower-left 

corner of your Zoom window, you should see your 

microphone and your video camera. You should also 

be able to find them in the upper right-hand side 

of your video box.

While you're not speaking, we ask that 

you please give your cameras off, it helps with 

connectivity issues with our bandwidth. The chat 

feature, which you'll find in the bottom center 

of your Zoom screen is enabled. So please feel 

free to say hi to each other, chat, we haven't seen 

each other in a long time. But chat is not part 
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of the public record and will not be part of the 

transcript. And the Board is not accepting 

questions or comments via the chat. Public 

commenters had to sign up in advance, so those are 

the folks that we'll be calling on.

Please make sure that your name is 

displayed in the participant panel, especially if 

you're a speaker, so we can find you. If you dialed 

in on the phone, Zoom won't recognize you, and it'll 

just display your phone number, so we ask that you 

please renamed yourself. And you can find that 

rename button in the upper right corner of your 

video camera. And also in the participant panel, 

if you hover over your name, you'll see a More 

button. And under More it should say Rename. 

Please don't click the Raise Hand button, which 

is now found under Reactions at the bottom of your 

Zoom screen. All commenters signed up in advance 

and Steve has the list and he's going to call on 

folks to speak.

If you're having any technical problems 

with Zoom, you can go to their website on zoom.us 
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and Help Center. They are very helpful. The 

Support button is in the upper right corner. And 

we are recording the webinars, and although the 

webinars, we're not going to post the video, but 

we'll have a transcript that's available after the 

conclusion of the board meeting, which is next 

week, the last day will be April 30th. So welcome. 

I'm going to turn it over to Jenny now. One 

moment, I've lost my place already. Oh no. 

MS. TUCKER: Hi, everyone.

MS. ARSENAULT: I hand the mic over to 

Jennifer Tucker, the deputy administrator of NOP. 

Hey, Jenny.

MS. TUCKER: Hi. Hello, everyone. 

Thank you so much, Michelle. Hi, everyone. I am 

Jennifer Tucker, deputy administrator of the 

National Organic Program. Welcome, first, to all 

our National Organic Standards Board members. 

This is our third online meeting, and I continue 

to be so impressed by how well you are coming 

together in this really, really unique 

environment. With our new Board appointees from 
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last year and this year, the majority of Board 

members have not actually met in person yet, and 

it's really amazing how well they have done 

together.

I would particularly like to 

acknowledge our five new Board members starting 

their very first meeting with us. And so I'm going 

to list their names, then we're going to do a Zoom 

applause. And so we have Amy Bruch, Logan Petrey, 

Dr. Carolyn Dimitri, Brian Caldwell, and Kyla 

Smith. And so just as a reminder for folks, this 

is how we clap in Zoom. So we're going to give 

a big round of applause to all of our Board members, 

including our new appointees. So welcome, and we 

are happy you are here.

I also want to thank all of our public 

commenters. Thank you for continuing to sustain 

this participatory process in this format for the

third time. And, you know, we've been doing public 

comments online for several years, but devoting 

full days -- full segments to this has been 

something new for us, and I think that is going 
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really well. And so we thank you for signing up 

and sharing your comments. And I want to thank 

our audience. You are critical witnesses to this 

process and we're grateful that you're here.

And so this webinar opens a series of 

virtual webinars that will occur over multiple 

days. It'll be two days this week and three days 

next week. Meeting access information for all 

meeting segments is posted on the National Organic 

Standards Board meeting page on the USDA website. 

And transcripts for all segments will be posted 

once completed. Meeting, like other meetings at 

the National Organic Standards Board will be run 

based on the federal Advisory Committee Act and 

the Board's policies and procedures manual. I 

will act as the Designated Federal Officer for all 

meeting segments.

To close, I would like to thank the 

National Organic Program team for their amazing 

work in getting us here today. In particular, I 

want to highlight really the incredible commitment 

and top-notch work by Michelle Arsenault, Jared 
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Clark, Devon Pattillo, and one of our new folks, 

Andrea Holm. So let's give them a hand. It's 

really a terrific team here and I genuinely 

appreciate their work.

Finally, I want to thank Steve Ela, the 

chair of the Board. I continue to really, really 

value our collaborative partnership from afar. 

Steve, you are a joy to work with and I want to 

thank you personally. I am going to turn the mike 

over to Erin Healy, who is our new official 

Standards Division Director. So we're welcoming 

Erin to her first official meeting as our new 

Standards Division Director, and she is going to 

guide us through a roll call of National Organic 

Standards Board members. So I thank you very much.

MS. HEALY: Hi everyone. I just 

wanted to say hello. I'm new. This is my first 

meeting, NOSB meeting, so I'm really excited about 

this. And it's great to see how the process works, 

and I'm really excited to be part of the National 

Organic Program. So I will start the roll call. 

Steve Ela, and NOSB Chair.
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MR. ELA: Here.

MS. HEALY: Nate Powell-Palm, NOSB, 

Vice-Chair.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Here.

MS. HEALY: Mindee Jeffery NOSB, 

Secretary.

MS. JEFFREY: Present, thank you.

MS. HEALY: Sue Baird.

MS. BAIRD: Here.

MS. HEALY: Asa Bradman. I think we 

knew that Asa would be a little bit late so she 

might be joining us later.

MS. HEALY: Amy, sorry, is this Bruch.

MS. BRUCH: It's actually Amy Bruch 

here.

MS. HEALY: Sorry about that.

MS. BRUCH: No problem.

MS. HEALY: Brian Caldwell.

MR. CALDWELL: Here.

MS. HEALY: Jerry D'Amore.

MR. D'AMORE: Good morning, here.

MS. HEALY: Carolyn Dimitri.
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MS. DIMITRI: Here.

MS. HEALY: And Rick Greenwood?

MR. GREENWOOD: Here.

MS. HEALY: Kim Huseman.

MS. HUSEMAN: Here.

MS. HEALY: Logan Petrey? I haven't 

found Logan yet. So Erin, I think she might not 

have joined us. Okay. Kyla Smith.

MS. SMITH: Here.

MR. TURNER: And Wood Turner.

MR. TURNER: Here. Good morning.

MS. HEALY: All right. Good morning, 

everyone. In addition to Jennifer Tucker, the NOP 

Deputy Administrator, we also have several other 

NOP staff on the call. She actually just mentioned 

several of them. So Jared Clark is our National 

List Manager, Devon Pattillo is Agricultural 

Marketing Specialist. And David Glasgow is the 

NOP Associate Deputy Administrator. So now I will 

hand the mic back to Steve, Chair of the National 

Organic Standards Board.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you Erin and 
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Jenny. As always I just want to acknowledge the 

staff. There's a tremendous amount of background 

work that goes into both these virtual public 

comment webinars and also the virtual meeting. 

You guys have been great and we'll hope that 

continues. I don't want to jinx it, but thank you 

for all the work you guys do in the background and 

keeping this all running smoothly. I do want to 

welcome all the members. There are three of us 

that are in our final term, one that has got two 

years. Rick, good luck on that. And then we have 

five new members that cut their teeth last year, 

and five new members that are brand new this year. 

So we're old hands except for the five new members. 

I know you all will do quite well and you'll adapt 

very quickly to this process, so welcome.

I do you want to remind everybody that 

there is a policy in the policy and procedures 

manual about public comments. All speakers who 

will be recognized signed up during the 

registration period. We don't accept any late 

registrations. Proxy speakers are not allowed. 
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If you signed up, you were the one that has to 

give the comments. And very importantly, 

individuals providing public comment shall refrain 

from making any personal attacks or remarks that 

might impugn the character of any individual. And 

I would extend that to any company. We'd like to 

keep this professional and we value your comments, 

but please do not bring up personal names or cause 

anybody to feel uncomfortable. If that happens, 

I will interrupt and ask me to reframe your 

question. If you do it again, we will move onto 

the next speaker, so please keep this very 

professional.

Speakers will be called upon in the 

order of the schedule. If a speaker is not present 

or has technical problems, we will skip over them, 

if it's an issue we will fit them in as soon as 

they get online, otherwise, if somebody's not 

present, we will return to them at the end of the 

call and give them a chance to speak. And if 

they're not there then you will lose your slot. 

We will use a timer that will sound when your time 
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is up. Everybody is familiar with that. Michelle 

has it projected there and we're going to have that 

screen pinned so you'll know how much time you have. 

When you hear the timer, please finish your 

sentence and end your comment.

We have a really full public comment 

webinar this time, so it's very important that we 

stick the time. I do not want to run over is we 

often do, but please respect everybody's chance 

to give their comments. Here's a preview of what 

it sounds like. Michelle, do you want to give 

that?

if you can't hear that, I don't know 

what to say. So you'll be able to see that timer 

in Michelle's window. And she said they have at 

pins for everybody. So as the process, I will 

announce the speaker coming up and I will also let 

the next two people know that they are on deck. 

We're going to try a new thing this time. We're 

going to ask that each commenter to turn on their 

videos just so we can pin a face to a name. If 

that doesn't work for you, just go ahead and don't 
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worry about the video. But we've love to see your 

face, if that's possible. Otherwise, keep your 

videos off and please stay on mute.

Next thing is if you will state your 

name and affiliation when we start the timer. And 

also, if you would, if you're a consultant, you 

would -- we'd appreciate it if you say who you're 

affiliated with or who you're consulting for. 

That's just kind of know who's speaking for what 

entity. Once you are done with your three minutes, 

the Board members will indicate to me if they have 

any questions, they'll do the raised hand in the 

chat and I will call on them in order of how they 

raised their hand. And we'll get through as many 

questions and we can. However, if we start to run 

long I will cut off our discussion so we can move 

on to other speakers and give you all a chance.

Only NOSB members are allowed to ask 

questions. With that, we're going to get into the 

fun of it and gist of why we're here today. Our 

first speaker is, and I do want to say, I will try 

and butcher all names uniformly. If I 
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mispronounce your name, please, I apologize for 

that. But I'll do my very best and I'll make sure 

I mispronounce a few Smiths and Jones just to be 

fair. So our first speaker is going to be Noah 

Lakritz. After Noah, we're going to have Phil 

LaRocca and then David Gould. So Noah, you are 

the first speaker, you have three minutes. Please 

start, and state your name and affiliation.

MR. LAKRITZ: Thanks, Steve. And 

thanks NOSB members. Can you all hear me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MR. LAKRITZ: Okay. Great. So yeah, 

good morning. My name is Noah Lakritz and I'm a 

Policy and Outreach Specialist with California 

Certified Organic Farmers, CCOF. We represent 

over 4,000 certified organic farms, processors, 

handlers, and certified organic businesses 

throughout North America. Today, I'd like to 

focus my comments on three substances that are up 

for sunset review. Copper sulfate for use in 

organic rice systems, peracetic acid, and tartaric 

acid.
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CCOF encourages NOSB to carefully 

review organic rice growers' comments when 

reviewing copper sulfate, especially those from 

California. As mentioned in our written comments, 

rice production in California relies almost 

exclusively on flood or irrigation and water 

suiting for various reasons. We heard from one 

producer that they are experimenting with 

sprinkler irrigation instead of flood irrigation 

on a single field. Yet this producer still relies 

almost exclusively on flood irrigation and lists 

copper sulfate in their organic system plan for 

occasional use to control tadpole shrimp, which 

they told us can quickly decimate a field. CCOF 

supports continued efforts to find alternatives 

to this substance and understands the concern about 

its toxicity. However, we have not seen over-use 

or contamination from this substance and 

acknowledge that viable alternatives do not 

currently exist, especially in California systems.

Moving on to peracetic acid, CCOF has 

seen the use of peracetic acid amongst CCOF members 
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nearly double since the NOSB last reviewed the 

material. And we've found that this increase is 

associated with used to comply with food safety 

requirements particularly related to irrigation. 

CCOF supports the relisting of peracetic acid 

under the currently reviewed sections.

Lastly, 55 CCOF members list tartaric 

acid on their organic system plan, particularly 

to produce wine -- in the wine production process. 

The meeting materials asked whether there were 

organic or natural alternatives to tartaric acid 

and mentioned malic acid and citric acid in the 

discussion. We want to emphasize that malic acid 

and citric acid are not replacements for tartaric 

acid. Malic acid can add a sharp taste to wine 

and is often fermented into lactic acid during the 

wine-making process to reduce the acidic taste of 

wine, and citric acid lends a distinctive citrus 

flavor that makes it unsuitable at high levels, 

and many wines. So CCOF is in favor of relisting 

tartaric acid. I want to thank NOSB members for 

doing the difficult work of continually improving 
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the organic system. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Noah. We 

appreciate your comments. Are there comments or 

questions, excuse me, from the Board members?

MR. D'AMORE: Question from Jerry 

D'Amore. I can't raise my hand so I'll do it this 

way if it's okay. The support you issued, Noah, 

referenced the tadpole shrimp control, and in terms 

of a rice algicide, would you make the same comment?

MR. LAKRITZ: Yeah. And to be clear, 

like, we are not taking a position in support of

relisting. We're just trying to provide as much 

context based on our experience with our members. 

And we have heard from our members that it is still 

essential for algicide control, especially in 

those flooded systems. And so I'm happy to follow 

up with more information, and my understanding is 

that there are several CCOF members, rice producers 

in California that submitted public comments that 

you'll be able to review as well.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: And just for Board members, 
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if you go to the Reactions button at the bottom 

of your screen, bottom right-side, under that 

should be your Raise Hand feature. Otherwise it 

should be in the participant's section, so just 

as an FYI. But as always feel free to make note 

if I do not see your hand raised. Any other 

questions for Noah? All right. Thank you, Noah. 

We do appreciate your comments. We are going to 

move on to Phil LaRocca, and on deck we'll have 

David Gould, and then Eugenio Giraldo. Okay. 

Phil, please go ahead. State your name and 

affiliation.

MR. LAROCCA: Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MR. LAROCCA: Okay. I'm trying to get 

the video to start, but anyway, my name is Phil 

LaRocca and I am the owner and the winemaker of 

LaRocca Vineyards. And I'm proud to say that this 

is my 45th year as a certified organic farmer. 

I also am chairman of the Board for CCOF and I've 

always prided myself in being able to grow just 

about anything, however the computer actually has 
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me baffled and I stress out tremendously, so I 

certainly appreciate this opportunity to do this, 

but I personally look forward to in-person meeting 

when the actually organic community can share our 

knowledge and learn more from other organic 

members.

On my comments, I would like to 

encourage this Board and the NOP to solve some of 

the problems we've had in the past. This Board 

has passed a lot of things that are just floating 

out there and I'm referring to access to pasture 

and origin --

MR. ELA: I think I've --

MR. LAROCCA: -- of livestock. I 

would like to see that. Somehow we can move on, 

and settle these things. I think it's pretty 

obvious what the organic community wants. I also 

want to mention peracetic acid. We use peracetic 

acid in the winery as a sanitizer. Before that 

we used to use iodine and then we had the rinse 

the iodine off which kind of defeats the purpose 

of using a sanitizer. I did a lot of research into 
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this myself as being an organic winery, using 

something as a precursor to vinegar did not really 

sound like it was going to be a positive thing. 

But while the research I've done, it actually fits 

quite well into a organic wine-making program, 

which cleanliness is extremely important aspect.

Tartaric acid. We do use tartaric acid 

quite a bit. Not always. We use it to adjust our 

pH, to lower the pH, gives us a protection, and 

not having to use the preservative sulfur dioxide, 

which we do not use in any instance. I've had 

several organic groups call me about the use of 

organic tartaric acid, and we would absolutely use 

organic tartaric acid if there was one out there. 

This would be an area of research where to get 

a company that would be willing to take the chance 

to put in time to make an organic tartaric acid. 

And certainly, as a winery, we would be willing 

to put wine out there to make the tartaric acid. 

Prior to the fires in 2018, we were the largest 

producer of organic wine as an ingredient. I want 

to thank you for this time and again, I look forward 
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to in-person meetings in the future. Thank you.

MS. HEALY: Steve, you on here?

MR. ELA: I couldn't see -- yes. I 

couldn't seem to find my Mute button, it was not 

showing up. A little bit of panic there. Are 

questions for Phil? All right. Phil, I'm not 

seeing any. Thank you for testifying over the many 

years, we do appreciate it, and I'm impressed by 

your 45 years of certification. That's awesome.

MS. LAROCCA: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to 

David Gould, and then to Eugenio Giraldo. And then 

Hamsa Shada -- I'm sorry, Hamsa. Shadaksharappa. 

I just butchered that, I apologize. So let's go 

ahead and start with David. Go ahead, David.

MR. GOULD: Hi, can you hear me?

MR. ELA: We can hear you. And state 

your --

MR. GOULD: Very good.

MR. ELA: -- name and affiliation.

MR. GOULD: Yes. Thanks. And I'm 

sorry. I apologize that my camera does not work, 
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so I'm just going to have to go just a voice only 

here. So thanks for this opportunity. I'm here 

to address the NOSB's questions on excluded methods 

determinations. My name is David Gould. I'm 

currently the Global Head of Sustainability for 

FoodChain ID. We're the parent company of the 

accredited and certifying agent Bioagricert. We 

certify over a thousand operations of the NOP and 

about 14,000 organic operations worldwide.

FoodChain ID is the global leader in 

detection of GMOs and assurance of non-GMO supply 

chains. And I've working in the organic movement 

on this issue for over 25 years and never 

encountered a topic more complicated. So my three 

minutes, I'll respectfully offer some quick 

recommendations to address the Board's very 

thoughtful questions. In my previous position at 

IFOAM -- Organics International, I was the lead 

and producing their position paper on the 

Compatibility of Breeding Techniques in Organic 

Systems, you know, I'll put a link in the Chat. 

I know it's not part of the public record, but 
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that has a wealth of information. I think they 

can greatly inform the Board's deliberations.

Next, I would recommend to not 

retroactively exclude variety's already being used 

by organic producers. The process of discovery 

can take a lot of time and it's often inconclusive. 

Given the non-threat that these varieties have 

proven themselves to be, it would the far better 

to make efforts to control the potentially huge 

and disruptive risks posed by new varieties, 

especially through newer technologies. But 

whether it's an older or newer method, if it's 

deemed excluded, then new variety's produced so 

it should be prohibited in organic.

I would respectfully challenge, also 

a basic assumption in the Boards questions, namely 

that it has to be a given that there's a lack of 

transparency about the development and release and 

new genomes, because this should not be a given. 

Companies who develop and distribute new genomes 

should be required to divulge the specific genomic 

changes they've made, the methods used, and the 
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channels through which their products have been 

released, and they should make available the 

referencing materials to enable further 

development of detection protocols. Pollution of 

the genetics used by organic producers by these 

new excluded method is a growing and existential 

threat to the organic sector.

AMS and USDA should be instituting the 

diligence and interagency coordination needed to 

protect the integrity of organic systems. And that 

oversight and protection should extend to crops 

authorized for importation from other countries. 

As to whether or not excluded methods may be quote, 

hiding in organic systems, I would again say to 

focus on the new releases. They're only hiding 

if we tolerate their being hidden. We do already 

largely have the inspection and testing 

capabilities, and enforcement protocols and tools 

to keep prohibited materials out of the organic 

marketplace as long as those purveying these 

products of excluded methods are held to some basic 

requirements of transparency and reporting. 
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Testing and detection protocols are also 

continuing to improve.

To repeat, this is a growing and 

existential threat to organic. We must control 

it. We can control if the rules of the game are 

fair. If we're unable to know source, method, and 

distribution.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you very 

much, David. Are there questions of David? 

Carolyn, you have a question.

MS. DIMITRI: David, could you please 

re-state the name of that IFOAM paper you 

mentioned?

MR. GOULD: Yes. It's called the 

Compatibility of Breeding Techniques in Organic 

Systems. And I didn't realize the chat wouldn't 

necessarily be part of the public record, but I 

put the link in there and I can forward it to 

Michelle as well if she want.

MS. DIMITRI: Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. Carolyn, right 

now I can't seem to lower your hand, so if you would 
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do that for me that would be greatly appreciated. 

Are there any other questions? All right. 

David, thank you very much. We're going to move 

on to Eugenio Giraldo. Up on deck is Hamsa 

Shadaksharappa. And then Jason Ellsworth will be 

after Hamsa. So Eugenio, please continue, and 

state your name and affiliation.

MR. GIRALDO: Thank you. Do you hear 

me?

MR. ELA: We can hear you.

MR. GIRALDO: Okay. So my name is 

Eugenio Giraldo. I'm an environmental engineer 

that dedicated my life to environmental 

protection. I thank you the opportunity to share 

my analysis of the information provided in the 

technical evaluation report for ammonia extracts. 

Next, please. I provided written response to six 

main comments to the TER, and I'll focus today in 

four of them. Next, please. The TER focuses on 

pure synthetic ammonia substances, anhydrous 

ammonia, aqua ammonia, and ammonia sulfate, for 

example. However, if you look at the definition 
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of ammonia extracts it includes a large variety 

of already MRO approved products, fish emulsions, 

beef extracts, soy hydrolysates. All of these are 

liquid fertilizers. They are derived from plant 

and animal matter with low carbon to nitrogen 

ratio. With enhanced mineralization through 

either thermal hydrolysis or enzyme hydrolysis in 

order to provide plant-available nitrogen within 

season and their use is varied. Next one, please.

The TER focuses on uses of synthetic 

ammonia in conventional agriculture, but not 

within the OFPA framework where you have an organic 

plan that is required from our producer. The 

organic plan requires soil fertility management, 

with crop rotation, covered crops and application 

of plant and animal materials. The majority of 

carbon provided to the soil comes from this 

practice does not by low carbon to nitrogen 

fertilizers that are used as sparingly. The 

organic plan also requires a fertility plan to 

avoid contamination by nitrates, heavy metals, 

pathogens, or residues of prohibited substances. 
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Next, please.

The TER fails to address the benefits 

of low carbon to nitrogen liquid fertilizers. We 

recall ammonia as a last resource. With this

fertilizers, we'd use the input of materials like 

fish hydrolysates. Avoid the release of ammonia 

to the environment, reducing health and 

environmental impacts. Having a high nitrogen and 

very little phosphorus enables the precise 

application of both nitrogen and phosphorus, 

minimizing contamination to soil and water. And 

finally, it avoids contamination of pathogens.

Next one, please. The TER fails to 

address the potential beneficial effects of low 

carbon to nitrogen fertilizers to soil organic 

carbon and soil microbiome. When nitrogen matches 

the crop needs as is seen in this graph, which is 

also present in my written comments, both soil 

organic carbon and soil microbiome are enhanced. 

When nitrogen supply beyond crop needs, both soil 

organic carbon, soil microbiome are impacted and 

environmental impacts are magnified. 
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Overapplication is the real problem.

Next one, please. Within the 

framework of OFPA, low carbon to nitrogen 

fertilizers are to be used as sparingly providing 

season nitrogen needs as not a toxic but an 

enhancer. OFPA already provides a regulatory 

framework to use low carbon connect-chain 

fertilizers for environmental protection, soil 

fertility enhancement and farmer benefit. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Well, then Eugenio, I always 

keep track of speakers within a second or two of 

their time, so you're on that list. Are there 

questions for Eugenio? I have one question, 

Eugenio. As you noted the dose makes the poison. 

How if you were to not prohibit these ammonia 

extracts, how would we prevent the over-use of 

them? You note that sometimes they're useful, but 

would you be in favor of annotating those materials 

for a certain percentage of total nitrogen needs 

or how would we prevent that from becoming a poison?

MR. GIRALDO: I am in favor of 
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annotating them. As a percentage of the total 

nitrogen there is also a precedent with Chilean 

nitrate that is being used in the past, and I think 

that will be the way of addressing this, yes.

MR. ELA: Okay. Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve, and 

thanks Dr. Giraldo for your dedication to 

environmental science and for your public and 

written comments especially on this topic. I just 

had a question from your point of view. When you 

look at the soil in a non-synthetic ammonia product 

is applied versus a synthetic ammonia product 

applied, can you see any difference to the soil 

microbiology, or is there any way that tests that 

a synthetic was applied versus a non-synthetic?

MR. GIRALDO: Yes. There is a way of 

testing and there is a written comment by CDFA on 

their efforts to use some of these testings. We 

also within organics have been promoting a test 

using infrared spectrometry. All these liquid 

fertilizers are derived from waste materials, 

either in plant or animal. And in the process of 
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making them, you always have a remaining footprint 

of carbon molecules that are totally different from 

just a plain synthetic one which you will have none. 

And there is a widely used method into food 

industry to verify authenticity of food 

components. Can we borrow from there and apply 

it in this case, where you would have a fingerprint 

of the carbon background that is left over from 

the original material, the ammonia was derived or 

nitrate was derived from, and that would enable 

you to distinguish when you painted with synthetic 

ammonia or nitrogen compounds.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you. Is 

there a duration that this would be visible or if 

it's as you mentioned, a footprint, is that 

something that would be visible for six-plus 

months?

MR. GIRALDO: I can't answer that 

question right now. We don't have that 

information at disposal. What we do know is the 

material that it leftover, it is very recalcitrant. 

It would qualify as humic or fulvic mostly. 
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However, we do not have right now or fulvic test 

that one can use to verify this assumption, and 

that's why. But there is enough evidence on that 

matrix that is remained behind that is 

significantly recalcitrant. Whether it's six 

months or one I cannot answer at this point.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you, I 

appreciate that.

MR. GIRALDO: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Are there any other 

questions? Perfect. Thank you so much.

MR. GIRALDO: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move onto 

Hamsa and then Jason Ellsworth and then Alison 

Watkins. Hamsa, you're up and please state your 

name and affiliation, and educate me of how to 

pronounce your last name. Again, I apologize for 

stumbling over it.

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: Okay. Thank 

you, Steve. It's Hamsa Shadaksharappa, and I'm 

co-owner of a company called RenewTrient, and we 

are in the business of recovering nutrients from 
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poultry manure and making organic fertilizers. 

We make dry fertilizers and liquid fertilizers. 

So I appreciate the opportunity to comment.

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: Next slide, 

please. I have six points regarding the ammonia 

extract petition as they specifically relate to 

manure derived products. First, responsible 

organic farmers and sustainable agricultural 

proponents have practical experience with animal 

derived products and understand the effects of 

these products on soil health over many years. 

Secondly, dozens of such letters of support have 

been submitted to the Board from across the country 

in support of naturally source biologically 

produced liquid manure products. We hope the 

Board has a chance to review all of these letters 

and consider them in your rulemaking. There is 

a lot of interest in these products.

Third, there are excellent liquid 

manure products listed by OMRI that have been 

developed strictly in compliance with NOSB stated 

principles. Recovering nutrients from natural 
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manures fits exactly with biological cycling, 

ecological harmony, and reusing farm inputs. 

These are NOSB's own principles and we've worked 

hardest to make products within these guidelines.

Next slide, please. Fourth, the 

technical report is a step, albeit a preliminary 

step, it misses some key items, some of which 

described by the previous speaker. From my 

perspective, the TER does state that manures are 

a good alternative, in fact, but the technical 

report notes the lack of transportability. The 

TER doesn't mention or fails to mention that there 

are liquid manure products like ours that are OMRI 

listed and they're may be transportable. These 

type of products allow farmers in soil nutrient 

deficient areas to have access to manure derived 

liquid nutrients.

And fifth, we do understand application 

rate limits can be prudent as part of an overall 

organic framework. I think the key is to have 

application limits and set them prudently, we 

support that. And finally, outright banning 
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excellent and legitimate products is completely 

unfair and anticompetitive. The petition to ban 

all competing products is a bit self-serving. 

Rather, reputable, committed suppliers like us and 

the petitioners who work together with NOSB for 

technology solutions to address potential fraud.

Last slide, please. In closing, one 

way to stay within the NOSB guiding principles 

encourage carbon and soil health and still meet 

the needs of organic growers is to clarify the 

definition of what products can be allowed. We 

believe products that meet the following 

requirements should remain part of the National 

Organic Program. Products that recover ammonia 

from animal manures that would otherwise be lost 

to the environment via natural processes. Such 

products should retain some level of carbon and 

organic material, and any liquid product that has 

a nitrogen effect greater than 12 percent and a 

C/N ratio of less than seven could have application 

rate restrictions. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Okay. Thank you very much, 
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Hamsa. Are there questions from the Board? I'm

sorry, I have a question. As the previous speaker 

as well, so it sounds like you will be in favor 

of an annotation limiting the amount of ammonia 

extracts that could be used in terms of total 

nitrogen use on a farm?

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: Yes. I think 

there's a lot of scientific debate, you know, 

somewhere between if products, you know, have a 

nitrogen concentration of higher than ten, you 

know, between ten and 15 percent, it probably is 

prudent to have some application rate restrictions 

on those products.

MR. ELA: Would you be willing to throw 

out a number? In terms of what --

(Simultaneous speaking.)

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: -- I might. Yes, 

I think, you know, again, I'm not a soil scientist, 

but I have, you know, read quite a bit about this. 

I think a level of, you know, if it's greater than 

12 percent nitrogen content, I would be in favor 

of considering application rate restrictions on 
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such products.

MR. ELA: But do you have a specific, 

like, percentage of total nitrogen you'd restrict 

it to?

MR. TURNER: I don't have a comment on 

that.

MR. ELA: Thank you. I appreciate 

your honesty in that. So anybody else --

MR. CALDWELL: This is Brian.

MR. ELA: -- have questions?

MR. CALDWELL: This is Brian --

MR. ELA: Go ahead then.

MR. CALDWELL: -- Caldwell. I did 

have my hand raised there.

MR. ELA: Go ahead. Yes.

MR. CALDWELL: Hamsa, thank you for 

those comments. What are the typical or maybe the 

maximum percent nitrogen ranges of the products 

that you offer?

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: Currently we have 

an 8 percent product that is approved by OMRI. 

That same product has a 7 percent limit by CDFA. 
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There is significant interest in products between 

12 and 15 percent, and we have the capability to 

make that. So I think when you get into that 12 

to 15 percent range, it makes sense to have 

application rate restrictions on those products. 

But we can definitely make a product between 12 

and 15 and that's very desired in the market.

MR. CALDWELL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? All 

right. Thank you very much. We appreciate your 

comments.

MR. SHADAKSHARAPPA: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to 

Jason Ellsworth, and then on deck we got Alison 

Watkins and Lynn Coody. Jason, please state your 

name and affiliation and you're welcome to start 

your comments.

MR. ELLSWORTH: Good afternoon to some 

of you. Good morning to the rest of you. I'm Dr. 

Jason Ellsworth with the Wilbur-Ellis Company. 

I believe that one of the guiding principle of 

organic agriculture is the consideration of all 
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of our actions with respect to the whole system, 

our farms, our communities, and our world. In a 

word, sustainability. We can't look at a single 

product under a microscope and not consider its 

origination and value to the whole system.

Nutrients, and in particular ammonia 

from animal livestock operations are lost to the 

environment through handling, transportation and 

application, thereby contributing to the 

environmental challenges that are 

well-documented. Processes and systems to 

capture nutrients from waste for use as a 

fertilizer enables growers to sustainably manage 

the soil health and vitality of their crops and 

limit nutrient loss to the environment.

For organic agriculture to continue to 

be dependent on animals, and it should, then it 

must be as efficient as possible. Can animal based 

nutrients continued to be transported the great 

distances required. Consider that today manure 

is being shipped hundreds of miles across the 

country at great costs. And not just monetarily 
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to satisfy plant needs for nitrogen, phosphorus, 

and other elements on an organic operation. 

Extracting nutrients such as ammonia from wastes 

ensures the valuable nutrients can get to a crop 

where does needed more efficiently than matures 

and waste themselves.

Please note, these manure derived 

products do not replace but complement nutrients 

and organic materials from manures, wastes, 

composts, green manure, and rotational and cover 

crops needed to build a healthy and productive 

soil. As I said in my written comments, these 

ammonia type products enabled the use of many other 

high carbon organic materials in an organic 

operation. To be sure, ammonia is required by many 

soil microorganisms to complete their life-cycle. 

Building a sustainable and healthy soil is key 

to successful long-term production.

Now, while considering the petition for 

ammonia extracts I suggest that the definition, 

and it appears from the previous speakers as well, 

that the definition for ammonia extracts is too 
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broad and includes many fertilizers and products 

commonly used today. Before any action can be 

taken I believe that he Board needs to ensure that 

the definition is correct and revised as necessary 

and open for public comment. We simply can't place 

any source of ammonia just on a prohibitive list 

just for the sake.

Finally, I want to address the concerns 

of fraud. Fraud is valid and unfortunately much 

to prevalent in organic. One of our business 

partners started his own company because of fraud 

he witnessed as a young employee. However single 

products cannot be prohibited simply for the 

potential of being fraudulent. I believe the 

organic certification system of today works as 

designed. The combination of honest growers, 

astute product manufacturers, diligent listing 

agencies, and qualified certifiers ensure the 

integrity of the products used and applied based 

on the principles of NOP. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you, Jason. 

Are there questions from the Board? I have a 
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question since the other Board members don't seem 

to. Noted that other products contain ammonia, 

you know, we all know that. But the ammonia 

extracts seem to be pure ammonia. Would you favor 

just lifting something like a percentage of ammonia 

in a product to help discern the differences 

between these various products?

MR. ELLSWORTH: Well, the percentage 

ammonia depends on the source and where it is. 

I'm not so much in favor of the percent ammonia 

within the product as I would be just limiting the 

use of these in an application system, and that 

would vary by crop input of course, so. Some crops 

require more nitrogen than others. This would be 

a percentage of that. And I believe that the 

certifiers are well able to elucidate what that 

is based on that growers organic system plan and 

what they're doing to improve their soil health.

MR. ELA: So would you be willing to 

throw out a percentage of how much ammonia extract 

could be used in a cropping system and the rest 

would have to be some of these other low ammonia 
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products?

MR. ELLSWORTH: I'm hesitant just 

because we don't have enough dated to show that, 

but, you know, it depends on crops, and if a grower, 

you know, if you look at my written comments where 

a grower uses it as part of their pre-plant, you 

know, before the soil is warm enough for 

mineralization and nitrification, and then has an 

issue later in the season for corn, for example, 

where they would need a rescue, I believe that the 

balance needs to be a combination of the grower 

with their certifier. I believe that the 

certifiers are the final say and have the knowledge 

to ensure that the tenets of soil health and 

sustainability are met and not overdone with these 

types of ammonia extra products.

MR. ELA: Just one quick last question. 

We've heard that it's difficult for certifiers 

sometimes to a issue at notice of non-compliance 

in terms of soil health and such listed and often 

because the standards are somewhat nebulous and 

a grower could say, well, I am building soil health 
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and the certifier might have a hard time contesting 

that. So let's say a grower using 50 percent of 

these ammonia extracts but still putting some 

manure on, you know, to me personally, that would 

not be a proper use of the extracts, but the 

certifiers might have a very hard time justifying 

that in a non-compliance. How would you suggest 

that, you know, certifiers could respond to that 

kind of argument?

MR. ELLSWORTH: That is a good question 

and it's especially difficult. I'm from the west 

Washington State and with the arid low organic 

matter soils. Yeah, that's a very difficult 

question. That's a tough. I agree, 50 percent 

would be too much. You know, in the range of 20

to 30 percent, and that still gives enough carbon 

that would be added through these other materials. 

The advantage of products like this is now I can 

use sawdust and wood chips and things like that 

that we haven't been able to use because of the 

carbon to nitrogen ratio. So there's some value 

in other avenues of other waste materials that can 
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be used.

MR. ELA: Okay. Any other questions 

from the Board? Thank you very much, Jason.

MR. ELLSWORTH: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Appreciate your comments.

MR. ELLSWORTH: Yeah.

MR. ELA: We were going to move on to 

Alison Watkins, and on deck we have Lynn Coody and 

Adam Seitz. Let's start with Alison. Please 

state your name and affiliation.

MS. WATKINS: Thank you. My name is 

Alison Watkins and I'm a Scientific and Regulatory 

Affairs Manager for the International Food 

Additives Council. IFAC is a global association 

representing manufacturers and end users of food 

Ingredients, including a number of substances 

permitted in organic food production. IFAC 

strongly supports relisting of agar-agar, animal 

enzymes, carrageenan, cellulose, and silicon 

dioxide on the National List.

All these ingredients are safe, are 

used in accordance with organic principles and are 
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essential in organic food production. The 

Handling Subcommittee materials raised questions 

regarding carrageenan's role in the production of 

organic products. As noted in our written 

comments carrageenan offers organic formulators 

a unique and versatile ingredient. These 

functional properties cannot be replaced with an 

individual hydrochloric or other thickening agent. 

Additionally replacing carrageenan in many cases 

would involve using multiple additives to achieve 

the same function.

As an example, on its own carrageenan 

can suspend particles with low solubility like 

cocoa, pea protein, almond, and rice protein in 

vegan and vegetarian beverage systems creating a 

stable homogeneous beverage. There are no single 

alternative ingredients that can achieve the same 

product. Carrageenan contributes to the 

innovation of plant based meat alternatives, 

coffee and neutral protein beverages.

For example, plant based deli meats 

rely on gellan structure, a function of carrageenan 
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for firm sliceable texture that maintains 

synergesis control. Carrageenan is also critical 

in the production of organic vegan and vegetarian 

products, like plant based dairy and meat 

alternatives, as well as the production of kosher 

dairy products. Delisting carrageenan will limit 

the opportunities to produce organic, vegan, 

vegetarian, and/or kosher food products. And 

would result in formulators needing to use more 

ingredients to achieve the same technological 

function as carrageenan.

Regarding the cellulose, reiterate 

that while the production of non-synthetic 

cellulose is technically possible, no commercial 

sources of non-synthetic cellulose are currently 

known. IFAC is also not aware of any organic 

cellulose currently available. Therefore, 

cellulose remains essential to organic production 

and we support relisting. IFAC also supports the 

relisting of agar-agar. Although other 

hydrochlorides have similar functionality 

agar-agar is less temperature sensitive than 
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alternatives, making it particularly useful for 

gels that need to remain firm at room temperature 

or temperatures below 50 degrees Celsius.

These important and unique features 

compared in many other hydrochlorides contributes 

to its increasing popularity in innovative new food 

products. Furthermore, agar-agar provides 

organic community with gel source suitable for 

foods for vegan, vegetarian, and other cultural 

and religious dietary restrictions. Finally, 

silicon dioxide is essential and an irreplaceable 

ingredient and functions as a defoamer in a variety 

of applications. They're essential in the 

production and processing of foods, including 

organic products.

IFAC is unaware of any suitable organic 

alternatives to silicone dioxide that can replace 

this importance substance in all food and beverage 

applications, therefore we support relisting. 

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on these 

important organic handling materials.

MR. ELA: Very well done, Alison, five 
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seconds to go. Good timing. Are there questions 

of Alison from the Board? I'm not seeing any. 

Thank you very much Alison for your testimony. 

We do appreciate it.

MS. WATKINS: Great. Thank you so 

much.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

Lynn Coody, followed by Adam Seitz, and then 

Jennifer Berkebile. So Lynn, please go ahead and 

state your name and affiliation.

MS. COODY: Hi, my name is Lynn Coody 

and I'm presenting comments for the Organic Produce 

Wholesalers Coalition, seven businesses that 

distribute fresh organic produce across the United 

States and internationally. In our comments to 

the NOSB, we express our own ideas and also provided 

conduit for the voices of the many certified 

growers who supplier businesses.

Supporting the work of the NOSB. OPWC 

agrees with the idea of the NOSB receiving 

technical assistance. Our members are grateful 

for the time and effort that each and every NOSB 
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member has contributed over the years. We think 

that assistance with tasks like research and 

technical writings would not only reduce the burden 

on the NOSB members, but also save time and effort 

for all organic stakeholders by eliminating the 

need for documents to cycle back to subcommittee 

simply to polish language or to make technical 

corrections. We note that our comments on the next 

two topics are examples of issues in which 

technical assistance may have helped proposals 

move through the NOSB process more smoothly.

Paper-based crop planting aids. We 

had supported adding this to the National List each 

time this topic has come before the Board, as there 

are many produce growers who need these products. 

Although we concur with the direction of the 

proposal from the Crops Subcommittee, our written 

comments detailed three specific concerns about 

the Subcommittees proposed regulatory language and 

provide suggestions for its revision. Because we 

do strongly support adding these products to the 

National List to clarify their use, we urge that 
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technical corrections be made expediency and that 

the NOSB complete a recommendation supporting 

paper-based crop planting aids at this meeting.

Biodegradable, biobased mulch film. 

OPWC supports the elements of the Subcommittees 

proposal that allow 80 percent biobased products 

while fostering incremental improvement by 

signaling that there is market interest for films 

continue increasingly higher percentages of 

biobased content. However, as we interpret the 

final sentence of the subcommittees proposed 

annotation, it creates a loophole in the continued 

improvement clause during the time in which films 

of 81 to 99 percent biobased content are 

commercially available. Again, OPWC's written 

comments suggests a friendly amendment of the final 

sentence of the annotation as a way forward.

Ammonia extract. We support the 

petition for adding ammonia extract to the National 

List as a proposed non-synthetic material. We 

assert that organic stakeholders have consistently 

maintained that the use of highly soluble ammonia 
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based fertilizer is not in line with organic 

principles. Our review of the TER found many 

scientific points supporting this position. We 

believe it is critically important for growers, 

certifiers, input manufacturers and materials 

review organizations to have a clear ruling on this 

material. Thank you for the opportunity to 

comment.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Lynn. 

We appreciate your comments every year. And I 

want to apologize to Amy. I think you had raised 

your hand and I didn't see it. So since the Raised 

Hand function shows up on your scream and not my 

participant list for the Board members, please jump 

in if I miss you, I apologize for that. Are there 

questions for Lynn? I don't hear anything. Thank 

you, Lynn. We --

MS. COODY: Thank you.

MR. ELA: -- appreciate your comments 

as always.

MS. COODY: Bye-bye. Thanks.

MR. ELA: Next, we're going to move 
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Adam Seitz, followed by Jennifer Berkebile and 

Patty Lovera. Adam, please go ahead. 

MR. SEITZ: Good afternoon, my name is 

Adam Seitz, and I serve as a Senior Reviewer and 

Policy Specialist for the organic certifier 

Quality Assurance International or QAI. QAI is 

supportive of the Board seeking and obtaining 

additional paid resources to help conduct its work 

and agrees with several other commenters that such 

resources are used. Individual NOSB members must 

maintain their independence regarding 

decision-making duties and interpretation of 

public comments. Please see our written comments 

detailing the use of sunset materials by QAI 

certified operations along with other sunset 

specifics. Additionally, for agar-agar please 

include a discussion of whether this material is 

appropriately classified based on NOP 

classification of materials guidance during its 

sunset review.

MR. SEITZ: Same for carrageenan. It 

appears both may currently be misclassified. Ion 
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exchange filtration. We agreed with the NOSB's 

previous proposal on this topic, which was 

supported during the last NOSB meeting by a nine 

to six vote. We support the current proposals 

requirement that recharge materials must be on the 

National List. Though the current proposal does 

not provide a determination on whether resins 

require National List inclusion, QAI recognizes 

the challenges the NOSB faces in navigating the 

intra and interagency regulatory dissonance 

regarding food contact substances and secondary 

direct food additives.

What types of substances require 

National List inclusion and which do not? What 

does a processing aid versus a food contact 

substance, or even food processing equipment and 

so on and so on. Despite some sentiments that the 

question at hand is not a valid question at all 

and as such so easily resolved, it's not, it's 

merited. The question and debate about what 

substances are permitted for use by organic 

handlers and which require inclusion on the 
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National List or outside the scope of OFPA and USDA 

organic regulations, it's an old one.

Consider sanitizers are neither 

ingredients nor processing aids. Should we 

consider their National List inclusion redundant 

and permit any no-rinse equipment sanitizer? The 

answer is no, but just an example of a discrepancy 

in the reg. Any subsequent policy from the NOP 

or recommendations from the NOSB on this topic 

should address the broader question of if or what 

specific type of food contact substances require 

inclusion on the National List in order to be used 

by organic handlers.

QAI would also like to rebuke any 

assertion that food or ingredients filtered via 

ion exchange filtration as synthetic. We also 

reiterate that organic products containing water, 

non-organic agricultural ingredients and 

non-organic, non-synthetic ingredients all purify 

via ion exchange filtration are all currently 

permitted under the NOP.

Finally, to prepare my comments 
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yesterday, I revisited the FDA's food ingredient 

and packaging terms website. I noticed for the 

first time a prominently featured, feed your mind, 

better understand genetically engineered foods 

graphic. It linked to a FDA resource intended to 

quote, help consumers better understand 

genetically engineered foods complete with a cute 

little GMO potato YouTube character trying to tell 

me why genetic engineering is great. 

Moral of the story, congress authorized 

7.5 million on this joint FDA/USDA advertising 

effort, which includes development of middle 

school classroom curriculum to help educate 

consumers on what they qualify as the safety and 

overall benefits of GMOs. Think how far a $7.5 

million appropriation by congress would go to 

perhaps establish an organic inspector training 

or provide outreach to university or even middle 

school campuses on the possibility of a career in 

the organic industry, or even to provide funding 

for the hiring of NOSB support staff. Thank you, 

NOSB and NOP for your efforts and the opportunity 
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to comment.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Adam. 

Are there questions from the Board? Adam, I just 

have one question. Just to be clear, at the last 

Board meeting the Board on nine to six voted not 

to -- voted down to proposal to an item of change 

to not list the actual resins. They supported the 

recharge materials. Are you saying in your 

comments that we should or shouldn't have the 

resins on the National List?

MR. SEITZ: I'm saying that the resins 

likely should not require inclusion on the National 

List. And I believe the vote was voted down but 

I thought it was nine/six in favor of the resins 

not being on the National List.

MR. ELA: Yeah. Actually, it was the 

reverse and I can't remember the exact vote, but 

regardless, thank you for clarifying that for me. 

And any other questions for Adam? I do not see 

any. Thank you very much for your testimony, Adam. 

Greatly appreciate it. We are going to move onto 

Jennifer Berkebile. And then on deck we have Patty 
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Lovera and then Priscilla Iskandar. Jennifer, 

Please state your name and affiliation.

MS. BERKEBILE: Hi, everyone. My name 

is Jen Berkebile and I'm the Materials Program 

Manager at PCO. PCO is a USDA accredited organic 

certification agency that certifies more than 

1,600 crop, livestock, and handling operations in 

the US. Today I will be commenting briefly on the 

need for support for the NOSB, paper pots, and 

biodegradable biobased mulch film.

MS. BERKEBILE: The CACS have put forth 

a discussion document on supporting the work of 

the NOSB. PCO agrees that the workload for NOSB 

members is heavy. As such PCO supports the Board 

having helped to conduct and provide literature 

reviews, write drafts, and otherwise support the 

work of the NOSB members. In particular, we 

strongly encourage the Board to have legal support 

to ensure that proposals are within the authority 

of NOSB as granted by OEFFA, and to clarify 

authority when multiple government agencies are 

involved.
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Although this is a sensitive topic as 

independence of the NOSB is crucial, we still 

support the hiring of help for the NOSB because 

it is ultimately the NOSB members who vote on any 

proposals. Thank you for your continued work on 

the proposal for paper as a crop production aid. 

I appreciate that you took the time to get it right 

and you did. PCO supports the proposal with some 

notes for the NOP when they write the proposed rule. 

We encourage the NOSB to pass it as written.

Finally, biodegradable, biobased mulch 

film is the material that comes up often with 

organic and conventional farmers alike. 

Overwhelmingly, we hear support for the allowance 

of biodegradable, biobased mulch products 

currently in the marketplace. Many stakeholders 

do comment on the over-use of plastic in organic 

agriculture due to the fact that biodegradable, 

biobased mulches cannot be used, and support a path 

forward that leads to the use of less plastic.

The Crops Subcommittee has proposed a 

revision to the definition of biodegradable, 
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biobased mulch film at 205.2. This proposed 

revision requires at least 80 percent biobased 

content. PCO supports this proposed requirement 

if it can be confirmed that products can and will 

be developed to meet this standard. We do suggest 

that you clarify the proposed language at 

205.601(b)(2)(iii), prior to passing this 

proposal.

The addition of a requirement to use 

BBMF with 100 percent biobased content when 

available is confusing. Does the Subcommittee 

meeting commercially available? A term defined 

at 205.2, with commonly adopted verification 

practices? If so the listing should be edited to 

include the word, commercially. If not, we 

request that the Subcommittee clarify that use of 

the term, available, and offer guidance or 

reconsider its usage. Thank you all for your work 

and for the opportunity to comment.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Jen. 

Are there questions for her? I do not see any. 

Thank you very much for your time, Jen. We 
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appreciate you giving us input. Next up, we have 

Patty Lovera, and then on deck, Priscilla Iskandar, 

and then after her or Aimee Simpson. Please go 

ahead, Patty.

MS. LOVERA: Great. Hi everybody. 

My name's Patty Lovera, I'm a Policy Director for 

the Organic Farmers Association, which is a group 

that's led by domestic certified organic farmers 

and certified organic farmers determine our 

policies. So I'm going to talk about a couple of 

specific topics on your agenda today and on 

Thursday our Director Kate Mendenhall is going to 

cover some more.

So first for paper-based crop planting 

aids. This issue's bid on the agenda because it's 

a tool that's really critical to so many small farms 

that depend on it. We've heard about this meeting 

after meeting. So we appreciate all of the Board's 

work to clarify the status of paper on the National 

List and we support the proposal and the definition 

change that you're going to vote on.

On ammonia extract, we included a 
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pretty broad question on ammonia extract on our 

2021 policy priorities survey of certified 

farmers. The majority of those who answered said 

he would not use ammonia extract if it were 

available, and we got some written comments that 

were very much in the vein of what's in your 

document about feeding the soil versus feeding the 

plants. But it wasn't unanimous. So we urge the 

Board to think about trying to gather more farmer 

input about their current practices and their needs 

looking forward because we also got some comments 

about never say never, that we have to kind of 

figure out what that means and have more 

conversations.

The context for this debate about this 

particular material is very important. Lots of 

our conversations as an organic community about 

specific materials are often about bigger 

dynamics, and this feels like one of those. We 

are hearing more from producers about price trends 

that really worried them, especially kind of in 

a row crop arena, continue to look for enforcement 
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on fraud because that's impacting the prices that 

people see in the marketplace. They believe land 

prices aren't going down, so that's not an option 

to increase revenues, so people are looking to 

increase yield as a way to deal with revenue. And 

that creates, that pressure to increase yields is 

making people think about what materials are there 

that I could use to increase that yield.

So that has to be part of this 

conversation, is how do we deal with those 

pressures as well as the specific conversation 

about materials. So we think we need to find a 

place to have that conversation as well as the 

important job you have to do about making a decision 

about this material. So we're open to having those 

conversations and we think that we really need to, 

as well as the specifics about the science of 

ammonia extract.

And then finally on the discussion on 

supporting the work of the NOSB, we agreed with 

the assessment in the document that it's a tough 

thing to be a volunteer on this Board. It's a very 
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heavy lift. All of you have very demanding day 

jobs, including being farmers. We listed a couple 

of things to think about as you explore the idea 

of providing research assistance. I'll just flag 

two here, just that it's going to be really 

important to figure out ahead of time before you 

start how to have some kind of conflict of interest 

process. Even with students, grad students live 

off of grants. What do those grants lead to at 

a land-grant school. Could it be a material that 

comes before the Board? And that any Board members 

should design what you need help on. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Patty. 

Questions for Patty? Quick question, Patty. I 

appreciate your discussion on ammonia extracts. 

You said it's not unanimous, but overall people 

said they wouldn't use them. But you also then 

said yield needs are kind of what justified their 

use. You know, my understanding of organic 

principles is that, you know, just saying we need 

more yield would not necessarily be a reason to 

use some material and put it on the list or prohibit 
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it. Can you address that a little bit more?

MS. LOVERA: Right. Every time we 

have to talk about material, we have to check back 

to the principles, right? That's in your 

checklist and it's the conversation we'd be having. 

We actually went to have more discussion about 

this with our folks. We didn't dive deep into 

sourcing of it, we just kind of asked about this 

category of ammonia extracts. And it was more 

folks said no. And then they cited kind of when 

they provided a written comment, they did say 

things like, feed the soil, not the plant, right? 

Which gives it that kind of more checking against 

the principles.

But we were a little surprised that some 

folks were just saying, well, could we get there 

an organic way? Could sit in a way that gets us 

this kind of product? So we just think there's 

more there in kind of the economic conversation 

that feels like it has changed for a lot of our 

members in the last couple of years. It's not an 

excuse, you know, to approve an the material that 
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doesn't make sense with organic principles. But 

we don't want to lose his context of pressure that 

people are feeling because we're only deciding yes 

or no on materials, right? We've had this -- I 

think we've all felt his need for a long time, to 

have a place to have kind of consolidation. What 

do our supply chains looked like? How are we going 

to get people the price that they need? And some 

of that's bleeding into these conversations about 

specific materials, and we need to talk about both.

MR. ELA: Are there other questions 

from the Board? I'm not seeing any. Thank you, 

Patty. Really appreciate your testimony, and food 

for thought here.

MS. LOVERA: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Next up is Priscilla 

Iskandar, followed by Aimee Simpson, and Amalie 

Lipstreu. Please go ahead, Priscilla.

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, I don't think 

Priscilla --

MR. ELA: Michelle, I remember she is 

not here; is that correct?
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MS. ARSENAULT: Right. I believe 

that's correct.

MR. ELA: I missed that. Okay. We'll 

circle back round on her. Okay, Aimee, we're up. 

And then Amalie Lipstreu, and then Mark Kastel. 

Please go ahead.

MS. SIMPSON: Good morning from 

Seattle, Washington. Good afternoon to those of 

you not in Seattle. My name is Aimee Simpson and 

I'm the Director of Advocacy and Product 

Sustainability for PCC Community Markets, the 

nation's largest independent consumer owned food 

market. PCC's vision is to inspire and advance 

the health and well-being of people, their 

communities, and the planet. We recognize the 

organic certification program to be a critical part 

of this vision. And this is why would she used 

to be a certified organic retailer and continue 

advocating on behalf of the issues we know that 

our members, shoppers and community care about.

So to touch on just a few of what are 

top on mind. Climate. For our community, climate 
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change remains a top priority and we continue to 

view soil based organic crop and pasture based 

livestock systems as a leading solution to 

addressing agriculture's impact on rising 

greenhouse gas emissions. If implemented with 

strict adherence to the standards setup NODPA. 

We would encourage the NOP to set climate change 

as both a programmatic and NOSB priority. This 

includes enforcing existing organic standards 

concerning pasturing, crop rotation, soil 

fertility, and organic systems based approaches. 

But also engaging the NOSB to review existing 

science on climate friendly agricultural 

practices, identify alignment with existing 

standards and identify categories for improvement 

to ensure better alignment with climate focus 

policy and frameworks.

Heavy metals and organic. While we 

believe organic to be a leader in climate friendly 

standards, we are concerned in its failure to 

address the rising issue of heavy metal 

contamination in certain crops and foods, 
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particularly those marketed towards children. 

Preventing toxic contamination from heavy metals 

such as inorganic arsenic, lead, cadmium, and 

mercury is squarely within the scope of OFPA. And 

there are specific actions that organic and take 

to ensure better testing and manuring practices, 

and production methods that will provide the 

protection and assurances that organic consumers 

expect from the organic certification.

Kasugamycin. And speaking of things 

that consumers and producers do not want in 

organic, PCC would encourage you to review our full 

comments and the small survey of our local organic 

apple producers on whether there was an urgent need 

for antibiotic treatment for apples. While one 

producer did potentially see a need for emergency 

use in pear production as a last resort if an entire 

orchard is threatened, the majority of the 

producers identified multiple organic systems 

based approaches to preventing development and 

spread, and expressed more concern over the 

negative impact that allowing antibiotics into 
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organic would have on organic integrity and

consumer confidence in organic.

We share in this concern and because 

of this, we would encourage the NOSB to reject the 

petition to add kasugamycin to the National List. 

Last but certainly not least, we would like to 

commend the efforts of the NOSB to address the 

aquatic ecosystem impacts of fish oil production. 

As you know this is not an easy topic. We do, 

however, have concerns about the proposed options 

and can encourage you to keep working with the 

experts at Seafood Watch and MST to identify the 

appropriate standard and language. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Aimee. 

You get on the list for perfect timing as well. 

So gold star, thank you very much. Are there 

questions for Aimee? Amy. Amy has a question for 

Aimee.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. And 

thank you Aimee, for your contributions to the 

organic community. And also with your written and 

your verbal comments here. I just had a question. 
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It was actually in the written comments you 

submitted and it was about carrageenan --

MS. SIMPSON: Yes.

MS. BRUCH: -- and the connections with 

that and Irish moss. Would you say, in general, 

your stance would be that Irish moss would be a 

substitute ingredient, instead of using 

carrageenan?

MS. SIMPSON: You know, I think what 

we were encouraging was pointing out that in 

recently we had actually a customer reach out to 

us and say, hey, you know, this Irish moss, just 

whole Irish moss as an important ingredient in 

their kind of cultural heritage and cooking. And 

when we kind of were digging into it more, there 

is a difference between carrageenan and Irish moss 

as far as an entity. Where there seems to be a 

lot of questions is whether the health concerns 

that are surrounding carrageenan and the 

essentiality concerns of which is an extract, a 

highly processed extract, we don't know if those 

definitely transfer over to Irish moss.
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And from what we could see, there was 

a little difference in that it did have nutritional 

benefits that maybe you weren't there with the 

extract. We weren't sure if some of the, you know, 

intestinal issues that you find with the 

carrageenan, which we are firmly against and we 

don't allow in our products, new products that we 

bring on. We just think there was a lot of 

questions there and that maybe in the way the NOSB 

was addressing it, they were kind of making a 

connection that hadn't been evaluated properly.

So just because we want to be very 

cautious with especially, you know, culturally 

important foods and things that have been there 

for people, that we don't just make leaps that we 

don't have support for. So I don't stay that we 

have a position on the whole ingredient yet, but 

we'd like to see them maybe dig in a little bit 

more just to make sure that they are one and the 

same, which, you know, initially our research 

showed that maybe they're not. So that was kind 

of our concern.
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MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you. 

Appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Rick, do you have a question?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah, I do. Aimee, 

since you're an apple growing country --

MS. SIMPSON: Yes.

MR. GREENWOOD: -- and pear growing, 

it's been interesting, the public written comments 

were very clear that the consumers don't want 

antibiotics --

MS. SIMPSON: Yes.

MR. GREENWOOD: -- in and their food 

or used. And many of the growers of apples and 

pears say they're ways. Have you seen any pushback 

from the growers in Washington State in particular 

that you've had interactions with, saying they 

absolutely need it?

MS. SIMPSON: Well, I was very curious 

about that to because I can affirm your statement 

that consumers do not want this in organic. And 

so we actually did a small survey to reach out to 

our local apple producers, and just to pull them
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as to whether they'd been struggling or needed this 

as an emergency treatment. And I did give a 

summary of all of those kind of responses that we 

received. And I was actually very surprised to 

see that. While there was one producer who said 

that they had lost a pear orchard to fire blight 

most said with apples, this was not something that 

they needed, that they felt that they could address 

it through organic systems management.

They felt this was a concern for larger 

scale producers because also with trellis growing 

systems, it's harder to combat that. And that most 

of them actually expressed that they felt like it 

was more of a threat to the organic label to kind 

of allow that and consumer perception of that, than 

to address it through the means that they'd really 

been able to, you know, by --

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. That --

MS. SIMPSON: I was surprised too, but 

that's all summarized in our comments.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Yeah. And 

it's just interesting since I went through all of 
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the written comments, literally hundreds of 

written comments saying, you know, keep 

antibiotics out of that. Interesting, thank you.

MS. SIMPSON: Yeah.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you very much, 

Aimee. We do appreciate your time to give us 

comments.

MS. SIMPSON: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Next up we have Amalie 

Lipstreu, then Mark Kastel, and then Harold Austin 

after Mark. So Amalie, please go ahead.

MS. LIPSTREU: Good afternoon Board 

members. My name is Amalie Lipstreu and I'm the 

Policy Director for the Ohio Ecological Food and 

Farm Association, or OEFFA. We're approaching our 

20th year as an accredited certifier and provide 

certification services in 12 Midwestern states. 

Our organic farmers are making daily decisions 

about how to adapt to the more frequent extreme 

weather affecting their farms. They know what is 

happening and they know that they are part of the 

solution.
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Organic agriculture is more resilient 

and must be part of a comprehensive climate 

mitigation and adaptation strategy. There is no 

other holistic system of agriculture even 

approaching the level of accountability and 

transparency that's present in the National 

Organic Program. And while we all know this system 

is not perfect, it is the best and most 

comprehensive system of agriculture that we have.

OEFFA is making a unique request of the 

Board. We have a window of opportunity that will 

only be open currently until April 29th. USDA 

released a request for comment on how they can 

create a climate strategy for agriculture, and the 

very first question asked in this docket is 

tailor-made for every organic farmer and advocate 

to answer. How can USDA leverage existing 

policies, existing programs to encourage voluntary 

adoption of agricultural practices that sequester 

carbon, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and 

ensure resiliency to climate change.

USDA has a 20 year history of enforcing 
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rigorous regulations related to soil health, water 

quality, and biodiversity through organic 

management systems. As a FACA board put in place 

to advise the USDA secretary on aspects of the 

implementation of OFPA, you are unique position 

to lift organic agriculture within the department 

as a critical solution to the challenge of the 

climate crisis. There is no time for debate. The 

science is clear and silver bullet approaches and 

single practices will not work.

MS. LIPSTREU: Please submit comments 

to the USDA before next Thursday, key 

recommendations on how the department can 

highlight and promote this voluntary adoption of 

agricultural practices that sequester carbon, 

reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote 

resilience to climate change. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. Are 

there questions from the Board? Sue has a 

question.

MS. BAIRD: Yes, hi. This has to do 

with your written comments as opposed to your 
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verbal now, and it's to doing with the CACS and 

the inspector pool, or lack of inspector pool. 

Was that you or was it someone else who wrote that? 

Shall I ask you or should I wait?

MS. LIPSTREU: I think if you wait 

until Julia Barton will be speaking and just about 

20 minutes, she probably answer that question more 

directly.

MS. BAIRD: Okay. No problem. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Carolyn, did you have your 

hand up?

MS. DIMITRI: No. That was just kind 

of like a hooray for the comment.

MR. ELA: Okay. Perfect. Just 

didn't want to skip over you. Any other questions 

from the Board? All right. I do not see any. 

Thank you very much. We do appreciate your 

comments as always. We are going to move onto Mark 

Kastel, followed by Harold Austin and then Julia 

Barton. And I am planning -- we'll see, we'll 

maybe go a little further and then take a break, 
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but we'll play that by ear. And I also really 

wanted to thank the sign language interpreters. 

I know there's a lot of jargon in this and you-all, 

I assume you're doing a great job. Thank you so 

much. Okay. Let's move on to Mark.

MR. KASTEL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

My name is Mark Kastel. I'm the director of 

OrganicEye, which operates as a project of Beyond 

Pesticides. Greetings from La Farge on the west 

coast of Wisconsin. For those of us who were 

involved in the discussion back in the 1980s that 

culminated in the passage of the Organic Foods 

Production Act and the Byzantine public/private 

certification scheme we operate under, it's been 

a grand experiment, and we are, to a certain extent, 

victims of our own success.

What started out with mostly low cost, 

non-profit, farmer lead certification has now 

morphed into multi-million dollar certifiers, 

certifying multi-billion dollar corporations. 

With agribusiness starting out hostile towards 

organic, they now own most of the organic brands. 
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And with a USDA that was equally hostile, we now 

have a firm revolving door in place and are 

experiencing regulatory capture. Nowhere is this 

more evident than the busywork that goes into 

annual inspections and certification.

The infrastructure facilitating this 

busywork now literally consumes tens of millions 

of dollars each year because it's just too easy 

to cheat. All the milk looks white, all the dent 

corn looks yellow. The cheating takes place on 

paper. What's been the return on investment for 

the hundreds of millions of dollars spent over the 

years on annual inspections. Almost every 

large-scale fraudulent activity has come from 

industry watchdogs like me, industry informants, 

and the media. After 30 years, I would suggest 

that a broad-based task-force be seated to 

investigate alternatives to the current model.

First, the threshold for exemption for 

small mom and pop producers has been frozen at 

$5,000 since 1980. Based on inflation that would 

be over $10,100 today. Secondly, the focus on 
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inspections and audits should be risk based. The 

IRS doesn't audit each of our tasks returns every 

year. By spreading the resources thin we receive 

way too many reports of drive-by certifications 

by grossly unqualified inspectors. If we don't 

audit everyone every single year, we could have 

highly trained inspectors doing periodically 

rigorous audits and plenty of unannounced visits.

Combine that with modern technology, 

surveillance, machine learning, and we could 

really leverage the same investment. And that 

might actually catch the real fraudsters in real 

time, with way, way less burden on the most honest 

and ethical industry participants. Thank you very 

much.

MR. ELA: Two seconds. You don't 

quite hit the list for perfect timing, but you're 

right in there. Questions to Mark, please. Sue 

has one.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. I'm sorry. Sue 

Baird, hi. Mark, I really appreciated your remark 

on risk based inspections and it's something that 
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I find appealing as an inspector. How would you 

go about discerning which inspectors were more 

qualified and/or would you propose having some kind 

of a funding to help inspectors become more 

qualified to do those risk assessments?

MR. KASTEL: Well, Sue, I think it's 

just the obvious -- opposite. I'm going to reverse 

your question a little bit.

MS. BAIRD: Okay. That's fine.

MR. KASTEL: Yes. And first I want to 

qualify this. Our old friend Dave Engel who ran 

a certification shop here in Vernon County, 

Wisconsin, used --

MS. BAIRD: Sure.

MR. KASTEL: -- to say we had more 

organic farmers here than any county in the 

country. We probably have more inspectors here. 

I know and I know you know many eminently qualified 

inspectors.

MS. BAIRD: Right.

MR. KASTEL: The problem is too many 

certifiers, in essence, bid out their 
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certification inspections to the lowest cost and 

we're getting young people mostly without 

production agriculture experience, fresh on a 

college and they go to a certifier course and 

they're a certifier. So if we were going to read 

imagine how certification took place and do 

demonstrably fewer inspections every year we could 

enlist the veteran inspectors who exist today. 

And do they need additional training? That's 

beyond my pay grade, but there are some folks that 

are obviously highly qualified. When it was 

voluntary, my first inspector when I was certified 

long before the USDA, was a guy named Jim Riddle 

--

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. KASTEL: -- it was self-learning 

and the farmers, it was learning process. So if 

we dialed it down, so we had less busywork and more 

important inspections, I'm just throwing ideas out 

here because it takes a community to discuss these. 

But instead of being inspected every year, if 

based on past performance, if my friend Jim 
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Gerritsen in Maine, who's been certified for, I 

think, 40 years, if he passes with flying colors 

year after year, maybe he can opt out for five 

years, although be subject to random inspections 

which would be ramped up anytime.

So it doesn't mean that you don't have 

to maintain your record keeping. And then when 

we go into a thorough audit and inspection, I have 

farmers telling me I maintain my records 

scrupulously and either they don't look at them 

at all, they just do a perfunctory examination or 

the people aren't qualified. So when I said, 

machine learning, some of this we're like in the 

dark ages here. We don't integrate the different 

certifiers. Who's selling what and who's buying 

what? Are we reconciling that in any automated 

form with what the production capacity of that 

particular farm is or that country is? We're not.

And so by ramping up our adoption of 

some of the technologies are being used in other 

industries that are scrutinizing supply chains, 

we could have less labor, higher quality, more 
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competent labor, and this year after year, tens 

of millions of dollars of expenditures by the NOP, 

by individual certifiers, by the farmers shelling 

out money by the cost share, what have we actually 

accomplished? Because we're really accomplishing 

a few letters of non-compliance every year. The 

big macro integrity problems are not coming to 

light through this process.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you, Mark.

MS. BAIRD: Totally agree, Mark. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right.

MS. KASTEL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Yes. I think we're going to 

move on just to kind of stay on schedule here. 

So appreciate your thoughts, Mark. We are going 

to move onto Harold Austin. We've got Julia Barton 

on deck and Michael Sligh. We'll do those two 

people and then we'll take a break after Michael. 

So Harold, former NOSB members, please go ahead.

MR. AUSTIN: Good morning. Can you 

hear me?
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MR. ELA: You're a little faint.

MR. AUSTIN: Okay. How about now?

MR. ELA: Still a little faint, but we 

can hear you as long as we listened carefully.

MR. AUSTIN: Okay. All right. I'll 

try to speak up a little bit louder for you. Good 

morning, everybody. My name's Harold Austin, 

former NOSB member and current Chair of the 

Northwest Horticultural Council's organic 

advisory subcommittee. I'd like to start by 

thanking all of you for your time to serve on the 

Board on behalf of the organic stakeholders in the 

community. Thank you so much.

A couple of different areas to go over 

with you this morning. First, I'd like to take 

and give my support to the materials that are 

currently up for the sunset review for the Handling 

Subcommittee. I served in one of the handler 

positions when I was on the list as the Subcommittee 

Chair --

MR. ELA: Harold.

MR. AUSTIN: Yes.
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MR. ELA: I'm going to interrupt. 

Just we're still having a pretty hard time hearing.

MR. AUSTIN: Okay.

MR. ELA: We want to make sure we get 

your comments.

MR. AUSTIN: Let me see here.

MR. ELA: Now we can't hear you at all.

MR. AUSTIN: How about now?

MR. ELA: It's still about the same.

MS. ARSENAULT: Harold, if you can get 

to the chat, scroll to very top, I pasted the phone 

numbers and if you want to try to dial in on the 

phone. Thanks.

MR. AUSTIN: All right. Steve, why 

don't you move on, and then I'll give a call-in 

on the phone.

MR. ELA: Sounds great. We'll come 

back to you here right before the break.

MR. AUSTIN: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Okay. We're going to move 

on to Julia Barton with Michael Sligh on deck, and 

then we'll come back around to Harold. Julia, 
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please go ahead. Julia, we're not hearing you.

MS. ARSENAULT: Julia, I see you're 

just on the phone. If you hit Star 6, you should 

be able to unmute yourself.

MS. BARTON: Has that?

MR. ELA: Much better. Go ahead.

MS. BARTON: Okay. Thank you. Good 

afternoon. My name is Julia Barton with the Ohio 

Ecological Food and Farm Association. Thank you 

for your facilitation of this online meeting and 

for your service. Today, I'd like to share input 

on three topics. First, containers. Since 2017, 

the greenhouse and field container production work 

agenda item has been on hold. While the topic may 

be on hold for the NOSB agenda, it remains very 

much in play for the rest of us. Transitional and 

organic producers, certifiers and inspectors are 

working with container systems regularly. And 

organic consumers are paying premiums for food 

produced in container systems bearing the organic 

label.

Please work with the NOP to get 
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greenhouse and field container production back 

onto the active work agenda, so we can learn from 

the communities input and move towards clarity and 

transparency in organic container systems. 

Secondly, the timing of meetings. OEFFA's Grain 

Growers Chapter have continually requested an 

alternative to the current meeting schedule. 

They've heard the constraints of the Board and 

continue to request a solution which would allow 

greater engagement of this important organic 

constituency. They suggested moving the schedule 

back two weeks each meeting. This would mean the 

meeting would rotate throughout the year. Equally 

benefiting and inconveniencing various 

stakeholders over time.

We'd like to request an update on 

alternatives to the current meeting schedule to 

be more inclusive of producers. Finally, the 

discussion document on human capital supporting 

the work of the NOSB. We wanted to thank you for 

taking this suggestion and turning it into a 

discussion document. We think a creative solution 
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can be found which serves the Board and the 

stakeholders, ultimately also benefiting the 

program.

Our first general response is that this 

sort of exchange already taken place on an informal 

basis. NOSB members seek input from or are 

provided unsolicited input from stakeholders 

between formal comment periods and through 

informal channels. Stakeholders share research, 

on the ground experience, and conversations on an 

ongoing basis. These practices are generally fine 

and not new, and while they are not the same thing 

as having a research assistant, it demonstrates 

that informal input can be provided to NOSB members 

for their information and further evaluation 

without issue.

Conflict of interest agreements could 

be put into place to mitigate other risks. We're 

very comfortable with the Board receiving support 

to help conduct and provide literature reviews, 

write drafts, and otherwise support the work of 

NOSB members. The better informed the Board is 
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the better equipped that will be to do it job. 

We want you to have the tools you need to do your 

job to the best of your ability. Thank you for 

your service and for your time.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you very much, 

Julia. Are there questions from the Board? Asa 

has one. I do want to recognize that Asa joined 

the meeting, I think two commenters ago. So Asa, 

I apologize for not making note of that. Go ahead 

with your question, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you. And 

apologies. I just want to comment. I agree, we 

do need more conversation and work on container 

issue as a Board and as a community, and I hope 

that we can move that forward.

MS. BARTON: Yes, thank you. We would 

very much appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Anybody else from the Board 

with a question? All right. Thank you very much, 

Julia.

MS. BARTON: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 
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Michael Sligh, and then come back to Harold Austin 

and then take a break after that. So Michael, 

please state your name and affiliation, and start 

your comments.

MR. SLIGH: Yes, I'm Michael Sligh, 

former NOSB member back in the beginning. I'm with 

the Alliance for Organic Integrity. Something's 

happening with the video. It won't show, but 

that's fine. Our focus is on strengthening our 

international organic guarantee system by 

promotion and harmonization of best practices in 

the building of tools and strategies for better 

consistency in fraud prevention.

Our experiences are dictating that now 

more than ever. Let's get back to the 

fundamentals. Hopefully as we have re-emerge back 

into physical oversight, we are strongly urging 

our entire system to focus on ensuring that our 

basic organic principles, practices, and 

regulations are being carried out in a consistent 

and highly competent manner through a risk based 

approach, prioritizing soil building, real crop 
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rotations, enhancement of biodiversity, ensuring 

that split operations are protecting against 

commingling, that approved organic fertilizer 

inputs match the yield potentials.

That mass balances are being conducted 

in a consistent manner that verify that acreages, 

yields, products and fields are all clearly 

confirmed as organic and matching. That livestock 

has real access to the outdoors, and that 

certifiers and accreditors are in constant 

communication, especially regarding common supply 

chains and product flows. Isolation is not in our 

best interests. These basic requirements not only 

protect our credibility, but they deliver on our 

promise to all organic operators that they agreed 

to meet these high standards if they would be placed 

on a level playing field.

But if everyone is not meeting the same 

high standards, this creates unfair competition, 

can drive good farmers out and accelerate 

concentration. So it is very important that we 

are actually delivering on these real soil 
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building, and carbon sequestration claims of being 

climate friendly farming practices if we are to 

remain strong and credible.

On a personal note, at the beginning 

of every administration there's an opportunity to 

reset and strengthen our norms between the NOSB 

and the NOP. I strongly urge you to use this 

opportunity to re-set these norms in good faith, 

to address the issues of common agendas, the need 

for technical assistance, clearing the backlogs, 

timelines, and setting priorities. We can do this 

best in a most equitable balancing of the needs 

of both USDA and our organic stakeholders. This 

will service all best. We appreciate and 

recognize your sacrifices you make, and thank you 

for your service.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Michael 

and I know you helped kind of create what we're 

dealing with, or the program we have now, so we 

appreciate that. Are there questions you Michael? 

I am not seen any. So thank you again, Michael. 

Harold Austin, we're going to try you again.
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MS. ARSENAULT: Sorry, Asa had his hand 

up.

MR. ELA: I'm sorry, Asa. Go ahead. 

Michael, you're still there.

MR. BRADMAN: Michael, I can think of 

a couple of backlog issues and that you mentioned 

as something that should be addressed, and some 

of the ones that I can think of origin of livestock 

list for in the poultry production standards. Are 

there any others or that you're concerned about 

and it would be interested to hear those? And if 

my list agrees with yours and any other comments 

on that?

MR. ELA: We may have lost Michael, 

Asa. So I apologize for not seeing your hand up 

there.

MR. BRADMAN: Sure.

MR. ELA: All right. Harold, are you 

there?

MS. ARSENAULT: Harold, you may have 

to get Star 6 on your phone to unmute.

MR. AUSTIN: Okay. How about now?
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MR. ELA: Perfect and much better 

volume. Thank you, Harold. Thanks for being 

patient.

MR. AUSTIN: Well, thank you guys. 

Again, Harold Austin. I'm a former member of the 

NOSB. I currently am the Chair for the Northwest 

Horticultural Council's organic subcommittee. I 

want to start by thanking all of you for your time 

and energy, your willingness to serve on the NOSB. 

It's an important process for our entire 

stakeholder and organic community, thank you very 

much. A couple of different areas to cover with 

you quickly this morning. First, I support the 

materials that are up for sunset review for the 

Handling Subcommittee. Having served in one of 

the handler positions when I was on the NOSB and 

serving as the Subcommittee Chair for a couple of 

different times, I've had the opportunity to review 

the majority of these materials and hear and listen 

to public testimony.

Organic handlers rely on these 

materials to assist them in their organic handling 
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operations. Unless something has come up that 

renders the material as no longer being needed by 

the stakeholder, I would review to relist these 

materials. I support the relisting of the 

materials under sunset review by the Crops 

Subcommittee. Of particular importance or the EPA 

List 3 inerts. I cannot stress enough how 

important to our insect control and monitoring this 

material listing is to organic tree, fruit, and 

berry growers. The materials are only allowed for 

use in passive pheromone dispensers. These 

dispensers are used in our mating disruption 

program and serve as our number one defense in the 

control of our codling moth, pandemis leafroller 

and oblique banded leafroller control on the 

Pacific Northwest and organic apple, cherry, and 

pear production, and are a vital component of our 

integrated pest management process as well.

I would urge you to relist and then move 

forward this fall with a resolution calling for 

the NOP to resolve this matter similarly to the 

one that was issued last fall for the EPA List 4 
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inerts. I urge you to please do not remove this 

listing until a solution is in place that can make 

for a seamless transition for our stakeholders so 

heavily reliant upon these two categories. Also 

under 602, a prohibited material is calcium 

chloride, but there is an exemption that allows 

it to be used to treat physiological disorders with 

calcium uptake.

With the newer types of organic apples 

and cherry's being raised along with the recent 

conversion to the industry to more semi-dwarfing 

and dwarfing rootstocks, the need for the 

applications of foliar calciums has never been more 

important to the organic tree fruit stakeholders. 

A loss of this material listing would create a 

significant reduction in the availability of 

organic crops simply because we cannot raise these 

crops without the foliar calciums being applied. 

The transition in the roots and overall tree size 

is driven by labor, not by the farmer.

Finally, on the chlorine materials for 

handling crops, livestock, as well as ozone and 
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peracetic acid, see my written notes as well as 

those as the Northwest Horticultural Council. I 

support the reenlisting of all six of the sanitizer 

disinfectants. I question -- anyway, I'll stop 

there. 

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you, 

Harold. Are there any questions for Harold? I 

am not seeing any. Thanks again, Harold for your 

patients and we appreciate your testimony, and your 

service on the NOSB.

MR. AUSTIN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: With this, we're going to 

take a ten-minute break, so if we could --

MR. TURNER: Steve, Amy's got her hand 

up. 

MR. ELA: Thank you. Harold, are you 

still there? I'm really doing poor on the hands 

up. Amy, do you want to just state your question 

and at least it will be on the public record?

MS. BRUCH: Sure, Steve. And sorry 

for my slow hand-raise, I apologize on that. I 

was just looking and referencing Harold's comments 
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and he had a comment in favor, I believe, of 

kasugamycin and I just wanted to ask him, you know, 

with the general state it seems like we've had many 

comments against using that substance because it 

is a antibiotic and I just wanted to hear more from 

his perspective on why that would be beneficial.

MR. ELA: Great. Well, at least have 

that on the record and I apologize again, Amy. 

So that would have been a great question.

MS. BRUCH: No problem.

MR. ELA: Okay. We're going to take 

a ten-minute break, so if we could come back at 

three minutes to the hour. We'll keep going. 

Thank you all.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 1:48 p.m. and resumed at 

1:57 a.m.)

MR. ELA: All right. By my clock, it 

is three minutes to the hour, so we will get started 

again here. Michelle, are you ready?

MS. ARSENAULT: I'm ready.

MR. ELA: I neglected to announce who 
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was going to be next after the break, but we have 

Russell Taylor, and then Artaynia Westfall, and 

then Alan Lewis. And, Artaynia, we haven't seen 

you, so if you are there, could you let Michelle 

know. Otherwise, we will skip over you. So, 

Russell, you are up. Could you state your name 

and affiliation, please, and go ahead and start.

MR. TAYLOR: Yes. Russell Taylor here 

with Live Earth Products. I also represent the 

Humic Product Trade Association as President. The 

reason for presenting today is, because we believe 

that the ammonia extract is vague, the definition 

is too broad and could actually capture humic acid 

products, we would like to at least lodge that point 

here. So we're going to just express some concerns 

about ammonia extract and how it could impact humic 

acid extraction. Next slide, please.

So, as you know, by definition, humic 

acid is only alkaline soluble. We're using the 

ammonium hydroxide to extract. It's already well 

established that these synthetics can't be not 

added for fortification, and most extractions 
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result in low increase of cat ions. Less than 1 

percent of the parent material would be ammonia 

before and after extraction process, so we're 

obviously not fortifying these products with 

ammonia. The use rates of humic acids are very 

low, making fortification pointless. You're 

using such a small amount of humic acid, you really 

would not make any huge contribution to the 

nitrogen content or ammonia. Next slide, please.

I'll steal Steve's comments earlier, 

that the dose makes the poison. And there are 

petition flaws that indicate that the ammonia, you 

know, could cause, you know, biochemical effects 

on the soil or toxic and microbial activity to the 

root zone. Because of the large amount of soil 

-- and you can see I just threw the number out there, 

2 million pounds of soil in a furrow depth per acre 

-- typically it takes about 1.2 tons of lime to 

change the soil pH one point. So even though these 

products might be alkaline, the added amount of 

alkalinity is very minimal. You know, one acre 
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of soil holding 1" of water is 30,000 gallons, so 

you're literally putting drops of humic acid into 

the soil profiles. So the concerns about 

fortification are very low. Obviously, you see 

humic acid applied at small rates would equate to 

about one mil, which is literally a drop per square 

foot. So, our concerns -- obviously, this ammonia 

extract is not directly geared towards humic or 

fulvic acids, but because the definition is so 

broad, we fear that it might capture these 

products. It's not mentioned in the 96 pages of 

the technical report, but we would like that 

clarification on this going forward, that humic 

acid extracts are not included under this rule. 

And last, obviously, is, you know, the ammonia 

extract is so small, it's negligible. So, happy 

to answer any questions.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you very much, 

Russell. Are there questions from the Board? I 

have a question. Russell. How would you define 

ammonia extract so it would include humic acid, 

but exclude the ammonium extracts talked about in 
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the petition?

MR. TAYLOR: That's a good question and 

I've thought about that. Obviously, you know, the 

ammonia is an added synthetic, so you would 

possibly exclude those extractants and just 

indicate that excluded synthetics would not be 

considered under this proposal. We're not 

creating -- we're not, you know, the intent here 

is not to add that nutrient. You know, we're not 

trying to add a bulk of nitrogen to the soil 

profile. We're trying to add organic acids that 

would benefit the crop.

MR. ELA: So you would say that the --

I mean, the ammonia is included with the humic acid 

just kind of naturally. It's not concentrated?

MR. TAYLOR: Right. It's 

intentionally added to extract only, and there is 

already language in the humic acid rules for 

fortification for synthetics. So I think that 

covers us. We just need to make sure that the 

ammonia extract proposal we have here kind of 

parses out those synthetics.
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MR. ELA: Great. Any other questions? 

All right. Thank you very much Russell. I'm 

just going to note, if you look back in the chat, 

Harold Austin is addressing your question, Amy. 

So I don't want to have that ignored. So 

appreciate that, Harold. Sorry for not getting 

on that question when it was answered and letting 

it go. Okay. We are going to move on to Artaynia. 

Michelle, are you still not finding her?

MS. ARSENAULT: I haven't found her on 

the participant list by phone or video.

MR. ELA: Okay.

MS. ARSENAULT: Thanks, Steve.

MR. ELA: Okay. Well, we'll move on. 

Alan Lewis, you are up, followed by Kiki Hubbard, 

and then Michael Crotser. So, Alan, please take 

it away.

MR. LEWIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and 

NOSB members and staff. I'm Alan Lewis 

representing Natural Grocers. I have three topics 

to cover today. First, recertify all of our 165 

stores as organic handlers to prevent comingling 
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of organic, conventional, and GMO fresh goods in 

case we accidentally receive them, and to prevent 

contamination by agricultural residues, toxic pest 

control materials in the store, cleaning 

substances, and other things consumers expect from 

organic produce, in particular. We continue to 

see uncertified handlers, also known as 

conventional wholesalers and supermarkets, 

represent to the public that they are certified 

handlers by how -- by displaying the USDA seal 

prominently on, above, near, or around their 

conventional produce displays and sales materials. 

They do not have proper controls and inspections 

in place. USDA NOP certification should be 

prerequisite for displaying the USDA seal. At the 

very least uncertified operations should make a 

disclaimer above or below the seal that they 

display, not a certified handler.

Second, as a leading organic retailer, 

we see a rise in skepticism among consumers. 

Shoppers used to ask if organic was really better 

than conventional and worth the cost. That issue 
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may be settled now, but the new questions are about 

soil-less hydroponics, for instance, and its 

potential for fertilizer fraud, as well as justice, 

equity, food access, synthetic biology, worker 

welfare, community sovereignty, animal welfare, 

and climate change. Alas, the OFPA focused almost 

exclusively on soil and inputs. It is silent on 

the important issues which form the context for 

the perceived value of regenerative organic 

systems. Movements like the Real Organic Project, 

Natureland, Organic 3.0, and Regenerative 

International are now broadening what consumers 

understand as organic integrity. Given this seed 

change, we encourage the NOP and its stakeholders 

to pay attention to social, economic, and political 

issues driving consumer sentiment, not just what's 

on the National List.

Third, keystones in the foundation of 

the National Organic Program are being removed one 

after another. Hydroponics, in particular, but 

also whispers of synthetic biology, unsunsetted 

synthetic materials, concentrated feeding, the 
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ongoing dairy cow switcheroo process, and group 

certification provide an opportunity for critics 

to further marginalize the organic community. 

Every one-time win for a special interest threatens 

the program's overall value. We need to be 

skeptical when we are asked to allow just one more 

shortcut and just one more accommodation. That's 

not making a bigger tent. That's putting holes 

in the tents. That's giving license to our 

distractor to say I told you so and for consumers 

to look elsewhere for leadership. Let's not let 

that happen. Thank you, and I yield the remaining 

nine seconds.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Alan. We'll take 

that nine seconds. Are there questions for Alan?

MR. TURNER: Steve, I've got my hand 

up. I have a question for Alan.

MR. ELA: Go ahead Wood and --

MR. TURNER: Alan --

MR. ELA: -- thanks for letting me 

know. I am not seeing all the hands, so please, 

everybody, barge in. Go ahead, Wood.
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MR. TURNER: Alan, should I hear you 

-- thanks for your comments. I'm curious. I want 

to name something here. I want to kind of get a 

little deeper on your comment. Should I assume 

that you're getting a lot of requests from 

consumers broadly for products that have the 

regenerative organic certification standard? I'm 

trying to make sense of your comment because I feel 

like there's --

MR. LEWIS: We are asked about all of 

the problematic little issues in organic because 

they're being talked about in social media, in 

particular. So occasionally we'll get people 

asking for real organic products, especially if 

there's a local producer. Would you bring in real 

organic product? I have more trust in them. And 

I think that's the key answer to your question. 

They're losing trust in, well -- I don't like the 

term, but industrial organic -- and they're looking 

for more reassurance that the practices of the 

producers they're buying from actually align with 

their values, which are much broader, as I said, 
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than soil and inputs.

MR. TURNER: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Great. Any other questions 

for Alan? Thank you. As always, Alan, we 

appreciate your thoughts.

MR. LEWIS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

Kiki Hubbard, followed by Michael Crotser, and then 

David Epstein. So, Kiki, would you please go ahead 

and state your name and affiliation?

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, Kiki couldn't 

be with us today.

MR. ELA: Fair enough. I think I knew 

that, so, okay, we'll move on to Michael Crotser, 

followed by David Epstein, and then Jill Smith. 

So, Michael, go ahead.

MR. CROTSER: Okay. Good afternoon, 

everyone. I'm Michael Crotser, the Certification 

Manager at CROPP Cooperative. We appreciate the 

work of the NOSB and the NOP to support organic 

agriculture. Thank you for the opportunity to 

speak. Because of my limited time, I encourage 
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the Board to read CROPP's written comments on crop, 

livestock, and processing. My comment today is 

about sanitizer compliance review and industry 

challenges. Verifying sanitizer wash tag 

compliance of inbound tankers is needed at loading 

facilities. These tankers can be loaded and 

shipped without verification that the last step, 

sanitizer, is compliant. CROPP has worked on 

improving compliance with limited success. I am 

asking for help.

The following changes must be addressed 

to avoid tanker rejections and tanker 

resanitations. Although water rinses are allowed 

to remove no-contact sanitizers, the intervening 

event is not noted on the wash tag, which breaks 

the chain of command. More importantly, water 

rinses introduced bacteria are prohibited by the 

Pasteurized Milk Ordinance, PMO, CFR Title 21 Part 

178, and are against most label instructions. At 

times, certifiers disagree on whether a 

formulation is allowed. Industry needs a 

comprehensive list of allowed materials by trade 
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name. The purpose of this list is so operators 

can verify compliance in real time, not promote 

products.

There are limited locations for 

resanitation events. Costs for resanitation are 

$2.00 per mile and $200.00 per event. CROPP 

proposes a solution. Certifiers must expand the 

role in sanitizer review and verify wash tag 

compliance. To avoid rejections, handlers need 

tools to make real-time decisions. All wash tags 

must document the last step sanitizer. This 

information can be missing. Unless supported by 

the label, CFR, and PMO, water rinses must be 

eliminated. OSPs must clearly describe the 

protocol of reviewing outside sanitation events. 

The accredited certifier association should 

develop best practices to align certifier policy 

and new active ingredients should be considered 

if they meet the requirements of OFPA and are 

referenced in the PMO or CFR. New chemistry would 

also benefit micro resistance management, as 
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voiced in the NOSB expert panel discussion on 

November 12, 2020. There are economic and 

environmental hardships due to these challenges. 

These events increase costs, delay receiving and 

loading, and increase plant discharge. The goals 

of organic production are to bring healthy food 

to the market and protect environmental resources. 

The NOP and the NOSB should encourage industry 

and certifiers to work towards resolution.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you very much, 

Mike. Are there questions? Asa has a question.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. Thank you for your 

comments about sanitizers. I'm curious, are there 

any specific chemistries in the pipeline that you 

think are important and may be, you know, 

appropriate for listing on the National List in 

organic? You mentioned the need for new 

chemistry, so I'm curious if you have any specific 

ideas about what's coming down the pipeline.

MR. CROTSER: Yes. So the question 

is, what new chemistry should be considered as 

sanitizers allowed on the National List, for 
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handlers primarily?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. CROTSER: Yes. We've been looking 

at these for about three years now. And of course, 

you guys know that chlorine materials and peracetic 

acid and peroxyacetic acid are really the only two 

chemistry groups that are allowed for organic 

handlers. What we see in the supply chain that 

are listed on the PMO and CFR includes chemistry 

like nitric, acetic, sulfuric, nonanoic, decanoic, 

octanoic, and citric acid are some of the common 

ones. So those are products currently on the 

market, and so this isn't not necessarily new 

chemistry and those should be considered by the 

organic industry to include. And this is 

primarily to relieve sanitation events if these 

chemistries meet OFPA requirements. They're 

commonly used in conventional industry, which 

overlaps greatly in the supply chain with the 

organic world.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you and just to 

follow up, so are these kind of in the pipeline 
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for folks to petition for addition to the National 

List? Some of these I recognize and some I don't.

MR. CROTSER: I'm not aware of any 

particular petitions for the new chemistry. You 

know, today, primarily from CROPP's perspective, 

we wanted to identify this challenge in the 

industry, and it is a big challenge. We spend a 

significant amount of time and money resanitizing 

tankers before we load organic milk. I think the 

new chemistry should be at least considered, but 

currently I'm not aware of any company petitioning 

the new chemistries.

MR. ELA: Sue, do you have a question?

MS. BAIRD: Yes. Hi, Mike. I'm going 

to change direction here. I really appreciated 

CROPP's comments on the CACS on inspector pools. 

Are you familiar with that comment or are you more 

in the sanitizing nook industry?

MR. CROTSER: I'm aware of those 

comments that industry needs for inspectors --

improving inspectors into the world of organic 

certification. At 3:30 today, Mary Capehart, 
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she's on the farm side within the CROPP 

Cooperative, and she's going to speak directly to 

those at that time.

MS. BAIRD: Okay. Then in preference 

for time giving, I'll just wait and ask these 

questions that I had highlighted on your public 

comments until that point and ask her. Thank you.

MR. CROTSER: Yes. You're welcome.

MR. ELA: Amy, did you have a question?

MS. BRUCH: No. My question was 

already answered. Thank you. Rick has a 

question, it looks like, though.

MR. ELA: Yes. I've seen your hand up, 

so I'm trying to be very diligent now. But, Rick, 

go ahead.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. Thanks, Steve. 

Mike, a question for you. It sounds like part 

of the issue you're facing, if I understood your 

comments, is the tracking of tanks. Is your group 

looking into block chain, which is what many of 

the logistics people are using now for food safety 

and transport. Is that something that's on your 
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radar?

MR. CROTSER: It's not on our radar and 

I would have to get more familiar with that. Your 

question was about block chain.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. CROTSER: Primarily where we get 

this information which is readily achievable is 

sanitizers are written on wash tags, whether 

they're empty or full tankers. And that's 

typically how we get the information to review 

sanitizer compliance. So it's readily available 

on tankers.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Available in 

the sense that it's transparent to everyone or do 

they actually have to see the tank itself?

MR. CROTSER: You have to see the tank 

itself, is one component of it, and then the second 

component is -- sanitizers are written by trade 

name. So you need a tool at receiving at the 

various organic plants to decipher a trade name 

into active ingredient and whether it's allowed 

or not. And we work with our current certifier 
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to provide a list of all sanitizers we see in the 

industry and have a quick cheat sheet, so to speak, 

of whether that chemistry is allowed or prohibited 

as a last step material, last step no-rinse 

material. But within some type of computerized 

system, we do not have that readily available at 

this time.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. No. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? Going 

once, going twice, going three times. Thank you 

very much, Michael. We appreciate your thoughts 

on that. We're going to move on to David Epstein, 

then Jill Smith, followed by Kathy Park Price. 

So, David, please go ahead and state your name and 

affiliation.

MR. EPSTEIN: Thanks, Steve. Can you 

hear me?

MR. ELA: We can hear you. Go ahead.

MR. EPSTEIN: Great. Good afternoon. 

I'm David Epstein with the Northwest 
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Horticultural Council representing growers, 

packers, and shippers of apples, pears, and 

cherries in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. Over 

93 percent of organic apples sold in the US come 

from our growers. The Council is concerned that 

the proposed draft framework that polls 

stakeholders about the appropriateness of certain 

materials and organic production is an improper 

means of gathering input and is not in compliance 

with the sunset review process. The evaluation 

of sanitizers is best addressed as a research 

priority that focuses on relevant new information 

about a substance and that integrates input from 

experts in food safety, chemistry, microbiology, 

and other relevant fields. The National List must 

represent the best available science on the use 

of antimicrobials to protect the American public 

from exposure to pathogens that cause food-borne 

illness. The Council appreciates that the EPA no 

longer maintains its listing of List 3 inerts and 

that the system to review materials, the sunset 

review, needs to be addressed by the NOSB.
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As the use of passive pheromone 

dispensers is absolutely critical to the 

successful management of lepidopteran pests in 

organic tree fruit production, the Council 

strongly encourages the NOSB to reform its inerts 

working group to develop the path forward in 

evaluating inert ingredients that will allow for 

the continued use of these materials while a method 

of inert materials review is developed. Passive 

pheromone products used for mating disruption, 

pest monitoring, and mass trapping of pests are 

the cornerstone of a sound ecological approach to 

pest management. Without pheromone disruption, 

there will be far greater reliance on pesticides, 

which will be far less effective in managing key 

pests without disruption to reduce overruled 

population levels. Washington State University 

website on CM management -- that's coddling moth 

-- simply states control of coddling moth in 

organic orchards is impossible without the use of 

pheromones. 

The Council also supports the petition 
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to add kasugamycin to the National List. Organic 

palm fruit growers are experiencing high levels 

of damage from fire blight that costs growers tens 

of millions of dollars in lost trees and 

production, including the need for increased labor 

to prune blighted trees, sometimes several times 

a season. Should the petition be successful, the 

Council supports limiting the number of 

kasugamycin applications for managing the 

evolution of resistance. So, thank you for 

hearing my comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, David. 

Appreciate those thoughts. Amy, do you want to 

ask the question you were going to ask Carol?

MS. BRUCH: Sure, Steve. I actually 

will ask a version of it. Thank you for your time 

today. I appreciate that. And I guess I see in 

your written comments, you do mention that 

peracetic acid is used by some of your growers and 

has some effectiveness in controlling fire blight, 

and then you're also in favor of adding kasugamycin 

to the National List. So I was just going to 
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question the effectiveness, in your opinion, of 

putting the two against each other? What are the 

pros and cons of each one of them in its 

effectiveness of controlling fire blight?

MR. EPSTEIN: Well, that's a good 

question, Amy. Thank you. When we put together 

our comments from the Council, what we do is we 

survey our growers, our organic growers, across, 

you know, the three states, and the statements we 

make represent their input. And what we hear is 

that certain varieties of apple, fire blight is 

much more challenging to control. And some of the 

products that are available right now are not as 

effective as they need to be. In pear production, 

it's a perennial problem, as well. So it's not 

a matter of one or the other or -- our growers would 

like to use all of these products. But if you've 

ever been in an apple or a pear orchard that has 

been decimated by blight, you don't recover. You 

have to end up replacing a lot of trees or doing 

a whole lot of pruning out of infected limbs. And, 

you know, they're using the predictive models, but 
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when you have a bad fire blight event predicted, 

a tool like kasugamycin could be very, very welcome 

in a management program. And once again, you know, 

it comes down to varietal differences where it 

would be used. I don't know that it would be used 

across the board, but as a tool that would be 

available when a, you know, bad weather system is 

causing concerns with a bad fire blight infection, 

I know the growers would welcome the use of 

kasugamycin. I hope that answers your question.

MS. BRUCH: Yes, I appreciate your 

comments. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Mindee has a question.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you. David, do 

you have any reflections on what experience growers 

are having since, I think it's tetracycline and 

streptomycin went off the National List?

MR. EPSTEIN: Right. Well, so the 

comments that I made about having to get in and 

prune out, growers are reporting that they're 

having to do a lot more proactive getting in and 

pruning out limbs that have been affected, which 
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is, you know, a much higher cost of labor to 

maintain the trees. Once again, it's also going 

to depend on the planting system. I don't know 

if you're familiar with modern tree fruit orchards. 

You've got a number of different planting systems 

that are being used. So it will differ between 

planting systems, as well the amount of work that's 

got to go into addressing fire blight management.

MS. JEFFERY: So --

MR. ELA: Any -- oh, go ahead, Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: So the experience of 

growers has been since the loss of those tools on 

the National List, is that they spend a lot more 

labor working on pruning? And is this, then, sort 

of the replacement in that, like -- I guess what 

I'm trying to get at is how big is the impact since 

farmers don't have those two tools that they used 

to use and now we're looking at this one? And so 

I guess trying to --

MR. EPSTEIN: Well, also understand, 

Mindee, I'm speaking just for the Pacific 

Northwest. I used to work with the growers in 
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Michigan and New York and the Mid-Atlantic region, 

where this is even a far greater problem. It 

really depends on the year. I mean, back in 

Michigan in, I think it was 2000, we had a fire 

blight epidemic that took out a lot of trees. So 

you don't get events like that every single year. 

You know, they're periodic and a tool like 

kasugamycin, you know, in a particularly bad year, 

can be a big product. The loss of tetracycline 

-- you know, growers are doing the best they can 

to work with the tools that they have at hand. 

But when we, you know, went out to them this year 

and asked, the kasugamycin petition is being 

considered, what do you think, I didn't hear 

anybody say no, in terms of, you know, the growers 

that we're working with. Some people said, you 

know, they're getting along fine. Here in the 

Pacific Northwest, we are in a drier system than 

they are back east of the Mississippi. It's 

perhaps a little bit less of a challenge here than 

in the East, but it's still a challenge, especially 

in pear production and certain varieties of apple.
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MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, David.

MR. EPSTEIN: You're welcome.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board? I am not seeing any.

MR. EPSTEIN: Thank you all.

MR. ELA: Thank you, David. We 

appreciate your thoughts. We're going to move on 

to Jill Smith. We have Kathy Park Price after 

Jill, but my understanding is Kathy is not here. 

So, Kathy, if you are here, please let Michelle 

know. So we'll have Jill, then Christie Badger, 

and then Abby Youngblood on deck. So Jill, please 

go ahead.

MS. SMITH: Hi everyone. I hope you 

can hear me.

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. SMITH: Okay. Well, good 

afternoon. I'm Jill Smith, the Executive Director 

of the Western Organic Dairy Producers Alliance, 

also known as WODPA, and I'm an organic dairy 

producers myself with Pure Eire Dairy here in 

Washington State. I thank you for the opportunity 
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to comment today on behalf of the approximately 

285 organic dairies WODPA represents throughout 

the West. We're appreciative of the NOSB's 

support of origin of livestock rulemaking and 

finalizing this regulation. WODPA, along with 

NODPA, the Northeast Organic Dairy Producers 

Association, collectively represent dairy 

producers across the country. We ask that the NOP 

move swiftly on the origin of livestock rule. Our 

producers unanimously seek a strong enforceable 

rule with immediate implementation. We all look 

forward to a solution that ensures dairy operations 

of all sizes are held to the same standard across 

the industry.

WODPA fully supports the discussion on 

human capital management. Dairies are 

multi-faceted, complex operations including at 

least two scopes of organic certification. And 

though we've had some very knowledgeable and 

experienced inspectors over the years, we've also 

faced inspectors unfamiliar with the workings of 

dairy operations and, ultimately, this leads to 
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greater work and costs for both the dairy producer 

and the certifiers. We have concerns about losing 

sight of the true intention of organic farming 

practices overall, and if we don't work in 

partnership with our certifiers to achieve the 

continuous improvement that we seek in organic 

production. However, we face continually 

increasing certification costs at a time when 

organic cost share is being kept back. We continue 

to face greater recordkeeping expectations, taking 

the farmer away from their actual job of farming. 

It's in the best interest of organics for all to 

have the best of the best in certifying as we work 

to keep the organic marketplace growing while 

insuring our consumers that the true intentions 

and integrity of the organic seal are being upheld.

Written comments were submitted on the 

livestock substances considered for sunset review. 

We largely support the relisting of these 

substances, as they are necessary resources for 

the highest animal welfare standards, especially 

as we face unique situations that are inherent to 
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grass-based livestock systems. Nutritive 

supplements are especially necessary for 

maintaining strong immune systems or providing 

supplementation when deficiencies are found. 

Chlorine and other sanitation products are also 

essential to dairy operations in order to provide 

the best quality organic milk possible. Food 

safety is not defined by conventional or organic, 

making it necessary that sanitizing products on 

the National List are up-to-date and up to current 

standards and also readily available for 

reference. I thank you for the opportunity to 

provide comments today and extend a very big thank 

you to all of you Board members for your service 

to the organic community. And I'm happy to answer 

any questions you have on substances or anything 

else that I've talked about today. 

MR. ELA: Good timing. Jill. 

Questions from the Board for Jill? I am not seeing 

any, so -- oh, Asa has a question.

MR. BRADMAN: I just really appreciate 

your comment and this ongoing saga over the couple 
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of years around the origin of livestock law and 

just -- you know, I think that's something that 

all of us need to keep working on and I really 

appreciate your concern that that be implemented 

as soon as possible.

MS. SMITH: Thank you and we appreciate 

that support and really do hope for something to 

happen soon.

MR. ELA: I think actually Jenny will 

talk a little bit about that in her opening comments 

at the meeting next week.

MS. SMITH: Great.

MR. ELA: Next step, we have -- oh, 

thank you, Jill. Much appreciated. Next up we 

have Kathy Park Price. Kathy, are you out there? 

We are not seeing Kathy, so we're going to move 

on. Christie Badger is up, followed by Abby 

Youngblood, and then Jay Feldman. So, Christie, 

please kick it off with your name and affiliation.

MS. BADGER: Thanks, Steve. My name 

is Christie Badger and I'm a consultant with the 

National Organic Coalition. I've a lot say and 
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only three minutes to say it, so I'll jump right 

in. Paper pots. We are requesting the Board 

acknowledges the listing has known deficiencies 

that need to be considered by future Boards. 

Specifically, a missing requirement for continuous 

improvement. There is a need for continued 

research. All the intermediate compounds that 

occur during decomposition may have an impact and 

we must continue to study soils where these 

products have been used over time, and there is 

a need for NOP guidance to ensure certifier 

consistency.

Biodegradable, biobased mulch film. 

GE technologies, microplastics, nanoplastics, 

effective secondary metabolites, effects on 

overall soil health, soil biology, soil nutrient 

balance, soil biological life, soil tilth, effects 

on livestock that graze these areas in subsequent 

years -- the list goes on. We maintain that this 

product is not ready for prime time.

EPA List 3 inerts. The solution for 

EPA List 3 inerts is specific and succinct. List 
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3 inerts should be delisted with each of the four 

individual materials covered by this listing and 

used in organic production petitioned and reviewed 

to be added to the National List. We encourage 

the NOSB to move forward boldly to address a listing 

that is an embarrassment to organic integrity by 

providing a timeline by which the currently used 

List 3 inerts must be petitioned and reviewed for 

addition to the National List.

Kasugamycin. Use of antibiotics in 

organic production -- haven't we been down this 

road before? Antibiotics and organic production 

are contrary to consumer expectations. Organic 

livestock producers are prohibited from using 

antibiotics. Antibiotic resistance poses serious 

threats to human health. Using antibiotics in 

agriculture contributes to that threat. 

Kasugamycin is not compatible with organic 

practices and the NOSB but must vote no.

And copper sulfate for the uses that 

it's being considered for this round. The Crops 

Subcommittee indicates that it appears there is 
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sufficient evidence to conclude that, one, the use 

of copper sulfate in rice fields is environmentally 

detrimental; two, alternatives seeding practices 

could eliminate the need for the chemical, as both 

algae and tadpole shrimp cease to be problematic 

once seedlings are established, and, three, 

international standards do not allow for spraying 

of copper sulfate for organic rice production. 

We suggest a fourth. There has always been an 

alternative to copper sulfate use in rice 

production. It's time to delist copper sulfate 

for this use. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Well done, Christie, you're 

on the gold star list.

MS. BADGER: Thanks.

MR. ELA: Are there questions for 

Christie from the Board? Christie, I have a quick 

one on the paper planting aids. In terms of the 

requirement for continuous improvement, what would 

you say that requirement should be?

MS. BADGER: This time, Steve, we 

included something in our comments with a lot of 
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discussion about it. And we suggest something 

similar to the listing at 205.204 for seeds and 

planting stock practice standards, which allows 

for the use -- that standard allows for the use 

of non-organically produced on-treated seeds and 

planting stock, quote, when an equivalent 

organically fruit juice variety is not 

commercially available, end quote. Not only would 

a listing similar to this apply the commercial 

availability statement, but it could allow for 

variances based on functionality.

MR. ELA: Right. Asa has a question.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. Just your comments 

on biodegradable mulch is an issue that a lot of 

people are really just torn over because of this 

-- I guess, this idea of also comparative risks 

to current use of polyethylene films. You know, 

I know, for me, organic plastic culture is an 

oxymoron and I looked at these fields of 

strawberries with polyethylene films that are 

organic. Many different types of growers, 

including, you know, historically pioneering 
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farmers in organic, and, as for me, it has an 

asterisk by it. And the use of the films has its 

own and substantial impact on the environment, 

heavy use of petroleum products, and yet everyone 

seems to want plastic in organic, and whether 

polyethylene or biodegradable. So how do we move 

forward with that? And, you know, we have kind 

of an analogy to the paper pots where we are 

permitting up to 20 percent non-biodegradable 

plastic, at least in the current wording, so, in 

a way, that's the link here. I'm curious about 

your comments and I also look forward to other 

commenters on this issue because it's really, I 

think, an important issue and plastic use in 

organic is extreme, in my mind.

MS. BADGER: Thanks, Asa. I 

appreciate that. One, let's be clear, we don't 

completely move away from petroleum-based products 

just because we go to a biodegradable, biobased 

mulch, because, frankly, you're talking about a 

product that's not 100 percent biodegradable, 

biobased. And we don't get away from the wording 
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that you use, the plastic culture, in organic just 

by changing which plastics we're using. That's 

what we said in our comments. When you start to 

look at the container production that has 

ground-covering down for years on end of hundreds 

of acres. So, you don't get away from that by 

changing to the biodegradable, biobased mulch 

film.

The other problem when we're talking 

about paper pots versus the biodegradable film, 

mulch film, paper pots usage compared to the mulch 

film. Again, the mulch film, we're talking 

thousands of acres covered. And, finally, one 

thing I would point out and not try to take too 

long, but with the plastic mulch, we have a chance 

of removing it. The biodegradable mulch, we 

don't. And as I noted in our comments, or as we 

noted, we had a member of the Crops NOSB Committee 

visit the site in Tennessee and that individual 

just noted that there was absolutely plastic pieces 

all over, and he said along the tree line, it was 

horrible and gave a personal, you know, note of 
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what it was like when he was there. With plastic 

mulch as we're using it now, we understand, at 

least, to a certain extent, what happens to the 

soil under that mulch. With biodegradable, 

biobased mulch film, we don't understand long-term 

what happens to the soil. There aren't enough 

studies. There aren't studies in the long-term.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Christie. We do 

appreciate those thoughts.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. Thank you and 

there's obviously a lot to discuss here, but this 

isn't the right time.

MS. BADGER: Thank you.

SPEAKER 4: Only a few topics at this 

meeting that are thoroughly discussed, so, as 

always with all our meetings. Thanks so much, 

Christie. We were going to move on to Abby 

Youngblood, followed by Jay Feldman, and then Terry 

Shistar. So, Abby, please go ahead and state your 

name and affiliation.

MS. YOUNGBLOOD: Thank you, Steve. 

Good afternoon. I'm Abby Youngblood, Executive 
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Director at the National Organic Coalition, and 

I want to welcome the new NOSB members and I want 

to thank all of you for your hard work. The 

National Organic Coalition, or NOC, is an alliance 

of organizations and companies that works to 

advance organic and protect the integrity of the 

organic program, and we see an important 

opportunity at this moment in time to work with 

new leaders at USDA and in Congress to get organic 

back on track. Our top priorities with the new 

administration include reinstating the Organic 

Livestock and Poultry Practices rule, finalizing 

Origin of Livestock and strengthening Organic 

Enforcement proposed rule, fixing the funding 

shortfall with organic certification cost share, 

building a more equitable and diverse food and ag 

system, and demonstrating to Congress the role 

organic agriculture can play as a climate change 

solution.

We see an important goal for the NOSB 

on this last topic. NOC is requesting that the 

NOSB create a work agenda item focused on climate 
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change mitigation and adaptation and enforcement 

of soil health provisions in the organic 

regulation. We're asking the Board to say no to 

ammonia extract and to recommend a detailed 

restriction on the use of highly soluble sources 

of nitrogen. Over reliance on highly soluble 

sources of fertility can short-circuit soil 

building practices and violate the foundational 

feed-the-soil principle in organic.

On a different topic, an ongoing and 

egregious area of inconsistency in organic is how 

the three-year transition requirement is applied. 

NOC conducted a survey in 2020 with the Accredited 

Certifiers Association and the Organic Farmers 

Association that demonstrated the high level of 

inconsistency on three-year transition 

requirements, but the NOP has not taken any action 

to address the problem. We're asking that the NOSB 

actively engage on this issue and urge the NOP to 

provide clarity so all certifiers and organic 

operations are held to the same standard.

On excluded methods, the organic 
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community and NOSB have been clear in our 

opposition to genetic engineering in organic. We 

need clarity on which methods are allowed and which 

are prohibited under the organic regulations. 

Failure to complete work on the TBD methods and 

to codify NOSB recommendations will negatively 

impact organic plant breeders and the organic feed 

industry, who need certainty to advance plant 

breeding efforts.

Finally, I have a comment on ion 

exchange filtration, that NOSB should use OFBA as 

a guide and review and recommend which 

non-agricultural substances used in the ion 

exchange process must be present on the National 

List. We urge the NOSB not to give the NOP the 

final decision, but to remain true to the authority 

granted in OFBA to make recommendations on National 

List materials. Thank you for considering my 

comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Abby. Are 

there questions for Abby? Abby, I have a question. 

Considering that the Board, at the last meeting, 
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voted down just looking at the ion exchange, 

looking at the recharge materials, but not the 

resins, do you think we should review each resin 

separately by petition and, given that that would 

-- given that a lot of those resins are already 

used for organic materials and might be disruptive 

to the industry. What are your thoughts on that?

MS. YOUNGBLOOD: I am going to defer 

that question, Steve, to my colleague, Terry 

Shistar, who is speaking just two slots from now. 

I think she's a better person to answer that 

question.

MR. ELA: Fair enough. Any other 

questions for Abby? Thank you so much, Abby. We 

appreciate it. We are going to move on to Jay 

Feldman, followed by Terry Shistar, followed by 

Alice Runde. So, Jay, please go ahead.

MR. FELDMAN: Good day. Greetings to 

the NOSB members, new and old. I'm Jay Feldman, 

Executive Director of Beyond Pesticides, a former 

NOSB member. There is always a balance in 
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preparing oral comments to the NOSB between zeroing 

on National List decisions, which we do have 

written comments on, versus providing context for 

official or critical process concerns about your 

work plan, priorities, articulating minority 

opinions, greater transparency, and advice to the 

secretary. Central to all of this is the integrity 

of the organic label. Integrity is central to 

every decision and every process utilized by the 

Board. Every week, somebody says to me, organic 

standards have been watered down, you can't trust 

organic. This is painful for me because Beyond 

Pesticides' mission as an environmental and public 

health organization bridging consumer, farm, and 

science is built on eliminating toxic pesticides 

and fertilizers, especially petroleum-based 

materials, that are contributing to existential 

crises associated with chemical-induced diseases, 

climate, and the precipitous decline of 

biodiversity and our ecosystems.

Every NOSB decision is a link in the 

chain of organic. All of the businesses that are 
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tied to the chain are dependent on the strength 

of each link and, to the extent that we lose public 

trust in what we are doing here, we lose the market. 

We must protect consumer and farmer investment 

in organic investment borne out of a constant 

stream of weak links in a chemical intensive 

agriculture that has helped to drive the organic 

market concerns about contamination of health and 

the environment. Organic consumers and farmers 

have invested in the notion that we care not only 

about land stewardship and what we feed our 

children and families, but stopping farm worker 

exposure to hazardous materials and ending the 

hazards to the fenceline communities where the 

toxic chemicals used in conventional agriculture 

are produced. The organic law, of course, 

requires the Board to consider this, the 

cradle-to-grave effects of materials, when 

protecting against adverse effects.

So another looming crisis is the crisis 

of confidence in organic. Now is the time to build 

on our foundation, not chip away or allow USDA to 
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ignore NOSB recommendations that must go to 

rulemaking, even if USDA stands in opposition. 

Regarding the five-year sunset cycle, default to 

the removal of materials from the National List, 

with consideration given for any needed annotation 

to tighten uses. Copper sulfate serves as an 

example, given its hazard. Sodium carbonate 

peroxyhydrate was added to the National List, with 

the stipulation that it would reduce the use of 

copper sulfate as an algicide, has it proved to 

be effective? If so, can the listing of copper 

sulfate as an algicide be eliminated?

Changing previous Board decisions 

without new science or updated information on 

essentiality compatibility undermines integrity. 

Weakening the biodegradable, biobased mulch film 

annotation will undermine the Board's previous 

attempt to keep plastics and toxic fragments out 

of soil and food. Thank you so much for your 

service and consideration of our comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Jay. You also get 

a gold star. Like Allen, you yielded a second to 
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our timing. Appreciate it. Well done. Are 

there questions for Jay? Asa has a question for 

you.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I just want to 

follow up more on the biodegradable mulch. I know 

you have some thoughts on that. I think we all 

do. Just, again, I'd like to hear, you know, more 

thoughts on this and what your opinions are. I 

do feel like when we talk about containerized 

production, organic plastic culture strawberry 

production, in my mind, is a container process 

where essentially -- I look at fields in Monterey 

and along the coast and we're essentially creating 

a container out of the ground by wrapping it in 

plastic, and that's basically a petroleum-based 

herbicide that we're using on the physical barrier, 

but it's certainly leaving probably micro plastics 

and other stuff in the soil and it's also extending 

it out into landfills and waste. So, even if we 

got a biodegradable mulch that was 100 percent 

biobased, we probably still have all the same 

issues we might have with one that's 20 percent 
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or 10 percent, or currently 80 percent, which 

nobody's comfortable with. And many in the 

organic community that you talk about are demanding

a biodegradable mulch. So, again, I don't have 

any particular opinion on this right now. We're 

trying to lay out the options and hear comments 

on that. So if you could comment more on that, 

that would be appreciated.

MR. FELDMAN: Yes. One of the 

standards I always used in these challenging 

questions -- I think you lay it out perfectly --

the contradictions, the challenges that we face 

as a community because of the ethics and the 

principles we bring to this topic. I think that 

what I used as a principle to guide myself is 

whether what we were doing was incentivizing moving 

toward the elimination, the concept that was 

embodied in the law of this idea that we can 

continually improve. And, you know, I think we 

-- with respect to the wrapping of plastic, I agree 

with you 100 percent. We have allowed that to 
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happen, as in NOSB. Certainly it was acknowledged 

in the original statute. But we have allowed that 

to happen by virtue of our lack of attention to 

mulching systems and restrictions and tightening 

up and annotations. We haven't used all the power 

we have as NOSB members to move toward continuous 

improvement. My fear with the biodegradable mulch 

-- I think I'm echoing what Christie said, to some 

extent -- is that we're intentionally leaving 

material in the soil. We can't even remove it to 

recycle it, re-purpose it. I know it's ending up 

in landfills, but under this concept of continuous 

improvement, we can stipulate where it goes, what's 

done with it. We can incorporate our ethic into 

this. The bottom line for all these NOSB 

decisions, as far as I'm concerned, is are we 

incentivizing the market to move to where we want 

to be eventually. And if the answer is no, even 

though what we're doing right now is not perfect 

or is not what we'd prefer, if we're introducing 

something that slows down the incentivizing toward 

where we want to be, then I think we need to take 
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pause and hold back in allowing that. I think the 

limitation that the Board -- when I served on the 

Board, the limitation that was written was the 

right balance there because it said to the 

industry, we like what you're doing here. You're 

moving us in the right direction. But we need to 

see certain other advances before we can embrace 

it.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you.

MR. FELDMAN: Thank you.

MS. ARSENAULT: You're muted, Steve.

MR. ELA: Thank you. Thank you very 

much, Jay. We're going to move next to Terry 

Shistar, and followed by Alice Runde, and then Jo 

Ann Baumgartner. Terry, please take it away.

MS. SHISTAR: Okay. My Zoom has cut 

out so I'm doing this blind. My name is Terry 

Shistar and I'm on the board of directors of Beyond 

Pesticides. This is a three-minute review of our 

comprehensive written comments. Organic can be 

a big part of preventing ecological collapse, but 

only if it doesn't stray from its core values and 
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practices. Organic is not just an alternative for 

people seeking better food or a more profitable 

way of farming. We urgently need to prevent 

ecological disaster. We must not step on the 

antibiotic treadmill again.

The reasons for rejecting the 

kasugamycin petition are the same as the reasons 

for eliminating the antibiotics streptomycin and 

tetracycline. Now that we have learned what a 

pandemic looks like and feels like, we must take 

serious steps to avoid a pandemic resulting from 

antibiotic resistance. When streptomycin and 

tetracycline were presented for the final votes 

by the Crops Subcommittee, the committee was 

unanimous that the antibiotics needed to go. The 

question was how fast. Now that streptomycin and 

tetracycline are gone, we do not need another 

antibiotic. Only a change in regulations as 

recommended by the NOSB will protect native 

ecosystems and prevent losses of carbon from woody 

biomass.

Planting aids should not be made from 
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virgin paper from wood pulp, which results in much 

greater environmental impact than recycled paper. 

Micro plastics cause harmful effects through 

physical impacts of entanglement and ingestion. 

They also carry toxic chemicals on their surfaces. 

Tighter restrictions are needed in both crops and 

packaging. Ammonia extracts and other highly 

soluble nutrients are harmful to soil biodiversity 

and should be prohibited.

Do not leave the final outcome on ion 

exchange to NOP. These substances must be 

reviewed by the NOSB. Ion exchange is chemical 

change, so food produced by ion exchange is 

synthetic. Only resins and recharge materials 

approved for this use should be allowed in organic 

food and only when listed on 605B. Chemicals added 

during the ion exchange process must be listed on 

the label.

Substantial levels of the heavy metals, 

arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury, are in infant 

foods. Consumers expected organic products to be 

free of harmful contaminants. Eliminating or 
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reducing this contamination will require making 

heavy metal contamination a priority for research, 

reinvigorating the work agenda item on 

contaminated inputs, and identifying possible 

actions to reduce contamination of organic foods. 

Finally, and hopefully you got the slide here, 

don't forget these important issues. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Terry. Flying 

blind, you did pretty well. There's 11 seconds 

left.

MS. SHISTAR: Oh, wow.

MR. ELA: Very good. Yes. Are there 

questions for Terry? I am not seeing any. Thank 

you so much, Terry. We do appreciate your thoughts 

each time. We are going to move on to Alice Runde, 

Jo Ann Baumgartner, and then Doug Currier. So 

Alice, you have the floor. Please go ahead.

MS. RUNDE: Thank you. Good 

afternoon. My name is Alice Runde. I'm the 

Coalition Manager for the National Organic 

Coalition. My comments today pertain to racial 

equity in the organic community, supporting the 
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work of the NOSB, and adding a research priority 

on heavy metals in baby food.

One, racial equity. We know black, 

indigenous, and people of color, or BIPOC, are 

underrepresented in the organic community. We 

recognize that access to the organic movement and 

organic certification has not been equal across 

racial groups. Addressing racial equity in 

organic agriculture is an important priority for 

NOC. The NOSB can also play a role by considering 

the impact of the Board's decision on BIPOC 

farmers, and by understanding some of the specific 

barriers to organic certification for BIPOC 

farmers. NOC's written comments address this in 

more detail, but to summarize, NOC would like to 

see the NOSB prioritize, one, research into the 

barriers to precipitation in organic certification 

for farmers of color, two, research on technical 

assistance and outreach needs for underserved and 

underrepresented communities, and, three, work 

with the NOP to identify languages that the organic 
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materials should be translated into and then work 

to identify the appropriate means of acquiring and 

sharing those translated materials. Immediately 

following his inauguration, President Biden signed 

an Executive Order titled Modernizing Regulatory 

Review. This Executive Orders sets the stage for 

the adoption of agency policy across governments 

to seriously and urgently confront the climate 

crisis, biodiversity collapse, and 

disproportionate harm to people of color. NOC 

holds up this Executive Order in our work within 

the organic community.

Two, supporting the work of the NOSB. 

NOP funding increases must translate into 

increases in NOSB support. The NOP has received 

significant boosts in funding the annual 

appropriations process. These spending increases 

have translated into significant and much needed 

boosts in hiring for the NOP. What we have failed 

to see is increased support for the NOSB members 

and NOSB activities. We have heard repeatedly 

that there is limited money for technical reviews 
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and no capacity for additional task-force work. 

As NOC continues to lobby for additional funding 

to support the NOP, our expectation is to see 

increased support for the NOSB. NOC supports 

measures to assist NOSB members to help conduct 

and provide literature reviews, write drafts, and 

otherwise support the work of NOSB members. This 

could help support some other research priorities 

into racial equity topics mentioned previously.

And finally, heavy metals in organic 

infant food as a research priority. I reiterate 

Terry's comments. NOC suggests a research 

priorities be added based on the recent 

congressional report that documented substantial 

levels of heavy metals in infant food, including 

organic infant foods. Organic standards are based 

on practices rather than purity, but consumers do 

expect that organic foods will be free of hazardous 

contaminants. Therefore, regardless of action 

that may be taken by Congress or the FDA affecting 

foods in general or baby foods in general, the NOSB 

and NOP should, to the extent possible, ensure that 
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organic food, especially infant food, is free from 

heavy metal contamination. Thank you for 

considering my comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. Alice. 

It looks like Wood has a question for you.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Steve. I just 

wanted to acknowledge Alice's comments about 

diversity and inclusion in the Board and in the 

community as, as a whole, that we should absolutely 

fundamentally be doing everything in our power to 

create more leadership opportunities for people 

of color, black people, and people of color in this 

community, and we're just not doing a good enough 

job. And I just want to acknowledge that and I 

appreciate Alice raising those points. Thank you.

MS. RUNDE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions for 

Alice? Thank you so much, Alice. We do 

appreciate your comments. We are going to move 

on to Jo Ann Baumgartner, followed by Doug Currier, 

and then Karen Howard. Jo Ann, please go ahead.

MS. BAUMGARTNER: Hi. Thanks, Steve. 
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Yes, I'm Jo Ann Baumgartner, Executive Director 

of the Wild Farm Alliance. In an effort to assist 

and educate the NOP about how to implement the 

NOSB's native ecosystem --

MS. ARSENAULT: Jo Ann?

MS. BAUMGARTNER: Oh, yes.

MS. ARSENAULT: I'm going to to 

interrupt you just for one moment because you have 

slides and they are not up on the screen yet.

MS. BAUMGARTNER: Okay.

MS. ARSENAULT: One second.

MR. ELA: Thanks for waiting, Jo Ann. 

There's always some little technicality.

MS. BAUMGARTNER: Yes.

MS. ARSENAULT: Okay. Here we go.

MS. BAUMGARTNER: In an effort to 

assist and educate the NOP about how to implement 

the NOSB's native ecosystem recommendation, part 

of which you see here, we submitted a draft Native 

Ecosystem Guidance. Just as we submitted the 

first draft of what the NOP officially published 

as the 5020 Natural Resources and Biodiversity 
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Conservation Guidance, we are sharing this 

document to help jump-start the process. Next 

slide, please.

Protecting native ecosystems slows 

climate change, something the Biden administration 

and organic consumers care deeply about, but NOP 

regulations will continue to contribute to the 

problem until the NOP makes this regulatory change. 

When destroyed, native ecosystems release huge 

amounts of carbon stored in their woody plants and 

in the soil. Next slide.

This required regulatory action is more 

than a national issue. It's international. In 

the last 50 years, animal populations worldwide 

have declined by almost 70 percent. Next slide.

The NOP is charged with insuring 

standards are consistent throughout, as Cornucopia 

detailed in their comments, but it is undermining 

consumer confidence in the organic label with its 

inaction. While on one hand, many businesses, as 

this one, and the NOP itself proudly proclaim 

organic preserves ecosystems, it's currently a 
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sham. Next slide.

The draft Native Ecosystem Guidance we 

put forth explains how to uniformly determine if 

a native ecosystem is or was present, and ways these 

lands may be used in organic production and more. 

Next slide.

We have also created a complimentary 

organic native ecosystem application and 

verification tools kit. It describes the best 

online tools to use, gives examples of how to use 

them in different types of operations around the 

country and the world, most with analog 

counterparts for those lacking internet access and 

includes priorities land use forms for certifiers 

to use and adapt as they see fit. Next slide.

We also provide links to short videos 

on how to use seven of the tools. Next slide.

The NOSB received approximately a 

thousand comments from organic farmers, 

certifiers, organizations, businesses, and 

consumers on these topics. There are few 

undistressed. We are horrified. I don't think 
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it's fair or wise. It's a scandal story ready to

happen. Next slide.

Now is the time for the NOP to take 

action to protect the integrity of the seal and 

help reverse the biodiversity crisis and reduce 

global warming. Will the NOP do what's right and 

take the step for consistency and integrity of the 

regulation? If so, we want to help. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Jo Ann. 

Are there questions? I am not seeing any. Thank 

you so much for your presentation and sorry that 

the slides took a little bit to start there. Next 

up we have Doug Currier, then Karen Howard, and 

then Michael Menes. So let's go ahead with Doug.

MR. CURRIER: Great. Hello everyone. 

My name is Doug Currier, Technical Director at 

the Organic Materials Review Institute. I'm 

presenting comments today on ammonia extract and 

List 3 inerts. My comments day aim to highlight 

specific areas included in OMRI's written 

comments.

Ammonia extract -- liquid fertilizer 
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products that meet the proposed definition of 

ammonia extract from the petition do currently 

appear on the OMRI list. Liquid fertilizers are 

assigned a specific use restriction if they contain 

more than 3 percent ammoniacal nitrogen. This use 

restriction appears on the product certificate, 

and the OMRI products list, and on the OMRI website. 

I refer members of the Board to the specific 

restriction language in our written comments. 

I'll read it again for the record and will say that 

the restriction language very much mirrors 

restriction language for sodium nitrate. The 

restriction language is, non-synthetic 

fertilizers that test above 3 percent ammoniacal 

nitrogen are considered at higher risk for 

violating the soil fertility and crop nutrient 

management practice standards at 205.203. This 

product contains highly soluble nitrogen and must 

be applied in a manner that does not contribute 

to the contamination of crops, soil, or water. 

Its use must be part of an organic system plan that 

maintains or improves the natural resources of the 
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operation, including soil and water quality, and 

comply with crop nutrient and soil fertility 

requirements.

As a liquid fertilizer containing more 

than 3 percent nitrogen, ammonia extracts 

currently listed by OMRI are considered 

high-nitrogen liquid fertilizers or HNLFs. Two 

onsite inspections, one announced and one 

unannounced, are conducted each year at each HNLF 

facility, per NOP Guidance 5012. Mass balance 

exercises, those exercises that compare the amount 

of incoming material with production records, are 

used as a fraud mitigation strategy. Obtaining 

accurate results from these exercises can be 

difficult when nitrogen sources are varied and 

numerous. With that said, mass balance exercises, 

along with an expected nutrient calculation and 

on-site visits, are all methods that, when used 

together, can combat fraud. Those formulations 

which contain less than 3 percent ammoniacal 

nitrogen would not be subject to those same 

requirements, so the risk of adulteration remains. 
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However, that risk already exists for all liquid 

fertilizer products that are not subject to 

inspection.

List 3 inerts -- as included in our 

written comments, 18 passive pheromone dispensers 

currently appear on the OMRI products list. 

Included in these products are a total of three 

distinct materials on the EPAs 2004 List 3, a list 

that includes close to 2,180 materials. OMRI is 

aware of one other 2004 List 3 material approved 

by another organic certifier. Given the apparent 

limited number of known List 3 inerts used in 

practice, the Board might consider moving towards 

listing these materials on the National List while 

considering the sunset review of 2004 List 3 

inerts. Great. Thank you all for your time and 

important work on these difficult issues.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Doug. Are there 

questions from the Board? I have one. So given 

that some of these products that have greater than 

3 percent ammonia content are already approved, 

are there alternatives to those products if we were 
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to limit or accept the prohibitions proposed by 

the petition? Understand there are already 

products out there, but are there suitable 

alternatives to those products if we were to accept 

the petition?

MR. CURRIER: Suitable alternatives 

might include the sodium nitrate that is already 

prohibited on 602 with a restriction. There are, 

you know, products that are less than 3 percent 

nitrogen and not qualifying as HNLF. Then there's 

a whole suite of, you know, not lower soluble 

nitrogen sources that are derived from animal 

materials, in particular, as well as plant 

materials. So, yes, there are alternatives, but 

they vary in their solubility and form, I guess. 

Yes. So to me, that's kind of what I'm thinking 

in response to that question.

MR. ELA: Just to follow up and then 

Amy has a question. So do you see those products 

that contain higher than 3 percent ammonia at this 

point -- I mean, my understanding and please 

correct me, is the ammonia extracts are all 
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relatively pure ammonia, whereas these other 

products, you know, when you say higher than 3 

percent, I mean, 15 or 10 percent is a lot different 

than 100 percent. Would there be a limit to the 

amount of ammonia that a product could contain that 

would be acceptable, do you think, and still maybe 

prevent the use of straight ammonia products? I 

don't know if I'm asking every well, but...

MR. CURRIER: Yes. It depends on the 

-- I think to me that it depends on how it's used 

on-site and the organic system plan and, you know, 

the certifier making the call on whether or not 

the producer is, you know, meeting that 205.MR.203 

standard. You know, I would say under OMRI's 

standards, there wouldn't be a threshold like that 

that would prevent a listing. So if it's a 

non-synthetic source and they're meeting all the 

standards, they're going to get restricted, but 

there's no upper threshold.

MR. ELA: Amy, why don't you go ahead.

MS. BRUCH: Sure, Steve. Thank you. 

Thanks, Doug, for your contributions today and 
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your work as the Technical Director for OMRI. I 

just wanted to know -- you kind of briefly commented 

on fraud prevention with some of these 

high-nitrogen liquid fertilizers out there and the 

amount of effort that goes into the dual 

inspections. You had mentioned in the written 

comments that mass balancing isn't always the

easiest to determine 100 percent that things are 

kosher. Is there any way to determine that the 

production of these synthetic versions of ammonia 

extracts are non-synthetic or synthetic, then, at 

the end of the day?

MR. CURRIER: Yes. We've moved away 

from -- So, the isotope analysis is one that, you 

know, has been used in the past, and we've moved 

away from that. It is tricky whenever you have 

large amounts of nitrogen sources to, you know, 

complete that mass balance. I'm very interested 

in the infrared spectrometry that I heard earlier. 

I did take a note of that. But it is tricky 

because my understanding is that chemically these 

are going to be showing up as identical to synthetic 
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versus non-synthetic sources. And so at that 

point, it really gets into the auditing and the 

on-site inspections, and the testing is one that, 

you know, could come into play, you know, 

especially that infrared spectrometry. That was 

interesting. But, you know, it's just a lot of 

documenting, you know, on-site and doing some 

trace-back on sources.

MR. ELA: Brian has a question unless 

you have some else, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: No, I didn't. Thanks, 

Steve. Thank you, Doug.

MR. ELA: Okay, go ahead. Go ahead, 

Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, thanks, Doug. And 

I'm just wondering, the way it's currently written, 

if ammonium extracts were prohibited, would that 

also prohibit, like, fish emulsions and some other 

kinds of fertilizers that contain some ammonia.

MR. CURRIER: It depends on how it's 

written at 602. I think that there is a risk. 

I think someone had hinted to that earlier about 
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the definition of ammonia extract being really 

broad and, you know, perhaps unintentionally 

prohibiting sources of less concern. You know, 

these concentrated ammonia products, I believe, 

are the area of concern according to the petition. 

So these are elevated, highly soluble sources of 

ammonia and ammonium.

MR. CALDWELL: Great. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? Thank 

you very much, Doug. I very much appreciate your 

presentation here.

MR. CURRIER: Thanks.

MR. ELA: Next up we have Karen Howard, 

followed by Michael Menes, and then Ramy Colfer. 

We'll do a few more here and then take a break. 

Maybe a couple after Ramy. But go ahead, Karen.

MS. HOWARD: Good afternoon. Thank 

you for the time. My name is Karen Howard. I'm 

the Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director 

for the Organic and Natural Health Association. 

We are a highly unique trade association in the 

dietary supplement space. Founded in 2015, we 
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represent the entirety of the supply train, from 

raw ingredient suppliers to manufacturers, 

distributors, dietary supplement brands, 

retailers, and consumers. Every decision made by 

our board of directors is rooted in the interest 

of consumers and we are very fortunate to have the 

American Grass Fed Association, Organic Consumers 

Association, SENPA, and Alliance of Independent 

Retailers, and individual progressive retailers 

like Lassen's Natural Grocers and Nature Time, 

among our members. We are also unique in that are 

members pledge to uphold principles of full 

transparency for consumers, accessibility to 

healthy products, and education to all individuals 

and communities, traceability of sourcing and 

processing, and continual quality improvement. 

This pledge includes regular surveillance testing 

of finished products for glyphosate residue and 

we are currently working to expand testing to a 

much wider a array of pesticides.

We understand that the health of people 

is dependent on the health of our earth, not the 
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other way around. To that end, our ongoing 

membership education efforts are focused on the 

relationship between human and environmental 

health. Topics that include microbiome, 

regenerative and biodynamic agriculture, and, of 

course, the organic standards. Degradation of the 

organic standard and its negative impact on our 

highly competitive dietary supplement market is 

a primary conversation. The growing prevalence 

of synthetic biology ingredients made in secret, 

sold without disclosure into our supply chain, is 

one of greatest concern. Our efforts to achieve 

our mission often refer to the guidelines 

established by the Organic Foods Production Act, 

but those guidelines alone are insufficient.

We also strongly support frameworks 

like Organic International from IFOAM and the 

Organic Consumers Association Regeneration 

International Forum. Our power rests in our 

ability to address the concerns of millions of 

Americans through our consumer education programs 

to date, focused on the importance of nutrition 
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supplementation. In just the past few months, 

more than 65 million people have learned from TV, 

radio, and print the importance of vitamin D for 

immune health. We look forward to creating a 

message that educates consumers on how purchasing 

organic food and supplements can support the 

planet's ecology, improve the health of our 

citizens, and improve treatment of farmers and farm 

workers across the globe. They deserve to know 

and understand that real public health requires 

us to be organic and regenerative in all our 

practices. You can visit 

www.organicandnatural.org for more information. 

Thank you. 

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Karen. 

Are there questions for Karen? I am not seeing 

any right off, so thank you very much, Karen. We 

appreciate your comments. We are going to move 

on to Michael Menes, followed by Ramy Colfer, and 

then Ehsan Toosi. Go ahead, Michael.

MR. MENES: All right, Steve, I want

to make sure you can hear me.
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MR. ELA: Yes, we can hear you and it 

looks like we've got your slides up, as well. So 

go ahead.

MR. MENES: Great. My name is Mike 

Menes. I've worked at True Organic Products for 

the past 12 years. Thank you to the NOSB for doing 

what you do. True Organics is an organic 

fertilizer manufacturer built to support the 

organic industry and the principles surrounding 

the movement. Today I'm here to clarify the 

definition of ammonia extract. Also, you'll hear 

from others on the team that will address the 

questions posed in your discussion document and 

also present the different perspective of focusing 

on the economic impacts.

The introduction of AE presents us a 

fork in the road of the organic industry. There 

are two paths here before us. One path originates 

from the organic pioneers and got us to where we 

are today. Consider a $50 billion industry that 

feeds the soil. The second path is one that 

exploits weaknesses in the system that were never 
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imagined during the development or the Organic 

Foods Production Act 30 years ago. Think about 

it, the use of ammonia fertilizers in organic crop 

production. AE manufacturing techniques may not 

be new or novel, but the application certainly is

novel. I acknowledge the variety of non-synthetic 

processes to achieve ammonia products and humbly 

request that you focus on the finished form of 

nitrogen being applied to the soil.

The definition submitted in the 

petition took much thought and consideration. In 

the end, the scope is satisfactory in that the focus 

was on the nitrogen containing product that goes 

into the soil at the time of application. The 

recurrent question was always, what form is that 

nitrogen in? Was it ammonia or ammonium, or some 

other forms, like a protein or an amino acid? Does 

mother nature need to break it down even further? 

Regardless if it was stripped or concentrated, 

where did that minimization take place? 

The definition of ammonia extract is 

critical. Part of the consideration should be if 
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ammonia is intentionally extracted or concentrated 

prior to the application in the field. This would 

exclude any currently accepted organic 

fertilizers, including compost teas and manure 

slurries. For example, manure slurry adds water 

to the manure for mobilization purposes. Nitrogen 

is predominantly in a non-volatile protein form 

and not ammonia or ammonium. Ammonia is not 

intentionally extracted. In closing, please 

consider your technical review that repeatedly 

states that AE is equivalent to a synthetic 

ammonia. Clearly the use of AE is not compatible 

with organic farming principles. The work you do 

for organic is critical on all fronts, at every 

meeting, for every decision. Your decision on AE 

is pivotal to the future of organic. I'm grateful 

for your dedication to this and look forward to 

your decision.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Michael. 

Are there questions for Michael? I have a 

question, Michael. It's certainly been brought 

up before -- appreciate your definition that you 
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shared in the petition, but if we weren't to accept 

that we completely prohibit it, would there be a 

limit that you would place, like such as in an 

annotation? I know you're in favor of 

prohibition, but if that didn't happen, what 

percent would you say might be appropriate? 

MR. MENES: You know, Steve, I don't 

think any of it should be allowed. I go back to 

the whole idea of is it compatible with the organic 

principles or not? Does it harm the soil and the 

environment Is it really necessary? So I don't 

think any part of it should be included in there. 

So I would be for a complete prohibition.

MR. ELA: Like with other highly 

soluble fertilizers, do you feel like those are 

adequate alternatives to ammonium extract? I 

mean, you know, we've heard from farmers, like in 

Vermont, if they have a hurricane blow through, 

they need some kicker, you know, just to kind of, 

you know, not rely on it but something immediate. 

I know in tree fruit, sometimes in cold Springs 

we need something. Do you think the other 
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materials available adequately address those 

needs?

MR. MENES: I do. I think there's a 

lot of other materials out there. There's still 

a lot of innovation that happens. They are 

water-soluble, but they also include the microbial 

degradation needed to be able to fit the organic 

principles. I think they are suitable to meet 

those needs addressed.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you very much. 

Any other questions for Michael? Thank you for 

your comments, Michael. They are much 

appreciated. 

MR. MENES: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

Ramy Colfer, then Ehsan Toosi, and then Zea 

Sonnabend. And after Zea, I think we will take 

a break. So, Ramy, please start your comments and 

state your name and affiliation.

MR. COLFER: Great. Thank you. Can 

you hear me?

MR. ELA: Yes, we can. Go ahead.
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MR. COLFER: Okay. Yes. My name is 

Ramy Colfer. I've worked as a research agronomist 

for True Organic Products over the last three 

years. Before coming to True, I spent 18 years 

working at Earthbound Farm, where I was involved 

with farming of organic leafy vegetables in 

fertility management, pest management, and seed 

selection. Traditionally, organic farming has 

been based on an approach that requires slow 

building up of soil fertility using good crop 

rotation, cover crops, and the adding of 

carbon-rich natural organic amendments to the 

soil. These approaches require time to develop 

soil health and soil fertility, building up natural 

enemies of pests and developing healthy plants that 

have some tolerance to pests and diseases. These 

processes require biological systems and natural 

food webs that allow organic farm systems to 

function successfully. The widespread use of 

ammonia extract products in organic farming would 

dramatically change how organic farms function. 

Mineral-based ammonia would not be required in 
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the biological systems to provide nitrogen to the 

crops. There's a growing awareness in soil 

management practices. Increasing soil carbon 

levels is critical for combating global climate 

change, exemplified by documentaries like Kiss the 

Ground.

Organic farming practices have been 

decades ahead of the regenerative agriculture 

movement and it would be tragic if ammonia extract 

products became widespread in organic agriculture, 

pushing organic farming in the direction away from 

regenerative agriculture. The founders of the 

organic farming movement, then later the USDA, NOP, 

and the NOSB have developed lists of strict 

standards that define organic farming and 

differentiate it from conventional agriculture. 

A line in the sand was drawn and the label 

Certified Organic has great meaning because of 

these strict rules. There has always been great 

efforts to push this line towards conventional 

agriculture and I'm afraid ammonia extract 

products would dramatically push this line towards
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conventional agriculture. It is imperative the 

NOSB stand up and do the right thing for organic 

farming and prohibit the use of ammonia extract 

products.

Proponents of AE products in organic 

farming have argued against the negative impacts 

of these products in organic farming systems. To 

be clear, these arguments are not new. These 

arguments were used to justify ammonia extract and 

are the same arguments used in the past to say 

there's no difference between organic farming and 

conventional farmer. This is a rehashing of 

arguments that conventional fertility management 

is not bad and not different from organic fertility 

management. And I ask, you know, do you believe 

that? Thank you to the NOSB for your hard work.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much for your 

comments. Are there questions? I have a 

question, just following up. So if your thoughts 

are that any fertilizer applied would have to go 

through some other microbial breakdown, like 

soybean hydrolysates have to go through that 
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breakdown, but they may have similar problems or 

other highly soluble fertilizers, how do you 

differentiate some of these other highly soluble 

fertilizers from the ammonium extracts?

MR. COLFER: I would say that they're 

different in the sense that they are not in a 

mineral form and they require the soil microbiology 

to break them down into a mineral form. So you're 

excluding the biological loop, which is, you know, 

the premises of organic farming, right, the 

definition of requiring the biological system for 

organic farming.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board?

MS. PETREY: I have a question, Steve. 

Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: Yes. Go ahead, Logan.

MS. PETREY: Yes. Okay. I have a 

question. Do you believe that sodium nitrate 

usage should also be prohibited?

MR. COLFER: Yes, I do. I mean, I know 

my time at Earthbound Farm, you know, we grew 
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thousands of acres of organic leafy vegetables 

which require a lot of nitrogen and we never used 

sodium nitrate. And I think it can be done with 

current available nutrients that are allowed for 

organic farming currently and I don't think it's 

consistent with organic farming principles either. 

It's kind of a crutch that was grandfathered in.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? Great. 

Thank you so much for your comments.

MR. COLFER: Thank you.

MR. ELA: They are very much 

appreciated. We are going to move onto Ehsan 

Toosi, and -- let's see, what did I say -- followed 

by Zea Sonnabend, and then a break. So, Ehsan, 

please go ahead and I probably have mispronounced 

your name. My apologies.

DR. TOOSI: Sure. Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: Yes, we can.

DR. TOOSI: Good afternoon, everyone. 

My name is Ehsan Toosi. I am a member of the R&D 

team at True Organic Products. Over the past ten 

years since completion of my PhD, I have 
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contributed to the field of sustainable soil 

management by publishing, teaching, and working 

in the ag industry. I do appreciate the Board for 

giving me the opportunity to share my view on the 

use of AE based products.

One of the fundamental differences in 

nutrient management between organic and 

conventional farming is involvement of soil 

biology in nutrient cycling in organic systems. 

A key aspect common to both organic and natural 

ecosystems is that nutrients are delivered in 

complex forms and are then gradually released in 

plant available forms. A wide range of microbes 

and fauna utilize the added materials as a source 

of energy and nutrients during decomposition of 

complex inputs. 

In conventional systems in contrast, 

nutrients, including nitrogen, are added 

episodically via mostly synthetic fertilizers in 

forms that are immediately available for the plant. 

The practice does not depend on soil biological 

processes at all and, thus, it is opposite to the 
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concept of soil health. Numerous reports have 

shown enhanced biological activity and diversity 

of soil microbes and fauna, over time, as a result 

of conversion of conventional to organic farming, 

primarily due to switching from synthetic 

fertilizers to abundant supply of carbon-rich 

complex inputs.

It is important to note that ammonium 

and nitrate that are the available nitrogen forms 

for the plant are indeed the microbial by-products 

of breakdown of complex nitrogen forms. They are 

gradually released to the soil during 

decomposition. In conventional systems, supply 

of nitrogen via synthetic fertilizers has resulted 

in bypassing the soil food web. This is in 

contrast to one of the fundamentals of organic 

farming, which is promoting soil health. Direct 

addition of ammonium to soil does not occur in 

nature. When ammonium is added to soil it 

minimally cycles within the soil food web and 

rather is rapidly taken up by the plant, as well 

as some of microbes, as is or after its fast 
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conversion to nitrate.

Together, allowing application of 

ammonium to soil, even if it is technically 

non-synthetic or is used to supply on a fraction 

of a crop's nitrogen demand, or if it's blended 

with carbon, will still be a step away from the 

notion of feed-the-soil back to the feed-the-crop 

concept that has been practiced for decades in 

conventional farming. Thank you again. 

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you very 

much for your comments. They are appreciated. 

We are going to have one more person before the 

break. That'll be Zea Sonnabend. After break, 

we're going to have Angela Wartes-Kahl, and then 

Jake Evans, just so you are aware. So, Zea, please 

take the floor and go ahead.

MS. SONNABEND: Thank you. You can 

hear me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. SONNABEND: I am Zea Sonnabend from 

Fruitilicious Farm, a certified organic fruit 

grower, and a former member of the NOSB from 2012 
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to 2017 in the scientist seat. I was involved in 

many of the issues that you're now considering. 

I'd like to welcome the new members in particular 

who are embarking on five years of interesting and 

challenging issues. In the interest of 

transparency, I have consulted on the ammonia 

extract petition and I'm the lead author of the 

petition on kasugamycin on behalf of the California 

Apple Commission. I also serve on the OMRI Review 

Panel and Advisory Council. My comments today are 

solely my own. I do not represent the other 

entities. Although I have a lot to say about 

everything, my written comments sum up much of it. 

I want to talk mostly about inerts.

Inerts issue one. The List 3 inerts, 

as several commenters have already made clear, it 

would be ideal to put them on the National List 

individually because there are very few of them. 

Unlike what some people said, that they should 

be petitioned, some of them already have been 

petitioned. I think three out of the four, there 

are old petitions for. These companies went to 
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all the effort to disclose what was in the products 

and write petitions, and yet the NOP at the time 

did not have money for TRs and decided to list them 

this other way. You could just dust off the old 

petitions, solicit a new one, and put them on the 

list for their limited use, but do not remove the 

existing listing until a replacement is in place.

Inerts issue number two. You already 

have a TR and a discussion document on the NPEs, 

nonylphenol ethoxylates. There's no reason why 

you can't advance this issue to a proposal and 

remove these from the National List while the long 

process of dealing with an alternative inerts 

proposal happens at the Department.

Inerts issue number three. Even 

though your resolution at the last meeting, which 

I thank you for because the NOP has been glacial 

in response to this, but it gives them all the 

power. You need to keep the pressure on and so, 

if you have not done so already, someone on the 

NOSB, especially who's early in their term, should 

be designated to be a point person on inerts policy 
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to help the Department and to interface with the 

public.

I want to say, in closing, I support 

the ammonia extracts petition and, as the author 

of the petition on kasugamycin, I can answer any 

technical questions. But I want to point out that 

streptomycin is where a lot of the contradictory 

research comes from that (audio interference) not 

appropriate. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Questions? I am not -- oh, 

Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Can you just finish your 

thought there on the streptomycin correlation?

MS. SONNABEND: Yes. The TR gives a 

lot of accurate information about which research 

is specific to kasugamycin, of which there's 

relatively little of it having any environmental 

or health effects because it's not used in human 

and animal medicine. So I refer to the TR. What's 

coming in from public comment, though, is a lot 

of hypothetical -- I don't want to say it's stereo, 

but a lot of speculation about resistance transfer. 
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But all of the information about resistance 

transfer has to do with streptomycin and maybe a 

little bit about tetracycline, which are widely 

used in animal agriculture and are wildly exposed 

to the environment. Kasugamycin is a quite 

different compound from streptomycin and you 

cannot just automatically assume that research for 

streptomycin applies to kasugamycin.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Other questions from the 

Board? I have a quick one, Zea. Speaking of 

kasugamycin, in the TR it noted that it was not 

a good idea to apply it within -- I can't remember 

off the top of my head -- within two months or some 

set of time after animal products were applied. 

Do you remember that from the TR and do you have 

a comment on that?

MS. SONNABEND: After animal products 

were applied?

MR. ELA: Yes. Rick might be able to 

help me out here, but basically --

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.
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MS. SONNABEND: In actuality, it is 

only used during the bloom period and so if --

there's nothing on the label that says you have 

to separate its application from animal products. 

But that would be very easy to do because the bloom 

period for most of the country is only a few weeks. 

In California -- and this is one of the reasons 

that we turned in the petition -- we have extensive 

rat tail bloom, what's known as rat tail bloom, 

because of the very warm winters and extended 

springs that don't allow bloom to all happen at 

once. And so our bloom period might last for six 

weeks instead of two or three weeks. And this is 

one of the reasons why the other alternative 

practices don't work very well. The blossom 

protect doesn't work very well because it just 

doesn't get through the end of the blooming period. 

And so our crops are very susceptible to fire 

blight infection. This is especially on pears, 

but on certain varieties of apples, as well.

MR. GREENWOOD: Steve?

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Rick.
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MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. I think what you 

were referring to was the potential for animal 

grazing in orchards where kasugamycin had been 

used. So the fact that most of it runs off of the 

trees and onto the ground, can get into the animal 

population. The other thing, Zea, I think you may 

have seen that there has been a change in soil 

microflora after kasugamycin has been used. So 

it does have an impact on the flora of soil, so 

we don't really know what the long-term effects 

of that are. And it is another aminoglycoside, 

so it is fairly similar to streptomycin.

MS. SONNABEND: Yes. But there aren't 

enough long-term studies to know how long the 

change in microflora takes place, you know, or how 

long it lasts for, and whether other organic 

practices, such as cover cropping and applying 

compost, mitigate that change. So, you know, 

definitely there's always the need for more 

research on different substances. But this one 

appears to me to be as benign as many of the other 

biological organisms that we use that might also 
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change the composition of flora.

MR. GREENWOOD: I guess the question 

is, do you want to use it and then find out three 

years later than it might be a mistake rather than 

having the research first? I think that's what 

I would say in the comments.

MS. SONNABEND: Okay. I don't think 

there's any indication that it lasts for anywhere 

close to three years.

MR. GREENWOOD: No. No. What I mean 

is --

MS. SONNABEND: It's up to you to 

evaluate that from the TR.

MR. GREENWOOD: No. You 

misinterpreted. What I meant to say was that maybe 

we need to do more research rather than letting 

it be used now and find out three years later that 

there's an effect. That's my final comment.

MS. SONNABEND: That's up for you to 

evaluate, but yes.

MR. ELA: All right. Any other 

questions? Thank you, Zea. Much appreciated.
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MS. SONNABEND: Sure.

MR. ELA: Okay. We are going to take 

a ten minute break and after break we'll have Angela 

Wartes-Kahl, and then Jake Evans, and then Kirk 

Sparks. So we will see you all at 52 -- well 18 

minutes before the hour or 52 minutes after the 

hour. However you want to figure that. So we'll 

see you all in ten minutes.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 3:42 p.m. and resumed at 

3:52 p.m.)

MR. ELA: All right. I think we are 

ready to start again.

MS. ARSENAULT: Ready, here.

MR. ELA: Okay. Off we go. Next up 

we have Angela Wartes-Kahl, then Jake Evans and 

Kirk Sparks. I said it at the start of the meeting, 

but just remind everybody just about our 

professional ethics, that we want to make sure not 

to call anybody out personally or a company out 

specifically since they don't have a chance to 

respond. So I just always like to state that.
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So if that happens, I will break in and 

avoid that problem. So I have to say everybody 

has been great about that so far. So Angela, 

please go ahead and I'll just say like Jake and 

Kirk are coming up. So please introduce yourself 

and your affiliation.

MS. WARTES-KAHL: Thank you very much. 

Can you hear me? Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: We can. I'm sorry. I had 

to get myself off mute. Go ahead, Angela.

MS. WARTES-KAHL: No, it's fine. Good 

afternoon, Board members. My name is Angela 

Wartes-Kahl and I'm a consultant with Independent 

Organic Services, Inc. and an organic inspector. 

Thank you for the opportunity to give public 

comment on the human capital proposal. I'll be 

focusing on the apprenticeship aspect of training 

new inspectors.

The apprenticeship is the bridge 

between graduating from the core crop livestock 

and processing trainings and paid inspection work 

with the certifiers. The Apprenticeship.gov 
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Program hosted by the US Department of Labor 

outlines five key components of an apprenticeship 

program. Pay to work while apprenticing, 

classroom learning, mentorship, work-based 

learning, and credentials.

IOIA and partners are best suited to 

codify, strengthen, and scale an organic 

apprenticeship program. The IOIA and Mentorship 

Committee has been meeting twice a month since last 

September with the express purpose of developing 

solutions to the human capital issue in our 

profession. We intend to launch the IOIA Organic 

Inspector Apprenticeship pilot program later this 

year with the first intensive training being in 

livestock inspections.

Our committee members are some of the 

most senior organic inspectors in the industry. 

We feel confident IOIA is well positioned to 

respond to this opportunity and increase the 

inspector pool through collaboration with other 

non-profit organizations. We feel apprenticeship 

are a strong foundation that develop highly skilled 
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organic inspectors.

I also want to highlight, IOIA's reach 

is international. Since 1994, IOIA has trained 

new inspectors in South Korea, Hong Kong, Mexico, 

Japan, Canada, Australia, Nepal, India, Central 

America to name a few. And in the US, we intend 

to develop partnerships with more agricultural 

programs in the HBCU system.

For example, universities with strong 

ag schools like Florida A&M, Kentucky State, or 

NC State University, where they have established 

organic programs that we can work with to build 

out curriculum for future inspectors. This is a 

long-term goal and may take a few years to see 

fruition.

By including organic inspection 

coursework in existing Ag and Food Science 

programs, we highlight the importance of this 

career path from the beginning. Complementary 

courses like Technical Writing, Computer Science, 

Mathematics, along with Animal Science, will 

increase the quality of our recruits.
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We need to work together to develop best 

practices for fundamental issues like pay scale 

and continuing education and recruitment. 

Funding sources for such a broad program could come 

from government grants, certifiers, and a 

scholarship fund sponsored by organic brands. 

Inspectors have been a stakeholder in the organic 

industry from the beginning, and now we need 

support to strengthen our career path.

Thank you so much for your time today.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you for your 

comments. Are there any questions? Oh, Sue, go 

ahead.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. Hi. Thanks for your 

comments. We appreciate that as we try to develop 

some, at least, discussion on this topic. You had 

mentioned that you thought that the apprenticeship 

mentors could be funded with government grants and 

perhaps industry. Did I hear that correct?

MS. WARTES-KAHL: Yes, that is 

correct.

MS. BAIRD: So how would you -- how do 
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you think that we could use industry funding 

without a semblance of conflict of interest 

perhaps?

MS. WARTES-KAHL: No. That's a very 

good question. And IOIA actually consulted with 

their counsel too, and asked for a white paper on 

the subject of conflict of interest and whether 

or not brands paying for a scholarship fund for 

inspectors would then somehow influence how their 

future inspections would -- the results of those 

future inspections.

And that attorney decided it's not 

going to be a problem because the brands would be 

contributing to a scholarship fund held within 

IOIA, and IOIA would then be paying the mentors 

to work in that capacity in the Apprenticeship 

Program. And so there's several levels of 

separation between the brands and the actual or 

possible inspection by that inspector that worked 

as an apprentice. So it's pretty far removed in 

that case. Yes.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. That's great. 
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Thank you.

MR. ELA: Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. Thank 

you, Angela. I appreciate your comments and your 

time today. I just had a question for 

clarification real quick and then probably a 

follow-up. Did I catch that you mentioned that 

you're training inspectors in different countries?

MS. WARTES-KAHL: That is correct. 

IOIA trains inspectors, yes, all over the world.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Can you comment, 

just so I can understand a little bit better how 

it works to train inspectors in countries that have 

different standards then maybe what their own 

country standards offer?

So for example, you know, you had 

mentioned Nepal, I think, but some of the countries 

I think you mentioned have either substantially 

different standards than the NOP for their own 

current countries or even, even no standards. So 

can you just walk me through that process?

MS. WARTES-KAHL: So the international 
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trainings are all based on NOP. So it's basically 

for inspectors that would be working in countries 

that would be exporting into the US. And so their 

farms or processors or livestock operations would 

all be certified to the National Organic Program 

under their certificate.

And it might also include the EU and 

Canada and any number of other certifications that 

could be involved in that same operation. But the 

premise is NOP certification, and so the inspectors 

are trained in NOP criteria that's used onsite for 

whatever country they're in.

And many of their members are from all 

over the world. Because maybe just the country 

that they actually are based in doesn't export into 

the US, but they travel, you know, extensively all 

over Asia to inspect other operations that might 

actually be important to the US.

MS. BRUCH: And just to follow up with 

that, I understand that they're being trained on 

the National Organic Program Standards, but when 

they're from countries that currently don't have 
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equivalent standards, do you see as knowledge gap 

there in the training? And what do you do to 

overcome some of that if they don't have any 

background going into things?

MS. WARTES-KAHL: The actual 

recruitment side of the basic trainings for 

everybody including US, Canada, and 

internationally always has a component in the 

application that addresses expertise and 

background experience. They can't become 

inspectors unless they have something.

So a person straight off the street with 

no information or expertise in Ag or Food Science 

or nothing, isn't qualified for a crop or a basic 

livestock course in the first place because the 

application process is kind of a gatekeeper to even 

entry into that level.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you. I 

appreciate that.

MS. WARTES-KAHL: I don't know if I 

answered your question specifically. I 

apologize. But I -- yes. It's much more nuanced, 
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I think, than people assume. Just because you pay 

for a basic crop course with IOIA does not mean 

you're accepted into it. So it's not like that. 

It's not a pay to play system. There's an 

extensive application process that goes into it.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you for that 

additional insight. I appreciate it.

MS. WARTES-KAHL: Thanks, Amy.

MR. ELA: All right. I don't see any 

other questions, so thank you so much for your 

comments. They are very much appreciated.

MS. WARTES-KAHL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move onto Jake 

Evans. And then my understanding -- I'm just going 

to go down the list here -- Kirk Sparks, Otto Kramm, 

and Israel Morales. We don't see you on our list. 

So if you are, would you please let Michelle know 

you're there. But right now, we don't see you.

So we're going to do Jake Evans now, 

and in case those next three aren't there, we'll 

have Jessica Shade and then Megan DeBates after 

Jessica. So Jake, please go ahead.
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MR. EVANS: Good afternoon. Thank you 

for your service on the Board, your dedication to 

serving our organic industry, and the opportunity 

to comment on ammonia extract and to present you 

with the decision on which road organic will 

travel.

If we continue to travel down the path 

will we deliver the most nutritious, tasteful food 

utilizing the most innovative organic farming 

practices to improve the soil and the Earth, or 

do we mimic the conventional marketplace where 

profit drives decision-making.

You'll receive a lot of comments on AE. 

I ask you to consider the motivation for these 

comments. Is it to preserve our organic 

principles or to profit? It is clear there's a 

strong benefit to having plant-available nitrogen. 

Plant-available nitrogen will increase yields, 

drive profit.

Organic growers already have a source 

of plant-available nitrogen, sodium nitrate, which 

is far cheaper than AE. One main problem with 
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sodium nitrate is that if you apply to much, you'll 

kill your soil. Soil health must still driving 

decision making. This is not the case for AE. 

Poured on and boost yields at the expense of 

long-term soil building practices utilizing carbon 

based inputs, cover crops, and diverse crops 

systems.

I absolutely agree that to digest 

there's environmental benefits. Digester 

technology is a sustainable solution to the big 

waste problems created by conventional practices. 

But look at the cost of AE at 30 multiple over 

conventional ammonia. There is no market for AE 

in conventional ag. They need organic margins to 

cover that cost.

I do not believe the organic industry 

should pay for CAFOs' waste problems. CAFOs need 

to figure out how supplement their synthetic 

ammonia with AE. AE's 30 multiple over 

conventional ammonia opens a door to fraud that's 

hard to ignore. This is equivalent to a clamshell 

of strawberries going for $5 conventionally and 
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a 150 organically, or a box of broccoli going for 

20 conventionally and 600 organically. Can you 

imagine the temptation?

Synthetic ammonia will bleed into our 

industry on all levels, the manufacturer, 

distributor, and farm level, without the 

possibility of detection. We have an incredible 

organic industry. Over the past 30 years, we've 

had huge beneficial impacts on food, soil, the 

Earth, and people's lives doing it our way, the 

organic way. We're not perfect, but we're doing 

a lot of great things.

Next slide, please. Please look at 

this slide. Just because the word organic is in 

front of ammonia nitrate, does that change 

anything? Does that make it okay? As the TR 

states, it's identical to synthetic ammonia. Does 

this look like organic farming to you? Can we 

honestly say AE is going to improve our industry 

or be one of the worst mistakes we've ever made? 

I urge you to please take this vote in the fall. 

Thank you.
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MR. ELA: Okay. And Jake, I just want 

to note, I didn't interrupt there, but we'd prefer 

if you didn't use brand names such as that for 

somebody that doesn't have a chance to respond.

MR. EVANS: Oh, sorry.

MR. ELA: Okay. Questions from the 

Board?

MS. PETREY: I have a question or 

comment.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Logan.

MS. PETREY: Sorry. Okay. And so 

with a huge concern or a big topic of yours being 

profit or preserve organic standards, are you 

speaking not in support of the product strictly 

because you want to preserve organic standards and 

not because you think this is going to hurt your 

own profits because of True being, you know, a 

natural organic fertilizer industry?

MR. EVANS: No, thank you, Logan. I 

appreciate it. You know, we've had the ability 

to buy or sell AE for 10 years, and I've chose not 

to. And in fact, I think it's hurting our business 
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worse by not selling AE right now. But I knew if 

I brought AE to the masses, it would all be over. 

And my, you know, my business is built on 

integrity. And that's what I stand for in 

organics. That's why we do what we got to do with 

organics.

And I really hope the Board doesn't 

force me to get involved in AE. I mean, as we've 

seen, the applications for AE are floating into 

the OMRIs and CDFAs, believe me. They're calling 

me first, so if I have to, I can find some. It's 

not going to be a problem. Just call up China and 

watch it flood in like you wouldn't believe. But 

I'm really hoping the Board doesn't have to make 

me get involved in that business.

MS. PETREY: Got it. Thanks, Jake.

MR. EVANS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? I'm 

not seeing any. Thank you so much, Jake. Very 

much appreciate --

MR. EVANS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: -- your comments.
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MR. EVANS: Appreciate it. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Okay. Sure. So do we have 

Kirk Sparks, Otto Kramm, or Israel Morales? Or 

either three of you three on the call? All right.

MS. ARSENAULT: I haven't seen any of 

them, Steve.

MR. ELA: Okay. We will move on then. 

So next up is Jessica Shade, followed by Megan 

DeBates and then Laura Batcha. So go ahead, 

Jessica.

MS. SHADE: All right. Hi everyone. 

My name is Jessica Shade. I'm the director of 

Science Programs for the Organic Center. We're 

a non-profit organization that communicates 

research on organic, and we also collaborate with 

academic and governmental institutions to fill 

gaps in our knowledge.

So first of all, I want to say thank 

you to the Materials Subcommittee for its 

recommendation on research priorities. We're 

especially happy to see the inclusion of evaluation 

of bio-based mulch film whole-farm ecosystem 
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service assessment to determine the economic, 

social, and environmental impact of farming 

systems choices, organic no-till practices, plant 

disease management strategies, relationships 

between biodiversity and pathogen precedence, 

practices that reduced greenhouse gas emissions, 

the examination of factors influencing organic 

food access, and production and yield barriers.

We're actively involved in conducting 

and communicating research on those issues. And 

NOSB prioritization is really helpful for us for 

things like securing funding. So I'm going to go 

ahead and move onto our suggestions for additions 

to this year's NOSB research priorities.

Based on feedback that we've received 

during our own outreach efforts. We'd like to 

suggest additional topics be added to the 2021 

research priorities, including benefits and risks 

of livestock integration into crop rotations; 

nutritional value of organic animal products such 

as dairy, meat, eggs; protection of organic farmers 

from chemical contamination; and comparisons of 
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pesticides, antibiotic, and synthetic growth 

hormone residues in organic and conventional 

products.

We'd also like to see the focus on 

alternatives to conventional celery powder for 

curing organic meat that was included in the 2019 

research priorities be included in this year's 

priorities, because while we're currently working 

on this issue in collaboration with the University 

of Wisconsin-Madison and a few other academic 

institutions, we still don't know what findings 

we're going to have.

And then we also submitted comments on 

ammonia extract. So I'm happy to take questions 

on either topic. Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Jessica, are there 

questions from the Board? Okay, Jessica. I'll 

bite on ammonia extracts. Being that you're from 

a research organization, give me, you know, some 

succinct comments, please.

MS. SHADE: So the main point of our 

comments on ammonia extract is that we can't know 
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how the extracts are going to interact with the 

soil until research is conducted on each specific 

product. We can make some broad generalizations 

about how they might impact soil health based on 

research focusing on synthetic ammonia products. 

But even within synthetic ammonia products, 

there's a lot of variability on soil impacts 

depending on the type and the production method.

In general, the application of 

synthetic nitrogen fertilizers alters soil 

properties like pH, organic matter content, soil 

microbial communities, often with negative 

consequences. And also nitrogen will be 

mineralized at different rates ranging from days 

to years when derived from different types of 

amendments and applied to soils with, you know, 

varying amounts of soil organic carbon. And the 

rate of mineralization will affect leeching or 

accumulation potential, ammonia and salinity 

concentrations, and microbial activity.

So when nitrogen mineralizes quickly, 

as is usually the case with synthetic fertilizers 
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and even organics, water, or liquid products, the 

potential for leeching increases and long-term 

fertility efficiency can decrease while nitrogen 

from amendments, like, you know, yard clippings 

and plant based composts mineralize more slowly, 

which increases the potential for accumulation in 

the soil. And then also, carbon to nitrogen ratios 

in the soil and in amendments will influence 

nitrogen mineralization with more carbon slowing 

the process and increasing the potential for 

long-term fertility while reducing the potential 

for leeching.

But there are also studies that show 

that if nitrogen fertilizers are applied at or 

below optimum rates and balanced with the 

application of additional nutrients from various 

forms like organic manures, than the negative 

effects of long-term fertilization are reduced or 

even eliminated. So there just hasn't been much, 

if any, research looking at the impacts of ammonia 

extract directly. So we can't know.

And once more, studies need to be 
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conducted in an organic setting when they do get 

conducted. Because what happens in conventional 

systems might not be the same as you'd see in 

organic systems. But one thing that we can say is 

that for the most part, the extraction process is 

removing some of the raw organic matter that would 

otherwise be going into the soil, which does add 

a component to the carbon sequestration process.

We just released a study in 

collaboration with the University of Maryland that 

looked at specific soil health practices within 

organic to quantify their carbon sequestration 

impacts and evaluate how long it takes to see those 

benefits. And organic soil amendments had the 

biggest impact on carbon sequestration.

And those benefits could be seen 

immediately, in part due to the immediate boost 

of carbon to the soil from adding complex carbon 

structures in the form of compost, manure, et 

cetera. So that part of the process could be 

impacted and the timeline for seeing carbon 

sequestration benefits from soil amendments could 
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be delayed. But I'm just speculating --

MR. ELA: Jessica, I'm going to --

(Simultaneous speaking.)

MR. ELA: Yes. I'm going to interrupt 

just in the sake of time, so -- but thank you so 

much.

MS. SHADE: No problem.

MR. ELA: I appreciate that 

explanation. So if you want to send me those 

comments, I'm certainly happy to look at them as 

well. So all right. We are going to move on to 

Megan DeBates, then Laura Batcha, and then Dragan 

Macura. So thank you very much, Jessica. And 

we'll put Megan on the floor here. So go ahead, 

Megan.

MS. DEBATES: Hi. Thank you. I'm 

Megan DeBates, vice president of Government 

Affairs for the Organic Trade Association. The 

Organic Trade Association is the leading voice for 

the organic trade in the United States with a 

mission to protect and promote organic. We 

represent over 9,500 organic businesses across all 
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50 states, including every step of the value chain 

from farm to marketplace.

This is the first NOSB meeting since 

Secretary Vilsack has taken the helm at USDA once 

again. Secretary Vilsack has laid out an 

ambitious new agenda for the Department drawing 

on the priorities of President Biden to Build Back 

Better. Hearing small and mid-size family farms 

can thrive in transitioning to a more sustainable 

system of agriculture to mitigate and adapt to 

climate change are key points in this new vision.

Advancing organic agriculture must be 

central to achieving these goals, given the 

opportunities that organic farming provides for 

family farmers to remain competitive and 

profitable, and the science back climate 

mitigation benefits of organic. However, organic 

cannot thrive without the support of a strong 

national organic program that can meet the 

increasing consumer and environmental demands on 

our food system.

Very purpose of the organic Foods 
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Production Act is to, quote, establish national 

standards, and, quote, assure consumers that 

organically products need a consistent standard. 

The work of the NOSB is critical to this. Most 

of the recommendations that have been made by this 

board in the last decade have been to address 

inconsistencies in the standards.

NOP has benefited from new resources 

and an increased budget from Congress with 70 staff 

now supporting the program. There continues to 

be a lack of focus on standards development with 

only the origin of livestock and the strengthening 

organic enforcement roles listed as priorities, 

which by the way, both of which have a statutory 

deadline set by Congress for completion.

So it was not Congress' intent in the 

OFPA to have any update to the standards built with 

Congress. Instead the NOSB was established to 

address standards questions and the direction was 

provided from Congress for USDA to consult and rely 

on the NOSB for these changes. NOSB 

recommendations on standards should be taken 
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seriously and implemented.

We urge you to hold NOP and USDA 

accountable in advancing the organic standards. 

Having clear, consistent standards is fundamental 

to the success of organic. Without that, any other 

measures to support Organic at USDA will not be 

impactful. It is central to your service on the 

Board to develop these recommendations of both 

consumer trust and maintain a level playing field 

for all those that choose to participate in the 

organic supply chain. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Megan. 

Are there questions? I am not seeing any. Thank 

you so much for your comments.

And I want to be clear, I ask that 

Jessica and the rest submit any extra comments to 

me. And actually I want to just be clear that 

that's not just for her. If there are follow-up 

comments when the Board for, we try and do that. 

So I just want to make sure I'm not giving 

preferential treatment to anybody.

And so we're going to move on to Laura 
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Batcha followed by Dragan Macura and then Mary 

Capehart. So go ahead, Laura.

MS. BATCHA: Thank you, Steve.

MR. ELA: No, Megan, I'm sorry. No. 

Wait. I'm all screwed up. Okay. Laura, go 

ahead.

MS. BATCHA: Can you hear me okay, 

Steve?

MR. ELA: We can. Go ahead.

MS. BATCHA: Okay. Great. Good 

afternoon, everyone. I'm Laura Batcha. I'm the 

CEO of the Organic Trade Association. And thank 

you for the opportunity to provide comment today.

I'll follow the comments by my 

colleague Megan by providing the Board with an 

update on the organic Livestock and Poultry 

Practices Rule that was finalized by Secretary 

Vilsack in his prior tour of duty at the Department 

of Agriculture in 2017, and then subsequently 

withdrawn by Secretary Perdue in 2018. While the 

withdrawal's been the subject of litigation for 

four years today, I would like to speak with you 
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not about the litigation, but about the underlying 

policy choices that may be made by the Department 

of Agriculture going forward.

For a brief history and a reminder when 

that first organic standards were finalized back 

in 2002, it was acknowledged that additional work 

on livestock and poultry standards would need to 

happen. And the discussion of standards

development related to animal care, outdoor 

access, and space requirements began with the 

National Organic Standards Board as early as 2002.

In 2009 and '10, the Board really dug 

in in earnest and worked on a recommendation that 

ultimately passed unanimously in 2011 and was 

turned over to the Department of Agriculture. 

Eventually, USDA issued a final standard known as 

the Organic Livestock and Poultry Practices Rule 

in January 2017. Despite a resolution from NOSB 

in the spring of 2017 calling on USDA to allow the 

Vilsack rule to become effective, under Secretary 

Perdue's helm, it was first delayed, and then 

withdrawn entirely in May of 2018.
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All the while there's been broad 

support within the organic community for the policy 

recommendations that the NOSB brought forward and 

we're codified in that final rule, including 

specificity around outdoor access and space 

requirements as well as the restrictions on 

physical alterations for livestock and poultry. 

Last week, Secretary Vilsack testified before the 

House Subcommittee on agriculture appropriations.

Fortunately, it appeared from his 

comments that the Department does not intend to 

defend or stay committed to the withdrawal of the 

rule. However, it was concerning to hear 

Secretary Vilsack say he believed the Department 

needed to start from scratch on the rule itself. 

These policies, including the outdoor access and 

space requirements, have been thoroughly vetted 

for over a decade.

Starting from scratch dismisses all the 

work done by prior NOSB, reiterated in 2017 by NOSB 

again, and the work on the part of the Department 

of Agriculture under Secretary Vilsack's prior 
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tenure. I urge the Board to continue as you have 

before and push for a final standard that reflects 

your initial recommendations and the final rule 

issued in 2017. Thank you for the opportunity to 

provide comments, and I'm happy to address any 

questions you might have on the topic.

MR. ELA: Than you, Laura. You get a 

gold star as well for timing. But questions for 

Laura? I am not seeing any. So thank you very 

much for your comments. 

MS. BATCHA: Have a good rest of your 

meeting, and thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on down 

the list. It looks like -- is Dragan Macura 

present? Michelle has looked for them, and we 

don't see them. All right. We're going to skip 

over then and go to Mary Capehart, followed by Tom 

Buman, and then Diana Kobus. Mary, please go 

ahead.

MS. CAPEHART: Good afternoon. My 

name is Mary Capehart. And I am the certification 

specialist at CROPP Organic Valley. We currently 
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represent roughly around 1,900 certified organic 

farms in 34 states. And I'm commenting today on 

the discussion document, Human Capital Management. 

CROPP is in a unique position to observe the 

current critical shortage of qualified organic 

inspectors.

Our farmer members is served by 30 

different certifiers and we receive extensive 

feedback on the performance of inspectors and 

certification services. Organic inspectors play 

a vital role in their organic certification 

framework, and are largely responsible for 

verifying the integrity to the organic standards. 

There are many training resources and continuing 

education opportunities for organic inspectors.

And general agreement amongst 

certifiers on minimum qualifications. However, 

USDA organic regulations do not include mandatory 

requirements for inspector qualifications or 

training. In 2018, the Accredited Certifiers 

Association developed a best practices document 

for organic inspector qualifications, which is the 
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basis of the International Organic Inspectors 

Association Training Program.

Farmers and handlers often express 

their frustration with inspectors who have no 

actual agricultural experience. However, a 

farming background by itself does not 

automatically make for a good inspector. Personal 

attributes such as professionalism, curiosity, and 

ethics, as well as time management and 

communication skills, can make a successful 

inspector.

A concerning trend is some inspectors 

feel increasingly subject to legal liability for 

performing onsite audits. High profile fraud 

cases in recent years have made being an organic 

inspector less attractive . And this has reduced 

the pool of individuals that are able to carry out 

effective organic inspections. Recruitment of 

qualified inspectors is not matching the growth 

of the sector, and experienced inspectors are 

exiting at an increasing rate. Many new 

applicants underestimate the challenge of the job 
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and lack support to gain knowledge and confidence 

in doing onsite audits.

Current critical needs, training that 

focuses on complex trace-back to match balance 

audits, investigation, and interview practices, 

communication, report writing skills, and 

independent inspectors cooperative to provide 

experience and mentorship, specialized training 

for inspectors and specific scopes, especially 

livestock. The current organic industry needs to 

be more inclusive of inspectors' resources to make 

the above happen. 

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Mary. 

Another gold star. Boy, we got two gold stars 

in a row. This is a new trend. Are there 

questions for Mary? I am not seeing any. Thanks 

so much for your comments, Mary --

MS. BAIRD: No. My hand was up. I'm 

sorry.

MR. ELA: Say that again.

MS. BAIRD: My hand was up. You didn't 

see me.
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MR. ELA: Oh, sorry. Mary, would you 

hang on.

MS. CAPEHART: Okay.

MR. ELA: Go ahead.

MS. BAIRD: Hi, Mary. Thanks. I 

really, really enjoyed your comments, specifically 

because you're the inspectee instead of inspectors 

or certifiers or whoever. So your perspective was 

a big help. I noticed in --

MS. CAPEHART: Well, thank you.

MS. BAIRD: -- in your comments you 

said, a funded mentoring program will link 

well-qualified, experienced inspectors with new 

entry inspectors, and I totally agree with that. 

I have become, you know, over 70-ish and don't 

really want to do all the travel I used to do even 

five years ago. I would love, love, love, to share 

my experience with new people, but I don't want 

to do it for free.

And I don't know if you were listening 

to IOIA's comments that they would lock to solicit 

industry and grant monies to perhaps provide some 
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of that mentoring apprenticeship program. How 

would you feel about that?

MS. CAPEHART: We're actually in the 

process of talking with them about that. So we 

at Organic Valley really want to be part of the 

solution in this. And part of the solution is 

really to help how we can provide the most competent 

inspectors out there in the organic industry.

And by raising that bar, it obviously 

maintains the USDA Organic seal. And with that, 

we all win. Organic Valley Farms, Organic Valley 

as a brand, and anyone else. So it's a win-win 

for everyone. So we are actually looking at how 

we at Organic Valley can help do that.

MS. BAIRD: Very good. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? 

Anybody else's raised hand I can almost ignore? 

Great. Thank you again for your comments. 

Thanks for staying on.

MS. CAPEHART: Thank you for your time, 

and take care.

MR. ELA: All right. It looks like --
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we had just skipped over Dragan Macura, but it looks 

like they are on the line. And so we're going to 

go back to Dragan. And then after that, we'll have 

Tom Buman, and then Diana Kobus. Dragan, if you're 

there, please go ahead.

MR. MACURA: Hello. Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: Maybe, maybe not. There we 

go.

MR. MACURA: Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: Yes, we can. Go ahead.

MR. MACURA: Okay. Good. Yes. 

Thank you. All right. So my name is Dragan 

Macura, and I am the founder and owner of 

AgroThrive, Inc., the manufacturer of liquid and 

dry organic bio-fertilizers in Gonzales, 

California since 2008. I would like to address 

the fraud issue as it relates to the petitioned 

material, ammonium extract.

The petitioner wants the normal 

material to be placed on the 205-602 list as the 

prohibited non-synthetic input. The proponents 

of the new nitrogen stores want to have it allowed 
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for use in certified organic agriculture since it 

is of natural and organic origin. Both have strong 

arguments for their positions and both list 

credible scientific evidence in support of their 

arguments, reminding me of a nightmare of the corn 

steep liquor that I was stressed in the middle of 

about 10 plus years ago.

It also reminds me of the rampant fraud 

that was prevalent more than 10 years ago. And 

this issue is bringing back the flashback from 

those years. Since the beginning of NOP rule and 

the legislation, nitrogen has been the most sought 

after nutrient by certified organic farmers. 

Nitrogen was the center of the attention during 

the flood of the fraudulent activities 10 plus 

years ago.

The fraudsters just added aqua ammonia, 

urea, or nitrates from Haber-Bosch process and 

labeled it organic. OMRI and WSDA bought it all, 

hook, line, and sinker as all these products were 

listed by both agencies. The CDFA was inexistent 

at the time. The fraudsters, however, paid for 
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it by doing jail and paying monetary fines that 

were in hundreds of thousands and millions.

Ammonium extract from natural sources 

is not a problem. In fact, most of us in the 

industry welcome the technology as it looks like 

it can provide a much needed nutrient and perhaps 

solve an environmental problem that is inherent 

in raising animals for food. However, the 

ammonium extract from natural sources is 

indistinguishable from the Haber-Bosch source of 

ammonia in us (audio interference) segue for the 

rampant use of chemical ammonia in the certified 

organic operations by just adding to already 

existing fertilizers, perhaps even to mine. Was 

that buzzer for me?

MR. ELA: That was the buzzer.

MR. MACURA: Oh, my goodness. Can I 

just read the conclusion?

MR. ELA: If it is in two sentences.

MR. MACURA: Yes. It's just one 

sentence. I hereby appeal to the NOSB to add the 

ammonium extract to the 205-602 list to prohibit 
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the non-synthetics, or at a minimum, put a hold 

to it until there is testing methods and inspector 

training before this product are developed.

MR. ELA: Great. Questions for 

Dragan? I am not seen any, Dragan. Thank you so 

much for your comments. I do appreciate it.

MR. MACURA: Oh, okay. Didn't get 

through half of it. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Well, you and many other 

people, so you're in good company. We're going 

to move onto Tom Buman, then Diana Kobus, and Linley 

Dixon after that. So Tom, please go ahead.

MR. BUMAN: Can you hear me okay?

MR. ELA: We can.

MR. BUMAN: Okay. Thank you for the 

opportunity to provide oral comments. My name is 

Tom Buman. I'm the CEO Precision Conservation in 

Iowa. My comments today concern the petition to 

eliminate the so-called ammonium extract. Today, 

I want to focus on three issues surrounding the 

petition. The definition of ammonium extracts, 

the concern for fraud, and the agronomic need.
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First, I'm concerned about the 

definition. I do not find any definitions of the 

term of ammonium extracts in academic journals or 

as a definition derived by academic researchers. 

The definition provided in the petition is 

uncertain and may eliminate existing viable 

products depending on the interpretation.

Before NOSB ruling, I would strongly 

encourage to clearly define what it is you allow 

and what you don't allow, and then look at the 

products that fall inside and outside of this 

decision. Without careful considerations, 

changes based on any definition could upset the 

organic supply chain.

The second issue is fraud. The 

argument of fraud as a reason to eliminate any 

products should be approached cautiously. Almost 

every organic product I know of has potential for 

fraud. Imagine how easy it would be for companies 

to eliminate competition by claiming any new 

product is subject to fraud.

Let's face it, it is the companies that 
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are producing these high-quality nitrogen products 

derived from animal manures, now termed ammonium 

extracts, that actually have the most to lose from 

counterfeit products. They have invested 

significant resources and want to keep this space 

free from controversy. Instead of purging 

products due to claims of fraud, I encourage all 

parties to work together to identify best practices 

to control fraud for organic farming.

As an example, blockchain would be a 

viable alternative for tracking and tracing. 

Blockchain is a system for recording information 

in a way that makes it difficult or impossible to 

change, hack, or cheat the system. This is just 

one example.

The third issue I want to address the 

agronomic need for new organic nitrogen products. 

Manure and cover crops will always play an 

essential part of building soil fertility and soil 

health for Iowa organic farmers. With novel 

products, organic farmers can achieve a more 

consistent blend of nutrients and continue to 
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maximize environmental sustainability.

I do not know of any organic certifiers 

or organic farmers that would allow these products 

as a sole source for their nitrogen program. 

Instead, these products that are derived from 

animal manure are merely a way to balance nutrient

needs while protecting water quality from the 

over-application of nutrients.

Consider these three issues, I strongly 

encourage NOSB to do more in-depth research before 

reaching a decision of so-called ammonium 

extracts.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Tom. 

Appreciate your comments. Are there questions 

from the Board? I have a question, Tom. If we 

don't prohibit them and it's required to these 

other soil health measures, would you be in favor 

of annotating the listing rather than prohibiting 

to a certain percent of nitrogen use in a cropping 

system?

MR. BUMAN: Yes. I think that is 

certainly a consideration. I mean, it's going be 
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important that we continue to use soil health 

practices, and if that's what it required, then 

I think that is a consideration.

MR. ELA: Would you be willing to put 

a number on what sort of annotation?

MR. BUMAN: You know, I have to go back 

to one of the previous speakers that said there's 

probably not been enough research on this. So I 

don't want to waffle on it, but I do think more 

information needs to be gathered on that.

MR. ELA: Fair enough. That's 

something certainly the Board will have to consider 

sooner than later if we decided to go that route. 

So that's why I keep asking people for a number. 

Any other questions from the Board? Thank you 

very much, Tom. We do appreciate your time and 

comments.

MR. BUMAN: Thank you very much.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

Diana Kobus then Linley Dixon and Jennie -- I'm 

going to butcher this again -- Chotirawi. Sorry, 

I'm terrible with phonetics. So Diana, please go 
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ahead.

MS. KOBUS: Great, thank you. It 

actually says it's unable to start my video because 

the host has stopped it.

MR. ELA: Just --

MS. KOBUS: Got it. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Oh, there you are.

MS. KOBUS: Thanks so much. I'm Diana 

Kobus, executive director of PCO. Along with five 

years of retail organic experience and academic 

study of the NOP while obtaining my Master's in 

Environmental Science, I served for 12 years as 

executive director of a non-profit that certifies 

environmental professionals.

During that 12-year period, I also 

volunteered with the accrediting agency, the 

Council of Engineering and Scientific Specialty 

Boards serving in various capacities, including 

co-chair of the Accreditation Committee and as 

president. I have a unique perspective on the 

issue of human capital currently before the NOSB 

and CACS.
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Qualified Inspectors for the USDA 

Organic Standards and Program are the keystones 

in upholding organic integrity, and we need 

sufficient members of them to maintain it. If we 

do not address this issue urgently, we are 

continuing to grow the sector without the proper 

foundation to support that growth while 

maintaining the integrity the public expects and 

demands from a USDA Program.

PCO agrees with the ACA's comments. 

However, we do not believe that the NOSB's proposal 

describes pan approach that is directed enough or 

centralized enough in its efforts to address the 

urgency of this situation. While many 

stakeholders may come together to address pieces 

of this proposal, an initiative of this scale and 

scope must be unified and centralized in its 

program creation, implementation, and enforcement 

in order to be effective and meet the urgent needs 

of the growing industry.

This specialized work deserves such a 

standard or a certification as defined in ISO 17024 
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for all of the reasons outlined in the ACA's 

comments and in the proposal ideally designed and 

monitored by the NOP or in conjunction with other 

qualified stakeholder groups. Though the general 

public's connotations of the farming professions 

may be that they are unskilled labor, we in the 

organic industry and at the ACA's in particular, 

understand the high degree of knowledge, 

expertise, and experience needed to be successful 

in this business of organic farming.

It is past time for inspectors and 

technical specialists to become recognized skilled 

professions earning the respect, wages, and 

support deserving of the environmental, scientific 

and experiential knowledge they bring to their 

work. As certifiers, our work is intended to 

ensure that the industry achieves recognized 

standards represented by the USDA Organic seal.

We need similarly recognized standards 

for the human beings, the human capital performing 

that work and serving as the unbiased keystone 

pieces in ensuring organic integrity. If we allow 
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for interpretations of rules from the variety of 

certification agencies and do not require standard 

training of inspectors and technical staff, how 

can we expect uniform decisions supporting organic 

integrity to be made in support of the NOP.

If as an ACA, PCO is charged with 

effectively enforcing a standard of organic 

integrity with transparency and the trust of the 

public, then we must have appropriate standards 

for the human capital performing that work.

My biggest concern as an ACA executive 

director is ensuring that we bring resources to 

this issue in a way that is unified in purpose, 

substance, and urgency. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Diana. 

Appreciate your comments. Any questions? Kyla 

has one.

MS. SMITH: Diana, just clear, I just 

want to make sure I underpin this correctly from 

your written comments and what you stated here 

today, is it correct that your recommending based 

on your knowledge and experience from previous work 
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that the unification and centralized part of this 

program, the responsible party should be the 

National Organic Program?

MS. KOBUS: I think they should set the 

standards and enforcement. Yes. I think there 

are a lot of different ways it can be accomplished, 

you know, utilizing the different stakeholder 

groups like the IOIA and others for different 

pieces of it. But the formation of the program 

itself and the enforcement really needs to be 

centralized, in my opinion, from the NOP.

MS. SMITH: Thanks.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board? I don't seen any. Thank you so much, 

Diana. Appreciate it.

MS. KOBUS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move onto 

Linley Dixon. And Jennie Chotirawi. Jennie, 

we're not seeing you on the list, so if you are 

there, could you contact Michelle? And then we'll 

go to Patrick Kerrigan. After Linley and Patrick, 

I'm going to circle back around to the people that 
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weren't here earlier and give them a chance in case 

they joined.

And then we will move onto a few people 

on the waitlist. I don't know how far we'll get 

on that, but we want to give everybody as much of 

an opportunity to speak as they can. So, Linley, 

you're on.

MS. ARSENAULT: Linley, I see you on 

the phone only, so you may have to hit star six 

to unmute yourself.

MS. DIXON: Hi, sorry, I was muted. 

Can you hear me now?

MR. ELA: We can. Go ahead, Linley.

MS. DIXON: Okay. I'm Linley Dixon, 

the co-director of the Real Organic Project. The 

Real Organic Project is a collection of now 850 

farms, and we're growing quickly. These farmers 

have come together behind the fundamental organic 

principle of soil health. I run a certified 

organic vegetable farm in Southwest Colorado, and 

we specialize in soil-grown tomatoes, greens, 

peppers, cucumbers, and herbs.
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All products that are increasingly 

hydroponic and organic. This comment is going to 

seem really rudimentary but sadly, we're here. 

Our farm, like many others, pride ourselves in 

composting. We cycle local veg scraps and 

landscaping waste into compost that is then added 

to our soil. No liquid feeding, no mining for 

added inputs. Please keep this in mind when making 

decisions.

Organic farming was founded on the 

basic principle cycling farm generated organic 

matter and local organic waste back into the soil. 

Many certifiers do enforce the soil health 

standards in OFPA. Many do not. Remember that 

the lowest standard allowed becomes the standard. 

When poultry porches were allowed as outdoor 

access, now over 90 percent of the organic eggs 

are produced in buildings with porches.

When the standards are weak, other 

labels rise. Pastured non-GMO eggs are everywhere 

outside of USDA Organic. Let's keep organic 

strong. Remember that a big tent means the 
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cheapest system wins. I directly compete with 

certified organic growers that simply fertigate 

with unsustainable off farm inputs at every 

watering.

Many use hydrolyzed soy originating 

from conventional GMO soy, soybeans that are 

synthetically fertilized, with multiple herbicide 

passes, and then synthetic acids are used to 

hydrolyze them. These conventional soybeans are 

grown just for the organic hydroponic market. We 

could save a lot of energy just by certifying the 

conventional GMO grains.

Real organic farming requires that you 

add enough locally generated organic matter to the 

soil to retain water and bleach nutrients slowly 

overtime. This is how we save water. This is how 

we can serve water. There's minimal nutrient 

leeching. This is how we filter and replenish 

water in our local aquifers, how we sequester 

carbon in our farming.

If organic continues to allow 

hydroponic and confinement livestock production, 
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organic will become irrelevant when it comes to 

mitigating climate change. The regenerative 

roundup farmers will get the carbon credit. While 

CAFOs and hydroponic producers shop to the right 

certifier to approve them, many of us shop to the 

ACA with integrity.

Please use your esteemed position as 

a National Organic Standards Board member. To 

stand on the right side, real organic. Publicly 

fight for real organic and remind the world why 

organic is always the best choice. Let's work to 

incentivize the market to move towards our shared 

principles. Thank you for volunteering your time.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. And 

you're right in the group of balancing time pretty 

well, so congratulations. Are there -- I see Nate 

has a question for you.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Just a quick 

question. Thank you for your comment, Linley. 

Would you be able to cite for us -- I think you 

mentioned 90 percent of all organic eggs come from 

chickens raised with porches as outdoor access. 
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Could you cite where that information came from?

MS. DIXON: Yes. It actually came 

from a conversation with Miles McEvoy. So it's 

not in print anywhere.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Okay. Well, that is 

it. All right. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Has a question.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. It's a question 

and also, I guess kind of a comment, you know, I 

think there's some really important issues here, 

and I think we do need new standards for container 

systems. You know, there's got to be a way to grow 

organic food, for example, on old parking lots or 

roofs of buildings and things like that. And, you 

know, we had some of that discussion a few years 

ago, but it stopped.

Nitrogen, also, I think is an issue that 

the community has discussed as well. We're having 

a lot of talk about ammonium extract, you know, 

most of the organic systems I know are importing 

manures that are from conventional agriculture, 

whether chicken manure or steer manure. And in 
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many systems I'm sure the majority of nitrogen is 

essentially recycled conventional nitrogen that's 

gone through an animal as grain. And you know, 

that's true for many farmers.

I have deep respectful for them. I've 

been in this field for decades. And so when we 

think about these things and you know, nitrogen 

cycling and climate change, there's a lot of 

challenges, and, you know, hopefully we can kind 

of shorten those loops and take out the 

conventional sources.

MS. DIXON: Are you arguing that -- it 

just makes sense to me that we might as well use 

synthetic nitrogen if we're just going to use the 

soybean that was fertilized with a synthetic 

nitrogen.

MR. BRADMAN: No. I'm not making any 

argument in favor of a specific source, but I think

what you're pointing to also -- and just beyond 

just the hydrolyzed soybeans is that there's a 

larger issue of nitrogen sources are many different 

systems, including almost all soil-based systems 
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that I know of are using essentially --

MS. DIXON: Yes. I'd agree with you, 

Asa. I see what you're saying, like, we've got 

essentially hydroponic production in the soil, and 

I wouldn't want that to be certified. And that's 

kind of what I was saying. There are ACAs that 

actually do enforce the soil health standards in 

OFPA and wouldn't certify that, you know.

I heard you comment on the, you know, 

raised strawberry beds that are, you know, covered 

in plastic and are essentially container, that 

shouldn't be certified as organic anyway. The 

National List with meant as an amendment, not to 

be the entire system.

MR. BRADMAN: Right.

MS. DIXON: And so hydroponics is where 

the entire system, you know, is based off of these 

highly soluble fertilizers.

MR. BRADMAN: Right. Right, I guess 

I'm just hoping in general that all the discussion 

around ammonia extract can also prompt a larger 

discussion about sources of nitrogen throughout 
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organic systems.

MS. DIXON: Yes, I would agree that 

that's important as well.

MR. ELA: And Asa, that sounds like a 

great thing to talk about at the Board meeting too 

between us all. So anything else for Linley? All 

right. Thank you so much, Linley. Very much 

appreciated. We are going to move onto Patrick 

Kerrigan as our final person on the normal list. 

We're going to circle back around to the people 

that weren't here.

And then we're going to go to the 

waitlist, and so if Laura Colligan and then Henry 

Ines will be on deck. We'll go to you if nobody 

else is present as we circle back around. So 

Patrick, please go ahead.

MR. KERRIGAN: Thank you. Dear 

organic stakeholders, I'm Pat Kerrigan with 

Organic --

MS. ARSENAULT: Pat?

MR. ELA: Patrick, you're a little 

faint, could you --
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MR. KERRIGAN: How's that?

MR. ELA: Still not great.

MR. KERRIGAN: That's as loud as it 

goes. I'll talk loud. I'm Pat Kerrigan will 

Organic Consumers Association, OCA and the organic 

community has been witnessing for years the 

continuing erosion of consumer trust in the USDA 

Organic Gold Standard because of lack of 

enforcement of OFPA requirements resulting in a 

large and growing number of consumers looking 

beyond organic to regenerative livestock and 

poultry and other kinds of foods.

With the ever increasing demand for 

healthy foods being grown, raised on healthy soils, 

we've seen the widespread greenwash and coopting 

of the term regenerative to the of which we now 

have McDonald's, Monsanto, Bayer, Target, and 

Walmart claiming to be regenerative. The spirit 

of organic should be regenerative but false 

technological solutions such as biofuels and 

carbon banking abound further confuse any 

consumers trying to find the most nutrient dense 
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and ecological sounds foods for their families.

Organic consumers are fed up with and 

appalled by the ongoing erosion of organic 

standards and enforcement. With synthetic 

substances being rubber stamped or having some 

hydroponic vegetables that are literally 

nutritionally watered down being marketed as 

organic. Animal livestock and poultry not being 

allowed to exhibit their natural habitat practices 

in organic CAFOs. All while consumers are paying 

a premium price for foods that do not meet their 

expectations.

Institutionalized regulatory neglect 

has resulted in organic producers having to create 

their own add-on organic label certified practices 

that consumers are erroneously expecting the NOSB 

and NOP to be protecting and enforcing. The fact 

that the vast majority of organic producers that 

are doing it right are having their livelihoods 

threatened by faux organic mega farms makes those 

prices even more onerous.

Organic consumers expect vegetables 
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that are grown in healthy soils as part of healthy 

ecosystems and livestock products from humanely 

treated animals that are allowed to exhibit their 

natural behaviors on grass and pastures. OCA 

wholeheartedly support the policy positions of 

OFA, ROP, and Beyond Pesticides is essential in 

protecting organic integrity and increasing 

consumer trust.

Finally, it is of critical importance 

that the NOSB and NOP support existing 

opportunities and work collaboratively with the 

organic community in wholeheartedly welcoming into 

and engaging with BIPOC farmers and ranchers and 

increasing opportunity of engagement in the 

organic market, and for consumers to find their 

products. OFA -- I'm sorry. OCA applauds the 

efforts of OFA, Rodale Institute, and other organic 

leaders in providing opportunities for Black and 

organic farmers.

We all must join in uprooting racial 

inequity and nourishing the seeds of regenerative 

organic justice. Thank you.
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MR. ELA: Thank you very much for your 

comments. Are there questions? I'm not seeing 

any, Patrick. Thank you, again.

MR. KERRIGAN: I just want to say thank 

you, NOSB Members. I know this is an enormous 

contribution of your time. I just wanted to tell 

you the whole organic community really appreciates 

your work. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you for those words, 

Patrick. We appreciate it. Just real quickly 

before we go to the waitlist. If Priscilla 

Iskandar, Artaynia Westfall, Kathy Park Price, 

Kirk Sparks, Otto Kramm, Israel Morales, or Jennie 

Chotirawi are on the call, could you please let 

Michelle know and we will go to you.

But if not, we're going to go ahead and 

go to the waitlist. We'll get through -- we're 

not going to go real long here, but maybe 20 

minutes-ish or so. So Laura Colligan, you are up. 

And then we'll have Henry Ines and Martin Burger. 

So Laura, if you're there, please go ahead.

MS. COLLIGAN: All right. Hello. My 
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name is Laura Colligan, and I own and operate 

Dirtrich Farm in Springville, New York. My farm 

is a small diversified vegetable farm and has been 

certified organic since 2017. I'm part of the 

first generation of Americans who grew up with the 

USDA Certified Organic label.

I remember being in elementary school 

when Certified Organic milk began appearing on the 

grocery store shelves in the early 2000s much to 

my parents great excitement. As a teenager, 

trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my 

life, being a good student of the Earth was 

important to me and organic farming seemed to offer 

that possibility.

At the age of 18, I left my middle class 

suburban life and spent three years interning on 

organic vegetable farms. I learned that while 

consumers might define organic farming by what it 

isn't, no antibiotics, no synthetic pesticides, 

organic farmers describe organic farming by the 

mantra, feed the soil, not the plant.

Around that time, more and more 
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scientific knowledge was becoming available to the 

general public of the complex and beneficial 

relationships between plants and the soil 

microbiome. This confirmed the wisdom of that 

mantra and also helped inspiring my farm's name, 

Dirtrich Farm because I see good, well cared for 

soil as the basis of making a living in farming.

I've been shocked in recent years as 

I've read about the growth of hydroponic operations 

certified as organic. Without a relationship with 

the soil, how could a farm be organic? And I worry 

that in the near future as more consumers learn 

how so much of their organic lettuce, tomatoes, 

and berries are being grown, that disconnect 

between the image they had in their heads of what 

organic produce farming looks like and the factory 

farm realities of hydroponic production will cause 

a backlash that will undermine trust in the 

Certified Organic label just as concerns about 

organic mega diaries and pasture access have shaken 

many consumers trust in the label.

While as an organic farmer I disagree 
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with including hydroponics as part of the Certified 

Organic label, the NOP seems set on allowing it. 

So I'd urge the NOSB to undertake a rule-making 

process for hydroponic production. There's been 

decades of rule-making for organic soil-based 

protection and organic hydroponic production 

should face the same level of thought and scrutiny.

There are many activities and materials 

being used in hydroponics that have not necessarily 

been reviewed for compliance to organic standards, 

such as artificial light, land leveling and 

long-term landscape cloth use. The scandal a 

couple of years ago of some certifiers not 

requiring hydroponic operations to undergo the 

same three-year transition to organic as 

soil-based operations also shows the necessity of 

rules to make sure all certifiers are upholding 

the same high standards and that soil-based and 

hydroponic operations are competing on a level 

playing field. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. Are 

there questions? Thank you so much, Laura. We 
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appreciate your comments. We are going to move 

onto Henry Ines, Martin Burger, and then Jennifer 

Taylor. Henry, if you are out there, could you 

let Michelle know? We're not seeing you.

In the meantime, will go onto Martin 

Burger followed by Jennifer Taylor and John Foster. 

So Martin, please go ahead.

DR. BURGER: Yes. Somehow -- good 

afternoon, everybody -- the video was stopped by 

the host. Maybe you can --

MR. ELA: We'll work on that -- oh, 

there you are, Martin.

DR. BURGER: Yes. It's working now,.

MR. ELA: Go ahead.

DR. BURGER: Okay. I'm Martin Burger. 

I'm an environmental scientist with the 

California Department of Food and Agriculture 

Fertilizer Registration Program. And I will 

comment on the so-called ammonia extract petition.

So to register these products, we 

relied on the review of the ingredients and the 

manufacturing processes and inspections. This 
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included nitrogen mass balance audits and analysis 

of samples taken at several points in the 

manufacturing process.

We conduct two audits per year, 

announced and unannounced. And at this point, no 

one has touted that these products are 

non-synthetic by NOP's standards. We do not use 

nitrogen stable isotopes analysis to determine 

whether a product is organic or synthetic. 

However, we do collect nitrogen isotope data of 

finished lots so we could potentially detect 

adulterations occurring in the channels of trade 

because the isotope signature of a finished product 

would only be altered if another source of nitrogen 

is added.

We currently limit concentrations of 

liquid ammonia products to 7 percent nitrogen to 

reduce risks such as damage to plant and soil or 

contamination of water in the case of spillage of 

liquid ammonia in undiluted form. CDFA does not 

regulate application rights of fertilizing 

materials. Should NOSB set an application limit 
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for inorganic nitrogen, it could easily be 

implemented as the breakdown of nitrogen forms must 

be shown on the fertilizer labels.

I have one more comment to address the 

question of whether the application of liquid 

ammonia depletes soil organic carbon that was 

mentioned in a earlier meeting and maybe today 

also. I reviewed the scientific literature, and 

I could not find evidence of that.

On the contrary, long-term studies have 

found that additions of nitrogen in any form lead 

to increases in microbial biomass carbon and soil 

carbon when compared to adding no nitrogen at all. 

On the other hand, poor soil management practices, 

such as lack of organic matter inputs or lack of 

cover cropping can lead to declines in soil organic 

car --

MR. ELA: We may have just lost you, 

Martin.

DR. BURGER: Oh, yes?

MR. ELA: Okay. You're still there. 

Okay. It looks like Mindee has a question for 
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you.

MS. JEFFERY: Hi. Thank you. Thank 

you, Martin. I know the CDFA needs someone went 

to work on this issue, but I'm not totally clear 

on what you were saying about what your process 

was with taking samples and nitrogen isotope data. 

Can you spell that out for me?

DR. BURGER: Okay. So the samples are 

during the audit. I can't go into all the 

manufacturing processes, but there are different 

steps where you can verify that this is really 

happening. So we look at the process inquiry. 

Could this work? And then we take samples.

But the nitrogen isotope analysis, this 

is based on the samples that we take from the 

finished product. So if somebody has finished 

product, we can record, we can analyze for nitrogen 

isotope ratio. That number will not change 

anymore.

So if somebody down the line in the 

channels have tried, used that product and change 

it somehow or if there was -- me we could identify 
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that and see that that it's no longer the same as 

the one that was produced. So it would be fraud 

committed in the channels of trade that this would 

help detect.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Martin.

MR. ELA: Other questions from the 

Board? I have one, myself, Martin. And it's your 

statement that you've looked within the literature 

review and there's no evidence that adding nitrogen 

decreases soil carbon when compared to adding no 

nitrogen at all.

Do you see any -- does it matter in the 

effects of what form of nitrogen you're adding? 

I mean, is that true of ammonia extracts, manures, 

fish emulsions across the whole spectrum?

DR. BURGER: Well, okay. So the 

research that you're asking for hasn't been 

conducted because these days, they're not 

available. It matters though which system you're 

talking about. There has been a lot of talk in 

the last 20 years or so on this question.

And in natural ecosystems, if 
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additional is added to them, they have sometimes 

seen some changes in the plant community and also 

declines in soil carbon. But in agricultural 

systems, any addition of nitrogen compared to a 

control that did not use any. It had, in fact, 

shown an increase overall. This is based on 

long-term studies that lasted for decades.

MR. ELA: Thank you. Any other 

questions for Martin? Thank you so much, Martin. 

Glad we were able to get to you on the waitlist. 

We are going to move on now to Jennifer Taylor, 

and then after Jennifer, John Foster and Dan Hazen. 

So Jennifer, please go ahead.

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, it looks like 

Jennifer's not on with us.

MR. ELA: Okay. We'll skip over 

Jennifer. John Foster, if you're out there, we'll 

go with you and then Dan Hazen and then Heather 

Spalding. So John, are you on the line?

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, John is on --

MR. ELA: No?

MS. ARSENAULT: -- it looks like his 
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mic --

MR. FOSTER: Yes. I'm here. Just, 

you know standard difficulties.

MR. ELA: All right, John. Go ahead.

MR. FOSTER: Thank you. Well, good 

afternoon. I'm John Foster with Wolf & 

Associates, although we're not representing any 

clients to NOSB process, so not talking about any 

materials here. Been a long time inspector in the 

past, past NOSB member. Thanks for providing your 

time and energy here. I know that burden. And 

particularly, welcome to all new members. There's 

a lot of work, but it's great work in front of you. 

So thanks for contributing, all of you.

So commenting on the additional support 

for NOSB members, which I know the need for really 

well. We would strongly support providing 

additional resources to NOSB members so that you 

can do effective, complete work and not kill 

yourselves doing it. Also while you're doing 

that, I do want to recognize first actually, NOP 

has provided, you know, very good, improved 
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technical reviews and specialist support staff 

already. And that has served the community very, 

very well.

Additionally, another idea for 

additional services could be regulatory 

comparisons with implications, alternative 

practices, applicability for multiple 

environments. Intent would be that the existing 

TRs could focus on the science and that addenda 

could focus on the practice of it. An example here 

would be where costs associated with alternative 

practices or strategies to be included along with 

review for materials to be retained or added to 

the National List.

Another provision can be draft 

proposals or recommendations not in terms of 

choosing content, that should remain with the NOSB, 

but the style of it and the regulatory language 

of it is an art in and of itself. I think NOSB 

could benefit from those who are trained in 

regulatory language writing.

Lastly, I think the process would 
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benefit from independent and impartial summaries 

of public comments, hopefully highlighting those 

that are articulating specific arguments for and 

against the matter being reviewed. And it would 

be very helpful for impartial summaries to be 

provided to make sure all NOSB members have the 

same kind of baseline understanding.

It would also mitigate disadvantages 

for NOSB members who can't manufacture the time 

to digest all the comments individually. We think 

it's really important in including examples with 

a bias toward and bias against industry positions, 

particularly with an emphasis on veracity of 

claims.

I'm going to go off script for a second. 

With respect to inspector training, when I was 

on the Board, we did a lot of work with CACS 

regarding inspector qualifications and basically 

a certifier's abilities to make good choices. And 

I'd be happy to revisit that. Not now. But at 

some point, we did a lot of work and that may be 

useful. So with that, thanks for your continued 
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service. And I'll stop there.

MR. ELA: Another gold star. Well 

done on time, John.

MR. FOSTER: It's what I live for.

MR. ELA: I think that was to the 

second, but questions for John? John, you were 

making my ears ring about time to read public 

comments but not that I'm ever going to admit 

anything, but I'm always amazed the Board does as 

well as they do in getting through everything.

MR. FOSTER: It's stunning. Kudos to 

all.

MR. ELA: Yes. All right. Well, 

thank you so much for your comments. Very much 

appreciated.

MR. FOSTER: You're quite welcome. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to go to the next 

to Dan Hazen followed by Heather Spalding and mike 

Dill. Dan, are you on the line with us?

MR. HAZEN: I am. Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: We can. Please go ahead.
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MR. HAZEN: Thank you for the 

opportunity to address the True Organics ammonia 

petition. My name is Dan Hazen, president of 

Perfect Blend Organics. We're the largest 

manufacturer --

MS. ARSENAULT: Hey, Dan. I'm going 

to stop you there because you have slides, we don't 

have them up.

MR. HAZEN: Just one slide. Just 

throw up the first slide. That'll go to my third 

comment.

MS. ARSENAULT: Okay. Thanks.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Dan.

MR. HAZEN: Okay. Well, I'd like to 

address the Committee on three points. First, the 

technical review, while we appreciate their 

analysis, the materials used in creating the 

technical review do not track history with 

scientific literature. This is obvious from the 

repeated references to the lack of studies on human 

and soil heath on the main materials.

The technical review then goes on to 
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compare these materials to supposedly comparable 

synthetic products in certain respects. But in 

doing so, assumes that the materials named in 

petition will be acting in the same way as these 

synthetic materials. In reality, the organic 

materials differ greatly from the synthetic 

materials, both in concentration and other 

elements found in the name of materials. And 

therefore, these assumptions do not hold true.

The technical review names two 

different manufacturing processes, ammonium 

concentration, which is our product, and ammonium 

stripping, which is the process we do not use. 

However, it again makes incorrect assumption and 

lumps the two processes together when it says that 

both processes result in a material that acts as 

a step towards a finished fertilizer.

This is true of an ammonia stripping 

technologies which create an intermediate aqueous 

ammonia that must be further reacted to create a 

fertilizer. It is not true an ammonia 

concentration technologies which create a usable 
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end product on their own without a final reaction 

step. We believe these differences require very 

detailed technical expertise to better understand. 

The technical review provides no clarity.

The second comment is regards to fraud. 

I would ask, where is the fraud? Has there 

produced any evidence that fraud exists with our 

product in the marketplace? Are we now going to 

create policy out of, what I would call, pure fear? 

We have in place the best tracking system set up 

with the CDFA that exceeds industry standards that 

Dr. Burger just mentioned a few moments ago.

And the third topic speaks to a trade 

dispute. The slide on the screen is provided for 

information purposes to help the Committee better 

understand the investment True Organics has 

currently in the liquid business. You can see the 

large --

MR. ELA: So hey, Dan. I'm going to 

interrupt. You know, I think it's just on a 

professional side, if we can stay away from company 

names, that'd be appreciated.
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MR. HAZEN: Okay.

MR. ELA: They don't have a chance to 

respond. So actually, we're going to take that 

slide down because you're not speaking for True. 

You can keep your comments general.

MR. HAZEN: Okay. So we'd just like 

to remind the Committee, though, that we had a 

five-year exclusive marketing agreement with 

BioStar for the same ammoniacal concentration 

products referred to in the petition prior to 

providing the technical assistance to bring the 

product to market.

Our product is disruptive but is 

positive for the industry. Millions have been 

invested in fixed assets. PB just launched our 

newest CDFA approved liquid consisting of 25 

percent Super-6 plus a 75 percent soy hydrolysate. 

In closing, due to the constrained nature of the 

comment process to the NOSB, it's difficult to make 

clear the differences in chemistry between these 

new products and synthetic products, their 

manufacturing processes and their interactions 
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with soil.

The petition is too broad and combines 

all products containing ammonium is not founded 

on a sound scientific basis. We would ask that 

the Committee consider forming a separate working 

group that would include soil scientists and 

technical experts who fully understand this topic. 

That would also include a wide variety of industry 

partners best with assisting (audio interference) 

with a final recommendation.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you for 

your comments, and sorry to interrupt you, but we 

just want to make sure that --

MR. HAZEN: It's not a problem.

MR. ELA: -- for professional reasons, 

we're not calling any company out. So I probably 

should have called you out on that a little earlier. 

Are there questions? I am not seeing any from 

the Board. So thank you very much, Daniel. We 

appreciate your comments.

MR. HAZEN: Thank you for your time and 

energy and effort.
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MR. ELA: We're going to move onto 

Heather Spalding followed by Mike Dill and then 

Matthew Molineaux. And we'll see how we come out 

on time there. That may be about the end of our 

day, but we'll play it a little bit by ear here. 

So Heather, please go ahead.

MS. SPALDING: Good afternoon, Mr. 

Chair and members of the NOSB. My name is Heather 

Spalding, and I'm deputy director of the Maine 

Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association. Thank 

you so much for your tireless efforts to keep 

organic strong after a very long day, especially.

MOFGA is a member of the National 

Organic Coalition, which has submitted detailed 

comments on our behalf. And we've also submitted 

some written comments on a few topics, but I was 

just going to zip through the list of actions that 

we'd like to see.

So first, the perennial challenges, we 

really want to urge the NOP to restore the organic 

certification cost share to the full reimbursement 

rates, reinstate the Organic Livestock and Poultry 
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Practices Rule, issue the final rule on the origin 

of livestock and adequately enforce the pasture 

rule, and clarify the prohibition of genetic 

engineering in organic production.

We also would like to see you encourage 

the NOP to shine a light on organic management 

practices when USDA considers programs to help 

farmers adapt to and mitigate the effects of 

climate change. And please consider developing 

work agenda items focusing on carbon sequestration 

and soil health provisions, including a 

restriction on ammonia extract and use of all 

highly soluble sources of nitrogen in organic 

agriculture.

Regarding the SOE rule, we'd really 

like to understand better how funds will be 

allocated to increase the ability to fight fraud. 

And we'd like to see increased support for 

accredited certifiers and the associated 

workforce, which has to comply with increasing 

demands from NOP, consumers, industry. And we all 

find it difficult to meet those demands without 
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increasing the fees for our farmers.

We also would like to see the NOSB's 

role and authority clarified. And we hope the NOP 

will provide an update on all previous and 

unimplemented NOSB recommendations. We also 

would like there to be consideration on the impact 

of NOP policies on BIPOC farm and ranch owners with 

special emphasis on certification challenges and 

barriers to land, markets, grants, and financing.

We want to ensure that planting aids 

and mulch products do not contaminate soil, water, 

and produce. We support the petition to add 

paper-based planting aids to the National List, 

but we urge caution regarding the percentage 

allowance of synthetic fibers. We do not feel that 

biodegradable bio-based mulch film is ready for 

prime time.

And finally, we oppose organic 

certification of hydroponic operations in hope 

that containers and hydroponics will return to the 

work agenda to ensure consistency across the 

industry. Thank you.
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MR. ELA: Good job, another gold star. 

People are racking them up today. Feel like a 

benevolent teacher today. It's great. Questions 

for Heather? I'm sorry. I'm trying to -- there 

we go. I don't see any. Thank you so much, 

Heather. We appreciate your comments and patients 

here.

We'll next go to Mike Dill, and then 

we're going to finish up with Matthew Mullen if 

he is here. So both of you two. Go ahead, Mike, 

and you've got the floor.

MR. DILL: All right. Well, good 

afternoon, everyone. I'm Mike Dill, coordinator 

for Organic Produce Wholesalers Coalition or OPWC, 

and also the compliance manager for Organically 

Grown Company. Organically Grown Company is a 

certified handling operation that relies on 

sanitizers every day. We don't apply any 

sanitizers directly to product, but do sanitize 

many different food contact surfaces.

Over the years, we've experimented with 

many sanitizers. All the chlorines, ozone, 
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peracetic acid, and others, always trying to find 

the most effective, eco-friendly, and sustainable 

option. In our experience, ozone was great, but 

our workers were afraid of it and didn't understand 

the technology. Peracetic acid performed well 

too, but our workers complained of the odor.

So we listened to our crews as they 

repeatedly asked to go back to chlorine, chlorine 

dioxide mixed from powder for our packing line, 

hypochlorous acid generated on site for table tops, 

and sodium hypochlorite for rags used on food 

contact surfaces. In the packet for this meeting, 

there are several things related to sanitizers that 

concern me.

What's stood out was, one, the Board 

switched from a broader comprehensive review to

simply focusing on chlorine alternatives. Two, 

basing research priorities for chlorine on 

anecdotal reports. And three, proposing during 

sunset review of sanitizer materials the new 

criterion of appropriateness, which comes with an 

unvetted draft framework based on questions that 
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have been suggested without disclosing who 

suggested the new assessment questions.

Part of the dilemma, as you well know, 

is that material evaluation criteria requires a 

material be safe to humans and the environment, 

right? Very difficult considering sanitizers are 

designed to harm a broad range of microbes. What 

we should be asking is, what happens if we do 

nothing? What is the harm in not using effective 

sanitizers?

We'll take chlorine and salad wash 

water, for example. If an ineffective sanitizer 

were used or none were used at all, the resulting 

harm could be human illness or even death. I think 

we can all agree that we need to protect human life 

and that doing nothing to sanitize in our food 

handling systems is simply not an option. But how 

does this type of thinking about human and 

environmental harm fit into OFPA criteria?

The National List focuses on materials 

that are necessary for the production of an 

agricultural product, but sanitizers used in a 
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handling system are different. Their only purpose 

is to protect consumers, organic and non-organic 

alike. Lettuce will grow just fine with E. coli 

on it, and ice cream can maintain its viscosity, 

smell, and taste regardless of whether or not it 

contains Listeria.

This is why sanitizers are an outlier 

on the National List, hard to evaluate against OFPA 

criteria. And why OPWC's comments offer new 

questions to help guide the research on sanitizers. 

Lastly, perhaps it's time to accept that we need 

clear standards for post-harvest handling. We've 

been thinking that sanitizer use maybe better 

addressed through more specific handling standards 

as opposed to simply through inclusion on the 

National List. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Mike. Much 

appreciated. Are there questions for Mike? So 

Mike, I have a question. So in terms of, I mean, 

given that the criteria that we have now are to, 

you know, we have to list them. We don't get a, 

you know, really don't have the option, you know, 
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statutorily to do what you just said.

How would you think we should move 

forward in kind of grouping, adding new sanitizers? 

You know, I think we recognize all your points, 

but it's a complicated subject. So what would be 

your suggestion for us to prioritize or such?

MR. DILL: Well, I think, you know, 

given that we have the criteria for harm to human 

health and the environment. I think we can take 

a different approach at looking at that. I mean, 

I think what we've looked at in the past is, you 

know, how does the sanitizer harm, you know, how's 

it harmful to the environment when it's released 

or when it's used?

But I think if we flip that around and 

look at what the harm is to human health and the 

environment. If we, you know, if people get ill 

or if people die, I think that's kind of a new way 

of looking at this. So we've always just kind of 

looked at how this affects the, you know, the soil, 

the ground, you know, the runoff water. But never 

really, you know, this do nothing approach or how 
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it, you know, how the inverse would really affect 

humans.

So I think, you know, taking that kind 

of lead and just looking at it, flipping it around 

a little bit to see what really happens if we do 

nothing or if we do end up with an ineffective 

sanitizer, I think it might change the way that 

we look at this. And so what we are suggesting 

is, you know, we go back to this concept of 

comprehensive review and do it as a research 

priorities.

So if you look at our comments in the 

materials section or the research section, under 

chlorine, we've posed a bunch of questions that 

we think can help guide us through the next steps 

in developing kind of this, you know, comprehensive 

review. And so what we'd like to do is see us, 

you know, kind of look toward that research. Maybe 

consider the questions that we posed. I think we 

posed, like, eight or nine questions, and use that 

as kind of the framework to move forward outside 

of the sunset review to really kind of continue 
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the discussion on, you know, this comprehensive 

review.

MR. ELA: Great. Yes. Thanks, Mike. 

I appreciate that. You've got two more 

questions. One from Asa and one from Kyla. We 

got one more speaker. So if both of you can be 

concise in your questions, and Mike, if you can 

be concise in your answer that will keep the Board 

going there, so go ahead, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I'll do my best. 

Steve, I appreciate that admonition, and I'll do 

my best. Because this is a issue that I've been 

working on a lot. Just a few things. You know, 

we have FSMA, we have food safety standards. 

There's no thought at all about doing nothing and

was that resulting in human illness, death, I mean, 

I teach food safety in some settings.

And, you know, that's really a crucial 

issue. And, you know, I think the real question 

is: How do we evaluate new materials? Well, old 

ones and new ones. Right now we have CPC 

petitioned. We're dealing with the technical 
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report. We have another one that's been proposed 

that'll probably be coming up next year. We voted 

down silver dihydrogen citrate, which I had mixed 

feelings about.

There's a lot of concern about 

nanoparticles, and also what impact it might have 

on the environment. I voted against it, but I like 

that material in some ways, and I think it had a 

lower occupational health risk profile. You know, 

I think you raised some extremely important points 

in that we do have to think about how we use these 

materials. And we definitely need to ensure that 

organic complies with food safety standards.

You know, we talk about pesticides and 

inputs and that sort of thing, but if the food can 

kill you, that's not appropriate. So I think, 

though, it is important to think about the human 

health impacts. I mean, for example -- well, I 

started going off here, and I'm making perhaps more 

comments than questions but, you know, I've seen 

with farm workers, they were much more concerned 

about bleach exposures and the health of that they 
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were than pesticides.

They just bitterly complained about 

bleach exposures and the health impacts. So I 

think we do need a framework to think about these 

materials and also evaluate their use to judge 

their safety or improve methods to use the same 

materials but project worker health and, you know, 

I look forward to continuing this discussion with 

the community and the Board because it's going to 

be an ongoing one.

MR. DILL: No. And I agree and I just, 

I mean, part of it is I don't want the focus to 

just be on chlorine because as we've experienced 

firsthand, which I thought was kind of, you know, 

interesting is, our workers complained about every 

material but chlorine, you know, they really were 

honestly afraid of ozone. They did not like 

peracetic acid in our enclosed environment, and 

they asked us to go back to chlorine, which I 

thought was a, you know, kind of a shock at first.

So we listened to what they said. But, 

I mean, ultimately, I think, you know, maybe this 
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is a bigger question. And again, I don't even know 

if it's in the realm of possibilities, but one thing 

that we're suggesting too is that we look at, you 

know, really doing some research on, you know, 

what, if any, measurable residue of sanitizers are 

on the surfaces that remain after sanitation, you 

know, following label use or remain on the product?

And then, honestly, I mean, if there's 

no residue or very little, maybe we consider 

handling this just through, you know, through 

handling standards. And we can make the big 

question or ask the big question is: Are these even 

appropriate to be on the National List if there's 

no, you know, if it's not coming in direct contact, 

if there's no residue left behind?

But I think, you know, as we embark on 

this journey, I think answering some of these 

fundamental questions might lead us to, you know, 

maybe some discovery of a whole different approach. 

And maybe, you know, the National List isn't the 

right approach or maybe restructuring the National 

List. I don't know, but I think, you know, we 
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really are standing behind our thoughts on these 

research questions. And we think that it can 

really open up the discussion. And from there we 

can, you know, figure out how to move forward 

hopefully.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I think that's 

great, and I really appreciate that input, and I 

think we all have to think about and talk about 

these issues.

MR. ELA: One more question from Kyla, 

and if we can keep this short. I want to get to 

our last speaker because I think everybody's 

getting fairly tired. But go ahead, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes. Thanks Mike for your 

comments. I was just going to, which you sort of 

just already said, but I'll just hammer it home 

for good measure in that basically what I was 

hearing was that in addition or maybe in 

substitution, there's nothing within the regs 

besides the National List that cover how operators 

are really to apply, you know, there's no standards 

that govern the use of these materials, I guess 
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basically.

And so what I was hearing your comment 

saying about moving forward with the post-harvest 

regulations would be helpful to setting the context 

for certifiers to be able to enforce again. So 

I'm just making sure I heard you accurately.

MR. DILL: You did. And, you know, our 

SOE comments were very heavy on kind of this 

handling standard concept where, you know, there's 

a lot in the standards for crop production. 

There's a lot for processing and manufacturing. 

But in-between there's a whole lot of nothing, 

you know, receiving, loading, storage, 

work-in-progress, sanitation, even pest control 

is, I mean, pest control has its mentions too.

But I think, you know, we feel pretty 

strongly that looking into expanding or getting 

some clarity behind some handling standards would 

help with enforcement, accountability. And 

especially with SOE coming out, going to be a lot 

more people that need to be certified. A lot of 

what we're calling these intermediate handlers or 
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auxiliary handlers that aren't processing but 

handling product, you know, post-harvest up until 

processing.

And I think it can really, you know, 

I think it's really helpful for everyone if we can 

kind of get that dialed in and get some clear 

standards put in place. So hopefully, you know, 

by the next meeting, we can possibly share what 

our draft was for SOE because we basically rewrote 

20527 to be the way that we think it should be. 

And I think we'd love to share that with you-all.

MR. ELA: We look forward to seeing it. 

So thanks, Mike. We appreciate your thoughts. 

You definitely have some experience in the field 

there. So we're going to move onto our last 

speaker.

MR. DILL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Last speaker -- yes. 

Thanks, Mike -- Matthew Molineaux. And Matthew, 

you are up. 

MR. MOLINEAUX: Well, thank you so 

much, especially for including me as the last 
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speaker here and thanks to the Board for hearing 

comments on these important issues. I did my IOIA 

crops training to become an organic inspector in 

2003 shortly after the NOP rule-making in 2002 

after completing my Bachelor's Degree in 

Agriculture. I worked as a small organic farm 

manager for a few years and was inspected by CCOF 

and Oregon Tilth for crops and livestock.

I began my inspection career in 2008 

and over the years have inspected with five 

agencies, averaging 100 to 150 inspections per 

year, mainly on the west coast where I was born

and raised in farms. My comments are centered 

around the struggle of independent organic 

inspectors to create a sustainable livelihood.

I want to recognize the attention the 

NOSB and other industry organizations have placed 

on the topic of human capital and the needs of these 

crucial players and the organic certification 

process. To be clear, my comments are based on 

my experiences. They're not representing Oregon 

Tilth, who I just recently became an employee of 
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after 11 years as a contract inspector.

I will say Oregon Tilth has stepped up 

and done the right thing hiring inspectors as 

full-time staff with benefits and a competitive 

salary. To get personal here, I have incurred a 

federal tax debt exceeding $30,000 over the past 

few years as an independent contractor for failing 

to withhold enough income to pay my appropriate 

tax. The struggle to pay in advance for inspection 

trips, airfare, rental cars, hotels, fuel, meals, 

submit my reports the following week, and then wait 

two to four more weeks to be paid or reimbursed 

all the while planning, scheduling, booking 

tickets, hotel rooms for the next trips, fronting 

often 2,000 a month in expenses during my peak 

season waiting to be reimbursed beyond my credit 

card limit.

This posed a stress on my family, and 

maintaining my own personal finances, mortgage, 

utilities, et cetera, challenging to the point of 

being routinely over drafted often during my 

busiest season. All these expenses don't include 
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extra insurances, trainings, and office expenses 

needed just to do the work. These factors can 

lessen an inspector's focus, encourage inspectors 

to overbook themselves just to get ahead.

I take pride in doing good work and have 

experienced several crisis moments where I hit a 

wall mentally and emotionally. In all honesty, 

I should've left this profession years ago and 

worked again as a farm manager or organic 

consultant or salesperson. But I've been 

committed to upholding organic standards for over 

20 years that I've been in the industry.

I feel connected to the work. I'm good 

at it. I've seen nearly every crop grown and 

inspected in 23 states. I've detected fraud and 

prohibited substance use on inspections. To 

continue to staff these critical positions, 

certification agencies needed to take into 

consideration the aspects I've outlined with 

guidance by the NOP, a right livelihood can be 

realized for all organic inspectors into the 

future.
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We cannot take for granted the path 

built by past inspectors, especially those who 

worked consistently since 2002 to uphold the 

standard we're all working toward together. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Matthew. 

Questions from the Board? Sue has one.

MS. BAIRD: Matthew, thanks for 

sharing that. I think most of us that have done 

long-term inspections have all experienced exactly 

what you've said. Maybe not the tax issues, but 

everything else. Trying to keep your credit cards 

paid up for the next time so that you can charge 

some more trips is very stressful. And trying to 

book enough inspections over the year to make a 

good living, which results in less family time. 

So just appreciate your comments and your honesty. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: Nate, you had a question.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Again, more of a 

comment. Just wanted to thank Matthew for that 

input. I think that really informs everything 
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we're working to address. And I really appreciate 

how you shaped it that, you know, a quality of an 

inspector's work, it does not exist in a vacuum. 

And so making sure that inspectors are treated 

well on the road and given humane working 

conditions is going to contribute to good integrity 

as well. So thank you for highlighting that for 

us.

MR. ELA: Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: Hi, Matthew. Thank you 

for your comments. Just curious, I'm not from the 

world of inspections. So what is your normal 

radius of travel and how does that vary, the 

perimeters of travel vary?

MR. MOLINEAUX: Yes. Well, you know, 

traditionally, I live in western Oregon and so I 

worked up in Washington State for WSDA and I worked 

for a few different agencies in California. And 

so I would drive often five, six, seven hours to 

the north or south on a Sunday or, you know, 4:00 

Monday morning to be on the farm by Monday afternoon 

to do an inspection, stay overnight a few nights. 
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Often booking two inspections a day if they were 

pretty straightforward. And then, you know, 

heading home.

And the back-end work is really the 

report writing. And it takes quite a bit of time 

to get all those done, especially if you do six 

or eight farms on a trip. The airfare depended 

if I had farms in Arizona or southern California. 

You know, I'd try to plan those more in advance 

to save money and have a cheaper ticket because 

those do get expensive to fly, rent a car, hotels, 

especially in some high-cost areas.

And that was generally how I traveled, 

and, you know, eight or nine months of the year 

was really when you made all the money. Because 

in the winter, especially with crops, much less 

work, and the phone doesn't ring as an independent 

contractor, you don't work.

MS. HUSEMAN: Understandable. Thank 

you very much. I appreciate your answer.

MR. ELA: Sue, did you have one more 

quick question?
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MS. BAIRD: No. Just follow up. I've 

done inspections in all 50 states, and Mexico, and 

Guatemala, and Peru, and Egypt. So you can travel 

as much as you want. It's probably inherently you 

have to travel a lot. So --

MR. ELA: Starting to sound kind of 

like my farm. I can make more money by doing fewer 

things.

MS. BAIRD: Right.

MR. ELA: The credit card doesn't get 

as expensive. Thank you so much for your comments. 

I think that, you know, the human capital side 

of things is really important to our industry. 

So appreciate the personal thoughts on that.

MR. MOLINEAUX: Yes. I'll just say 

when that document came out, when that guidance 

from the NOP came out earlier last year, literally 

almost brought me to tears because it was 

everything that I wanted to say and thought about 

my career for all these years I built.

And finally a light was shed on these 

issues that I as an independent contractor never 
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got to talk to anyone about because I didn't really 

have colleagues that I worked with on a daily basis. 

On an island unto myself, trying to do this work 

the best I could, and to finally recognize 

somebody's issues and challenges, I felt I wasn't 

alone. And again, appreciate you folks addressing 

this.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much. All 

right. Long day of public comments. Thank you 

so much to the Board for hanging in there. I know 

we went a little longer than I meant to. Told we'd 

go a half-hour over, but no more. Really 

appreciate the patience, great questions, and most 

of all, to our public commenters. All your 

thoughts really give us a lot of food for thought 

and a lot of help in our deliberations. I think 

that the stakeholders are so important to our 

process because it creates more than 15 brains on 

the board. It creates so many more.

So this will conclude today's public 

comment webinar. Again. Thank you to everybody 

who provided comments. We will try on Thursday 
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to get to more people on the waitlist. No 

guarantees. It really depends how the day goes. 

And we will pause for now, and we will reconvene 

on Thursday, April 22nd at noon Eastern. So take 

care. Enjoy your time off tomorrow, and we'll be 

back at it on Thursday. See you, everybody.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 5:41 p.m.)
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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

+ + + + +

NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD

+ + + + +

PUBLIC COMMENT WEBINAR

+ + + + +

THURSDAY

APRIL 22, 2021

+ + + + +

The Board met telephonically at 12:00 

p.m., Steve Ela, Chair, presiding.

PRESENT

STEVE ELA, Chair

NATE POWELL-PALM, Vice Chair

MINDEE JEFFERY, Secretary

SUE BAIRD

ASA BRADMAN

AMY BRUCH

BRIAN CALDWELL

JERRY D'AMORE

CAROLYN DIMITRI

RICK GREENWOOD

KIM HUSEMAN

LOGAN PETREY

KYLA SMITH

WOOD TURNER
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STAFF PRESENT

MICHELLE ARSENAULT, Advisory Committee 

Specialist, Standards Division

JARED CLARK, National List Manager, Standards 

Division

DAVID GLASGOW, Associate Deputy Administrator, 

National Organic Program

ERIN HEALY, Acting Director, Standards Division

DEVON PATTILLO, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist, Standards Division

DR. JENNIFER TUCKER, Ph.D., Deputy 

Administrator, National Organic Program; 

Designated Federal Official
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

(12:00 p.m.)

MS. ARSENAULT: So welcome back, 

everyone, to day two of the National Organic 

Standards Board comment webinar, or welcome if you 

weren't with us on Tuesday. I'm going to -- a few 

administrative housekeeping issues and then I'm 

going to turn it over to Jenny to take us out of 

recess, I guess. Hold on one second; I'm just 

going to make sure, Jenny is unpaused. There we 

go. All right. So if you're online and you're 

having audio issues, you can call in on the phone. 

The phone number was on your screen -- I lost the 

slide. I did chat it in, so at the top of the chat 

you'll see the phone numbers, if you need to dial 

in on the phone.

We ask that you please stay on mute with 

your video off until it's about your time to speak. 

That just helps us with bandwidth and background 

noise. We can control both your mic and your 

camera from our side, so if your camera gets turned 

off, we probably did it on our end and we can send 
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you a request to turn your camera on -- you should 

see a on-screen pop up with that message from the 

program. The chat is enabled, but it is not part 

of the public record, so feel free to chat to each 

other, say hello, you know, talk amongst 

yourselves, but the Board doesn't answer questions 

that are sent in chat, so no need to send questions 

in the chat, and again, it's not part of the public 

record.

We have a transcriptionist on the call 

with us who is capturing every word that's said 

so will have an official transcript will be posted 

after the in-person meeting concludes next week, 

so after April 30th. If you're signed up to speak, 

please make sure that your name is displayed in 

your video window properly -- sometimes people are 

dialing in on other people's computers, or if 

you're just on the phone we can rename you so we 

can identify you in the participant list in order 

to make sure that you're unmuted and your cameras 

on -- if you want it to be on -- during your 

comments.
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Also, please don't raise your hand, 

which is at the bottom of your Zoom window. We 

are not taking questions; only the people that 

signed up to speak will be allowed to talk, and 

Steve Ela, the Board chair, will call on you in 

turn when it's your turn to speak. If you're 

having technical problems, you can go to Zoom US 

and in the upper right-hand side of the screen you 

should see a support button. They are very 

helpful, so please contact support if you're having 

any technical issues that we can't resolve. And 

again, the webinars are being recorded as of this 

minute, and I'm going to turn it over to Jenny 

Tucker to start the meeting officially or take us 

out of recess. All right. Thank you, Jenny.

DR. TUCKER: All right. Good 

afternoon and welcome back, everybody. Thanks so 

much, Michelle.

My name is Jennifer Tucker. I am the 

Deputy Administrator of the National Organic 

Program. So first, a big welcome to all our 

National Organic Standards Board members. This 
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is our third online meeting and the group continues 

to come together beautifully in this unique 

environment. As I mentioned on Tuesday with our 

new board appointees that are just starting their 

first meeting, most board members, at this point, 

have not actually met in-person yet, and so it 

really is incredible how well they have done 

together. I wanted to in particular welcome our 

five new board members who are starting their first 

meeting, so this is their second day of public 

comments with you.

We have Amy Bruch, Logan Petrey, 

Carolyn Dimitri, Brian Caldwell, and Kyla Smith, 

and so like to give a round of applause to our new 

members and our returning members, and it's a good 

reminder of how we clap in Zoom. So we wave both 

hands in front of the camera in order to clap. 

So let's clap all of our new folks and our returning 

folks who just keep coming back for more. I also 

want you thank our public commenters. You are 

continuing to sustain a very important 

participatory process in this unique format, and 
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so we thank you for signing up to share your 

comments. And I thank our audience, the folks who 

serve as witnesses to this event; we're also 

grateful that you continue to come back and listen 

to all the voices that are contributing to this 

ongoing dialogue.

This webinar continues a series of 

virtual webinars that will occur over multiple 

days. We are in day two of this week and there 

will be three days next week. Meeting information 

for all segments is posted on the National Organic 

Standards Board meeting page on the USDA website. 

We need somebody to go on mute. Okay. Took care 

of that. Let's see. Meeting access information 

is posted on the NOSB meeting page on the USDA 

website and transcripts for all segments will be 

posted once completed. This meeting, like other 

meetings of the NOSB, will be run based on the 

Federal Advisory Committee Act and the Boards 

policy and procedures manual. I am acting as the 

designated federal officer for all meeting 

segments.
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To close, I want to, again, thank the 

National Organic Program for their great work in 

getting us here today. As I did on Tuesday, I 

particularly want to acknowledge Ms. Michelle 

Arsenault, Jared Clark, Devon Pattillo, and Andrea 

Holm. Michelle keeps our universe spinning, in 

particular, so Michelle, you are and always are 

amazing. Michelle is always so chipper; it's hard 

to remember sometimes how much she has going on 

behind the scenes at all of these meetings. She 

makes it look easy and keeps it cheery, so Michelle, 

I continue to be so grateful for you and for your 

work. I also want to thank Steve Ela, Chair of 

the Board; I continue to very much value our 

collaborative partnership. We've been doing that 

from afar for a while now, and you're terrific and 

I'm so happy you're here.

I'm going to now turn at the mic over 

to Erin Healy. We introduced Erin on Tuesday as 

our new Standards Division Director, so she has 

taken on the permanent role of Standards Division 

Director. We are thrilled to have her on board. 
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She's been with us since beginning of January and 

is doing a terrific job and she is going to do a 

roll call of National Organic Standards Board 

members. So thanks everybody; I appreciate 

your-all being here and look forward to hearing 

your comments this afternoon.

MS. HEALY: Hi everyone. If I didn't 

get to virtually meet you on Tuesday, I just want 

to say hello and looking forward to today's 

meeting. It's my first public comment with the 

Board, so I'm excited to be able to listen in and 

I'm very excited to be with NOP. For the roll call: 

Steve Ela, NOSB Chair?

MR. ELA: I think I'm here.

DR. TUCKER: I have to go through it, 

you know. Nate Powell-Palm, Vice Chair?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Here.

DR. TUCKER: Mindee Jeffery, 

Secretary.

MS. JEFFERY: Morning Erin and 

everyone.

DR. TUCKER: Morning. Sue Baird?
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MS. BAIRD: Yes, hi.

DR. TUCKER: Morning. And I think Asa 

is joining later, correct? Amy Bruch?

MS. BRUCH: Here.

DR. TUCKER: Brian Caldwell?

MR. CALDWELL: Here.

DR. TUCKER: Jerry D'Amore?

MR. D'AMORE: Good morning. Here.

DR. TUCKER: Carolyn Dimitri?

DR. DIMITRI: Good afternoon.

DR. TUCKER: Rick Greenwood?

MR. GREENWOOD: Here. Good afternoon 

also.

DR. TUCKER: Kim Huseman?

MS. HUSEMAN: Present.

DR. TUCKER: Logan Petrey?

MS. PETREY: Here.

DR. TUCKER: Kyla Smith?

MS. SMITH: Good afternoon. I'm here.

DR. TUCKER: And Wood Turner?

MR. TURNER: Here. Good morning.

DR. TUCKER: All right. Good morning 
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or good afternoon depending on your time zone, 

everybody. In addition to the Board, I wanted to 

also mention that we have several of our teammates 

on the call. Jared Clark, National List Manager; 

Devon Pattillo, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist; and David Glasgow, NOP Associate 

Deputy Administrator. So I'll hand the mic back 

to Steve Ela.

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, you're muted.

MR. ELA: Okay.

MS. ARSENAULT: There you go.

MR. ELA: I actually wasn't; I was just 

talking silently because, you know, we have to kind 

of have a little fun with this. Thank you so much, 

Erin; very much appreciate it, and I welcome the 

whole Board. Again, this is such a critical part 

of our deliberation for the NOSB, is to hear from 

our stakeholders and their collective advice and 

thinking. It really does help our decisions, so 

thank you to all out there. I would like to remind 

everybody that there is a policy in the policy and 

procedures manual about public comments.
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All speakers who will be recognized 

signed up during the registration period. Proxy 

speakers are not allowed. Individuals providing 

public comment shall refrain from making any 

personal comments or remarks that might impugn the 

character of any individual. We really want to 

stress that, you know -- make comments based on 

the evidence and on the documents before us, but 

please don't make comments about individuals or 

companies unless you are representing that 

company. Very important to keep this 

unprofessional professional level.

We will once again call speakers in the 

order of the schedule. If somebody's not present 

or has technical problems as we're going through 

at the end of all the speakers, we will wrap around 

and call on those people that we skipped over. 

And if we have time, we will move onto the wait-list 

that we have; we were able to get comments from 

about half the wait-list on Tuesday, so that was 

great. But I just remember that this is dependent 

on our time schedule. We went over about a half 
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hour on Tuesday, so thank you for the Board for 

having the patience to do that. Each commenter, 

again, has three weeks, or three minutes -- yes, 

three weeks, that would be a long time -- three 

minutes to speak, as per usual. We will use the 

timer that will sound when your time is up. When 

you hear that timer, please finish your sentence 

and end your comment.

Michelle, you want to give a 

demonstration of the timer? I just love that 

sound. So you will be able to see that timer in 

Michelle's Zoom window. We'll pin it so everybody 

can see it and give our speakers kind of a sense 

of where they are. Just procedurally, I will 

announce the next speaker and then the next two 

people that will be on deck so everybody can get 

prepared. At this time we're allowing speakers 

to use their video just so the Board can get a sense 

of who is out there. It is not required; if you 

have any problems with your video just go ahead 

and state your comments as we've done in the past. 

But if you'd like to turn on your video, we would 
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welcome that.

I will ask everybody to state their name 

and affiliation when they start their comment, and 

it would be wonderful if people who are consulting 

or representing some other organization would also 

identify that so the Board knows who you were 

speaking for or who you are consulting with. After 

the comments, board members will indicate if they 

have questions by raising their hand in the chat 

room. I will recognize people in order of how they 

raised their hands. And if for any reason I do 

not see your hand, please, please, please barge 

in before we move onto the next speaker; we want 

to make sure we get all the questions from the Board 

we can. 

I would remind NOSB members, in the 

interest of time, to ask your question right off. 

Don't give an extended comment before; our time 

here is really to ask speakers questions. Next 

week will have time for the comments among the 

Board. Only NOSB members are allowed to ask 

questions, and we're going to go ahead and start 
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right off and dive into the public comments. So 

today we're going to start off with Jaydee Hanson. 

After that, we will have Otto Kramm, and then Kate 

Mendenhall on deck.

So please start and state your name and 

affiliation.

MR. HANSON: Thank you very much. I'm 

Jaydee Hanson, Policy Director for the Center for 

Food Safety. I will address our comments on 

excluded methods and BPA. My colleague Meredith 

Stevenson will address the hydroponics later in 

the afternoon.

Beginning in 2011, NOSB began dialogue 

and debate regarding excluded methods and it 

developed a framework approved by the NOSB in the 

fall of 2016. This framework should be formerly 

adopted by NOP and codified as a guidance document. 

In 2016, NOSB identified 11 methods to be excluded 

from organic production. Without further delay, 

NOP should codify the prohibition for these 11 

methods by publishing the guidance document in the 

NOP Handbook. All of the NOSB recommendations on 
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excluded methods have been unanimous, which 

reflects the organics community's united stance 

that genetic engineering should be prohibited in 

organic. Delay in finalizing that guidance 

encourages lax and confusing enforcement of 

prohibitions on genetic engineering.

Unanimous agreement was found in 

allowing marker assisted selection in transection, 

embryo rescue in plants, and embryo transfer in 

animals. NOP should codify these four methods as 

well. NOSB must continue to move ahead to 

determine the status of to be determined 

technologies and other GE technologies that 

emerged to provide clarity to all stakeholders at 

work. We support the NOSB's work in updating 

organic seed regulations and guidance in recent 

years and strongly urge NOP to adopt these changes 

through making guidance documents.

Next, on BPA. The National Organic 

Program must proceed with research on Bisphenol 

A and related chemicals in packaging. Center for 

Food Safety has urged the NOSB to push the NOP to 
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act on BPA and related chemicals for five years. 

This year, one major organic company made the 

public commitment to eliminate ortho-phthalates 

from its products before companies one-by-one 

banned these chemicals from their products. NOP 

must implements its long delayed research into the 

prevalence of BPA and other chemical additives in 

organic packaging materials and the human health 

concerns associated with food contact with BPA and 

other chemicals used to replace BPA.

Consumers choose organic products 

because they seek to avoid synthetic and toxic 

substances. They want foods that protect their 

health and the health of their families.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Jaydee.

MR. HANSON: You have the longer 

version there. I would note that research is 

coming out on organic cheeses and organic drinks 

that have been found to contain these 

ortho-phthalates and that's a problem for us all. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: Are there questions from the 
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Board? Thank you for your comments, Jaydee. I'm 

not seeing any questions, so we're going to move 

onto the next speaker --

MR. HANSON: Thank you for your work.

MR. ELA: -- who is Otto Kramm -- you're 

welcome. We have Otto Kramm, then Kate Mendenhall 

and Greg Rawlings. Otto, you have the floor and 

would you please state your name and affiliation?

MR. KRAMM: Good afternoon. My name 

is Otto Kramm. I'm speaking on behalf of the 

Organic Industry. Currently, I'm director of 

internal farming for Dole Fresh Vegetables. Thank 

you for allowing me to reschedule my time; I had 

technical difficulties there on Tuesday. So 

anyway, 25 years ago in 1996, we stepped into our 

organic journey. After three years or so of 

fighting Mother Nature we finally understood the 

relationship we'd gotten into. Organic farming 

is about nurturing the soil -- not dirt, soil. 

A living, breathing body. 

We learned to cover crop, use proper 

rotations, properly balanced inputs, all to build 
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a strong base. Mother Nature responded well. We 

were a very successful organic farming operation. 

We always questioned and re-questioned any input 

which had a readily available source of nitrogen. 

How can it be organic? Can it be copied? Can 

it look the same by fraudulent operators or 

methods? We just feel that organic farming is a 

principal of working with Mother Nature, using 

proper inputs, understanding the business you've 

gotten into. Things happened. Weather happens. 

You know, it's not going to be successful every 

time.

So to have a product that gives you a 

readily available source of N to fix those problems 

just rolls us back to -- I'll say it -- to 

conventional farming. Integrity of the Organic 

Program relies on the hands of the on-farm 

operator. We are the keepers of the trust. We 

have to be truthful to what we're doing. We need 

help. We need the NOSB to help enforce those laws; 

help enforce those products. It's about keeping 

things organic and really being an organic. We 
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must protect it -- the integrity of the organic 

industry. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Otto. 

Are there questions from the Board? I'm not 

seeing any. Thank you again, Otto, for your 

comments. We do appreciate them. We are going 

to move on to Kate Mendenhall, followed by Greg 

Rawlings and Harry Rice. 

Kate, please go ahead and state your 

name and affiliation.

MS. MENDENHALL: Thank you, NOSB 

members, for the opportunity to speak before you 

today. Welcome new members. My name is Kate 

Mendenhall and I'm the Executive Director for the 

Organic Farmers Association. OFA was created to 

be a strong national voice and advocate for 

domestic certified organic farmers. In addition 

to leading OFA, I also own and operate a small 

diversified organic farm in my Iowa hometown. I 

grew up in small-town Iowa during the 1980s farm 

crisis, and by the time that I graduated high 

school, only a couple peers were still living on 
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their family farm and small, rural towns across 

the state were boarded up.

Now in some cases there's merely a 

billboard showing a photo of the town it used to 

be, where now immense corn and soy fields take its 

place. I left there thinking that there must be 

a better way for family farmers to make a living, 

to better care for the Earth, and to keep our rural 

communities thriving, and I found it in organic 

agriculture. Organic farming grew as an 

alternative to the industrial conventional model. 

It's based on principles of nature that not only 

care for the Earth and climate, but also our 

surrounding communities. I point this out because 

as organic has grown at record-breaking speed over 

the last two decades especially, we must not lose 

the spark that started it all.

Corporatization, consolidation, 

battles over price, sexy technologies with high 

lobbying dollars, pose severe risk to the 

principles of organic farming, both ecological and 

cultural. You must keep organic principles and 
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values front and center at every decision for the 

evolution of the label. To do this, we need real 

leadership and enforcement from NOP. The 2019 NOP 

memo on container growing and transition left more 

questions than it answered. The NOP asked 

certifiers to prove there was inconsistency and 

interpretation of greenhouse transition, which 

NOC, OFA and ACA presented in the fall.

The NOP must provide clarity. Pass on 

outdated rule-making like OOL, OLPP, and SOE and 

stop allowing certifiers from certifying 

production system lacking national standard. We 

must work hard to clarify and enforce standards 

that maintain the principal of organic farming at 

heart. As we drag our feet, family farms suffer, 

and big industrial farms push their way through 

until they are too big to fail and we cannot allow 

organic farming to follow the footsteps of 

industrial agriculture.

Organic farmers continue to highly 

prioritize soil and do not agree with organic 

hydroponic. Already, family farms are being 
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out-competed in the market from hydroponic farms 

that are literally watering down organic 

standards. I was taught that when you make a 

mistake, you need to go back and fix it. This is 

something the organic community must continue to 

fight for. Already, hydroponic organic has become 

the Wild West of organic certification. 

Greenhouses are certifier shopping, the NOP is 

pressuring certifiers to certify a production 

system they do not have standards for, and the NOP 

refuses to provide clarity when certifiers need 

a unifying decision upholding OFPA.

The nitty gritty issues of the NOSB and 

NOP cannot be looked at through a microscope 

without seeing the holistic picture of this organic 

program that farmers built and are desperately 

fighting to hold onto. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Kate. And you are 

the first of the gold stars today for nearly exact 

time. So are there questions for Kate? I am not 

seeing any -- Amy has a question.

MS. BRUCH: I'm sorry. Yes. Kate, 
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thank you for your contributions and being the 

director to the Organic Farmers Association. I 

was just reviewing your written comments and it 

looks like you had a survey with some of your farmer 

members about ammonia extract, and you said 

majority had appeared were not interested in using 

ammonia extracts, but it wasn't unanimous. Did 

you have additional comments on some of the folks 

that were in favor of using ammonia extracts, just 

to understand their side of things?

MS. MENDENHALL: Well, the comments 

that we received that didn't say they wouldn't use 

it weren't specific about why they'd wanted 

ammonia.

MS. BRUCH: Okay.

MS. MENDENHALL: And we brought it to 

our policy committee -- we have a very grassroots 

policy process -- so it was something that we wanted 

to provide the NOSB with more direction on from 

Organic Farmers Association, but we didn't get a 

lot of concrete feedback that was focused enough 

to be able to come up with a position for you. 
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So it seemed like farmers needed perhaps to talk 

about it more or, you know, we led to conversations 

about just soluble nitrogen is general, which is 

something that we don't feel like is in line with 

organic principles.

But as Patty noted in her testimony on 

Tuesday, it seems like there are some pressures 

from price that are a bigger a conversation, but 

sort of, like, the holistic framework of where 

organic is and going that need to also be a part 

of the situation, but I don't think a Band-aid is 

necessarily going to solve it, and the majority 

of farmers who did respond specifically to question 

said they wouldn't use it even if it was available.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Kate. 

Appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board? Okay. Thank you so much for your 

comments, Kate.

MS. MENDENHALL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to Greg 

Rawlings. Then after that, Harry Rice and Dave 
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Chapman. And before you start, Greg, I just really 

want to shout out to our ASL interpreters. There's 

a lot of jargon in these calls, they move very 

quickly and I know we make your job difficult, but 

thank you so much for hanging with us and including 

that segment of our stakeholders.

All right. Greg, please state your 

name and affiliation and the floor is yours.

MR. RAWLINGS: Morning. My name is 

Greg Rawlings. I work for Jacobs Farm / del Cabo, 

Inc. in California here. I've been an organic 

farmer for about 26 years now, and these are just 

my wishes to talk about ammonium extract and why 

it's so bad for organic agriculture. And it's 

actually all soluble nitrogen like Kate was saying; 

it's not just ammonium extract, but that's, like, 

the worst of the worst. And the reason is because 

it's breaking the symbiosis between the plant --

the crop plants and the biota in the soil -- the 

fungus and bacteria, which actually mineralize the 

organic matter and other rocks and stuff in the 

soil to bring nutrients to the plant.
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That is the important part of organic 

agriculture. That's what's gives you the flavor 

-- which is one of the big reasons why I became 

an organic farmer, was because I liked flavorful 

food and I wanted to provide that to other people 

as well -- but it also protects the plants in other 

ways such as, you know, pest management, you know, 

and also as the beneficial biota is said by the 

plants in order to -- you know, in exchange for 

the minerals that the plants need, it fills the 

niches in the soil. So there's no room for, you 

know, your diseases and your pests in the soil, 

and then it also -- how should I say -- it's, you 

know, providing a way to move nutrients underneath 

the soil between plants in your field, and it's 

also allowing for information passing about pests 

that are arriving and how to defend against those 

pests -- the plants themselves.

So for a true organic system, you need 

insoluble nutrients that are placed in the soil 

before planting and those soils and (audio 

interference) you know, you have to have that 
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symbiosis for true organic -- and in my feeling, 

for true organic, you know, product that's also 

flavorful, you know, you need to be able to support 

the symbiosis and that is feeding the soil to feed 

the plants. I mean, that's a big organic maxim 

from days past, but it's true. And if you don't 

have that symbiosis, your field is weaker, your 

food is less flavorful, and just in general, you're 

not really running an organic system.

So, you know, the reason why I became 

an organic farmer was for flavor and soluble 

nutrients, especially things such as ammonium 

extract, are going to kill your flavor, you know, 

and really not allow a correct organic system to 

just flourish in your field. So even though some 

people may think that it's a good use of that 

product, really they should go to a conventional 

marketplace because that's what they're dealing 

with with the soluble nutrients. So thank you very 

much.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Greg. You also 

used your time very well. Lots of people are 
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setting the standard for today. Are there 

questions from the Board? It looks like Logan has 

a question for you.

MS. PETREY: Hi. Thank you. Okay. 

And so just reviewing on what you mentioned in 

farming -- when you talked about nutrients, you 

said, you know, it's best to put it pre-plant. 

I'm just curious: In your system, are you able to 

rely on a heavy pre-plant application or mainly 

a pre-plant application of fertilizer?

MR. RAWLINGS: Yes. I feel like I 

haven't done my job correctly if I have to apply 

after, you know -- during a cycle for an annual, 

obviously if it's a perennial block, you know --

MS. PETREY: Right.

MR. RAWLINGS: -- if it's a perennial 

rosemary block, you have to apply nutrients, you 

know, over time, and compost, you know --

MS. PETREY: Yes. Okay. How many 

days are your crops typically?

MR. RAWLINGS: We grow -- I mean, we 

have some spearmint blocks have been for 20 years, 
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and then we have dill and cilantro that are 60 day 

crops --

MS. PETREY: Okay.

MR. RAWLINGS: -- so we have a range 

of crops. Yes.

MS. PETREY: Okay. So you grow also, 

like, the 120 or 150 annual day crops as well?

MR. RAWLINGS: Yes.

MS. PETREY: Okay. Do you get 

leeching rains during your season?

MR. RAWLINGS: In the wintertime when 

it's, you know, it's not the best season for us, 

but it does happen. Yes.

MS. PETREY: Sure. Okay. So you are 

able to grow --

(Simultaneous Speaking)

MS. PETREY: -- sure. So you were able 

to go to the 120 day crop with just a pre-plant 

application --

MR. RAWLINGS: Right.

MS. PETREY: -- and not run into 

leeching rains.
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MS. ARSENAULT: Okay. All right. 

Thank you.

MR. RAWLINGS: All right. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Logan.

Amy, you had your hand up, but did you 

want to ask a question?

MS. BRUCH: Sure, Steve, thank you.

Thank you, Gregory, for your time today 

and your written comments as well. I had a 

question. You know, there's several commenters 

-- and I believe your from -- is it California as 

well? Is that right? Where you're located?

MR. RAWLINGS: Yes.

MS. BRUCH: Yes. Okay. So there's 

several commenters in your same state that are, 

you know, expressing the need for ammonia extract 

and you're on the other side of the equation, and 

you mentioned about -- I think your comments are 

feeding the soil biota. Can you comment on some 

of the alternative methods that you're using 

briefly? Just because, you know, that's one of 

our criteria in which we evaluate substances, is 
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just looking for alternatives out there. Can you 

briefly touch on some of the methods you're using?

MR. RAWLINGS: Certainly. You know, 

the best is a compost that, you know, a good mix 

of 30, 40 percent animal manure and the green waste, 

and that's really the best way, you know, to provide 

nutrients to your soil long-term. Now, we also 

-- in our particular area, we use lime and we use 

gypsum. And then, you know, for kind of those 

shorter windows where the compost -- you know, 

compost is really like a multi-year additive, 

right? You know, if I need something like, for 

the dill and cilantro -- that's a 60 day crop --

I'll put in, you know, blood meal or feather meal 

-- organic blood meal or organic feather meal --

something like that. But, you know, it would still 

all be, you know, in the ground and not in a soluble 

form. So it's really about the soluble-ness of 

it -- the more soluble, the more problem you're 

going to have in your organic system.

MS. BRUCH: Uh-huh. Thank you, Greg.

MR. RAWLINGS: Thank you.
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MR. ELA: Other questions from the 

Board?

Greg, I have a quick question. How 

would you define highly soluble?

MR. RAWLINGS: Liquid. I mean, that's 

a good one. Liquid. Anything that's liquid I 

would define as soluble. I mean, if it's, you 

know, if it's in a solid form, you're much less 

likely to have problems than if it's in a liquid 

form.

MR. ELA: So like fish fertilizer --

you'd put in that, but not soybean hydrolysate?

MR. RAWLINGS: You know, if it's a 

liquid fish, then no. You know, like I said in 

my in my written comments, you know, I can taste 

it. You know, I was growing strawberries for a 

long time and I can taste that fish for 30 days. 

If you fertigate it within the time the flower 

was formed, I can taste that fish. And I know what 

it tastes like because I've done it myself, you 

know, unfortunately. But everybody else on his 

call probably has that similar flavor profile; they 
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just don't understand why they have that, because 

almost all -- even organic strawberries grown in 

California use a lot of liquid nutrients, mostly 

based in fish.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you so much, 

Gregory. We do appreciate your comments.

MR. RAWLINGS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to 

Harry Rice, followed by Dave Chapman and Stephen 

Walker.

So Harry, please go ahead and state your 

name and affiliation. 

MR. RICE: Thank you. Hi. My name is 

Harry Rice and I am with the Global Organization 

for EPA and DHA Omega-3s or GOED for short, which 

represents the worldwide industry for EPA and DHA, 

the primary long-chain Omega-3 fatty acids found 

in fish oil. Our membership is built on a quality 

standard unparalleled in the market, and our 

mission is to increase consumption of EPA and DHA 

to ensure our members produce quality products that 

consumers can trust.
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Today, I'm going to address the 

handling subcommittee's proposed options for 

modifying the current fish oil annotation. GOED 

supports sustainable fishing practices. While 

fish oil for human consumption is always a 

value-added byproduct of fish meal or seafood 

production, because the protein's value is much 

greater than that of the oil, there are those that 

remain unconvinced. For this reason, GOED views

the modification to the fish oil annotation as an 

acceptable solution to address sustainability 

concerns and ensure that fish oil is compatible 

with organic practices.

In GOED's written and oral comments 

from the spring 2020 meeting, GOED recommended a 

modification to fish oil annotation that is aligned 

with option one from the handling subcommittee's 

February 18th, 2021 discussion document on the fish 

oil annotation. GOED continues to support this 

modification. That is, GOED supports the 

expansion of the current fish oil annotation to 

include the following: Sourced from fishing 
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industry byproduct only and certified as 

sustainable by a third-party certifier.

At the same time, we understand a 

limitation of this annotation is that the NOSB 

would need to create and maintain a list of 

acceptable third-party certifiers. For this 

reason, GOED also supports option two, which 

expands the current fish oil annotation to include 

the following: Sourced from fishing industry 

byproduct only and certified as sustainable 

against a third-party certification that is 

international social and environmental 

accreditation and labeling code compliant, or 

Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative recognized 

with full utilization of said scheme.

This option essentially ensures 

third-party certifiers are held to the highest 

sustainability best practices. It is GOED's 

opinion that option number three: Sourced from 

fishing industry byproduct only, and has either 

a green or yellow Seafood Watch rating or is eco 

certified to a standard recommended by Seafood 
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Watch, is not a viable option at this time because 

the scope of fish species and locations assessed 

is much too limited. The unintended consequence 

of adopting this option could result in the removal 

from the market of many of the products labeled 

organic fish oil, and thus defeat the purpose of 

green-listing fish oil on the national list.

It's important to keep in mind that the 

goal at the end of the day is to ensure the consumers 

who prefer organic products have access to products 

made with non-organically produced fish oil since 

organic fish oil does not currently exist. As 

always, thank you for your time and tireless 

efforts.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much. Are there 

questions from the Board? I am not seeing any, 

so thank you for your commentary.

MR. RICE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We do appreciate it. We're 

going to move onto Dave Chapman, then Stephen 

Walker and Nicole Dehne.

Dave, please start with your name and 
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affiliation.

MR. CHAPMAN: Thank you, Steve. I'm 

Dave Chapman, co-director of the Real Organic 

Project. Listening to testimony Tuesday and 

today, I am struck by the sense of loss with many 

people around the National Organic Program 

integrity. I don't mean that we're defeated, but 

I do see many of our friends, including many of 

you on the NOSB who are being pushed or guided to 

what you think might be possible in the world of 

regulatory reform, rather than what you think is 

important or even crucial. We're told that 

hydroponics, for example, is a settled issue. 

Congress and the courts at this point seem to mostly 

agree. 

So it is attempting to turn away from 

the big picture and find some small rule that 

perhaps we can reform. Perhaps we can make better 

standards for soilless production, getting less 

plastic, better fertilizers, three-year 

transition period, all the while ignoring that you 

can't have organic farming that isn't based in the 
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soil; that isn't based on the fertility of a healthy 

soil. So as we decide where to focus our limited 

energies, I am reminded of an old story.

A guy comes upon a friend in the night, 

under a street light on his hands and knees. He 

says, What are you doing? He says I'm looking for 

my keys. And so he gets down on his hands and knees 

and helps his friend, and they look hard for quite 

a while. And finally he says to his friend, Are 

you sure this is where you lost your keys? And 

he says, No, I dropped them in the bushes up there, 

but the lights much better here.

And the point is, you know, we shouldn't 

just look where the light is good. We should look 

at where we actually lost the important things. 

The meaning that we think that we can win. USDA's 

mistaken when they assist that hydroponics is a 

settled issue. It will never be a settled issue 

as long as farmers and eaters say it isn't settled. 

In fact, I haven't lost my keys; I know right where 

they are. I'm just trying to help my friends who 

have lost theirs. So I urge you to join us and 
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you'll find a lot of company out there in the dark 

looking for where we actually lost the keys.

I wanted to -- before I end -- yes, if 

I could have a few seconds. My friend Linley Dixon 

asked me to apologize for a misstatement she made 

on Tuesday. She was actually quoting me about the 

percentage of CAFO eggs in America. The actually 

horrifying number is 75 percent of the certified 

organic eggs that would be decertified by 

implementing the OLPP, and I'm happy to share where 

I got that if you're interested. Thank you very 

much and thank you, Mary for translating.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Dave. Are there 

questions of Dave?

MR. CHAPMAN: Don't I get a gold star, 

Steve?

MR. ELA: Well, you get a silver star 

for finishing early. Maybe that's actually 

platinum star, I don't know, though I appreciate 

the time. I am not seeing any questions, Dave, 

so thank you again for your time and -- oh, Mindee 

has a question.
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MS. JEFFERY: Let me jump in, Steve. 

I was a little late with my hand. I apologize.

MR. ELA: That's fine. Go ahead.

MS. JEFFERY: Dave, I -- thank you for 

your comments and for your passion for organics. 

I just want to know if you think that we can really 

produce diverse, equitable, transparent, and 

accountable food system without democracy.

MR. CHAPMAN: I would say that's pretty 

unlikely.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you.

MR. CHAPMAN: Think democracy is what 

we hope we see in action in the USDA and I would 

say it's a struggle.

MR. ELA: Are there other questions for 

Dave? Again Dave, we appreciate your thoughts and 

comments.

MR. CHAPMAN: Thank you, Steve. We're 

going to move on to Stephen Walker, followed by 

Nicole Dehne, and then Garth Kahl. So Stephen, 

please take the floor and state your name and 

affiliation.
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MR. WALKER: Okay. Happy 

international Earth Day. I'm Steve Walker from 

MOSA. MOSA certifies 2100 operations and we've 

been a part of NOSB meetings for over 20 years. 

We have some insight on the human capital 

discussions and I'll touch on some of the high 

points and common themes from our written comments. 

Enforcement responsibilities are ever 

increasing. We're concerned that regulatory 

burdens are inequitable, increase stakeholder 

costs, and cause burnout. We support strong 

standards with detail, but compliance schemes 

don't always improve organic integrity can derail 

organic vision.

In these times, in our current system 

our route constraint is an inability to pass 

increasing financial burden onto farmers. We're 

very sensitive to financial struggles many organic 

operators face. At the core, we need strong 

agricultural policies that support living wages 

and consider true cost accounting in supporting 

organic systems. Capacity factors impacting 
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inspectors and reviewers are just a part of broad 

increasing demands. Besides collaboration or 

financial support, we need creative thinking on 

compliance verification methods, but our current 

burdens eat the time and space needed to develop 

creative solutions. For example, standard scale 

critical, as opposed to scale neutral.

Operations like organic dairies, or 

large dairies or importers have higher risk, but 

resulting enforcement mandates impact all 

operations inequitably, and folks with market 

advantages in our current system are less inclined 

towards systemic change, but our planet needs 

creative movement toward organic principles like 

health, ecology, fairness, and care. To keep 

organic accessible, we're seeking practical 

respite. Ideas include using risk assessment to 

focus our limited capacity, using remote 

technologies, revisiting the $5,000 exemption 

threshold and more certification costs assistance.

Without relief, we anticipate more 

small farm certification surrenders. Towards 
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solutionary thinking, we support assistance for 

the NOSB with more autonomy. We appreciate the 

breadth of skills and time needed for effective 

policy work. Non-prescriptive assistance with 

your busyness and burden can better enable your 

necessary creative and critical thinking. NOSB 

members should decide where or how you need 

support. However additional support is used, we 

expect the NOSB to offer your own proposals and 

documents.

Related, as private representatives 

and public private partnership, we support more 

work plan autonomy with balance. For some 

festering enforcement concerns, NOSB discussion 

could have great value, but these aren't finding 

their way to work plans. Conversely some past 

agenda items seemed an inefficient use of your 

time. Thanks.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Steve. It looks 

like we have a question from Sue.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. Hi, Steve. Thanks 

for your both written and oral comments. I was 
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reading with interest and agreement however we're 

conflicted when these changes cost and where they 

strengthen requirement. Also makes certification 

less widely important, and you talk about the cost 

to your certifiers -- burden to the certifiers --

and I've seen in the past, and we all know that 

a lot of our entities do shopping based on price. 

And if we, as the whole certification system --

and I'm talking inspectors through certifiers --

start increasing prices that is going to result 

in inequity.

So I guess -- I'm supposed -- I'm asking 

-- and then I also read about your risk assessment 

and you just commented on that -- I think that could 

very well be some of our answers, so could you 

elaborate on that? I really like this flow.

MR. WALKER: Yes. Well, it's easy to 

ask questions and harder to come up with answers.

MS. BAIRD: Right.

MR. WALKER: I think there are ways --

I don't know, you know, exact ways, but if we have 

to hold every operation to the same measures, the 
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same checklists and so forth, for some operations 

that doesn't make sense. Of course, they have to 

follow the same standards, but maybe we don't need 

to dig as deeply on some operations and maybe we 

need more time and capacity to dig more deeply on 

other operations.

MS. BAIRD: Right.

MR. WALKER: So that's where risk 

assessment comes in -- not necessarily having to 

hold every single operation to the same checklist 

and so forth. The challenge comes in in 

determining that risk assessment and ultimately 

that could translate to not doing some of the 

oversight that we're doing right now, but it would 

open up ability to do more oversight where we don't 

have the capacity right now. So how we divvy that 

up and make those decisions is a challenge, but 

it seems to be a good way to go.

The way we do certification these days, 

it always seems to be about more forms, more 

paperwork, more things that we need to look at. 

And sometimes there might be ways that we can 
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choose, that we don't always need more for every 

operation, or maybe -- I don't know. There's 

creative ideas out there and we need to start 

thinking creatively and have the pause that it 

takes to come up with creative ideas. In the 

meantime -- I think I used the analogy of fixing 

the plane while we're flying. We're so busy 

swimming -- there's like there's a lot of good and 

analogies here -- it's hard to find that pause to 

come up with working solutions and testing possible 

new solutions. But it's a good opportunity 

considering different ways of doing things.

MS. BAIRD: Right. May I follow up, 

Steve?

MR. ELA: Yes, if you can both be --

succinctly, then that would be great.

MS. BAIRD: This reminds me -- and the 

inspector's name was David Conrad, and he taught 

some classes in IOIA on risk assessment. His 

background was as a bank auditors.

Do you remember that? Were you in 

those classes, Stephen? 
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He outlined the whole matrix of risk 

assessment based on past non-conformances, size 

of operations, complexity of their lines of audits, 

and I'm really -- this brings me back to that, and 

I forgot all about that; that's been several years 

ago, but this really seems like a possibility to 

me.

MR. WALKER: Yes, the Accredited 

Certifiers Association had a working group a while 

back that tried to determine some risk assessment 

criteria. Also, I think there were several 

training sessions at this year's NOP and ACA 

training that talked about risk assessment. The 

effort in these is to maybe come up with 

quantitative criteria for determining qualitative 

factors. So, you know, maybe we assign a -- on 

a one-to-five scale a bunch of different factors, 

and if you rate something a three versus a four, 

it's a judgment call, but then you get a number 

at the bottom, and that can indicate relative risk 

with a system that is imperfect, but at least it's 

start. And then what we do with that risk 
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assessment is maybe a solution to some of these 

capacity problems.

MS. BAIRD: The other correlation I'm 

thinking about is IFOAM on their group 

certifications --

MR. ELA: Sue, I'm going to --

MS. BAIRD: I'm sorry.

MR. ELA: I'm going to jump in very 

quickly here. We need to move on.

MS. BAIRD: Okay.

MR. ELA: You can ask but make it make 

it very short.

MS. BAIRD: No, it was just a comment. 

IFOAM has a risk assessment for the group 

certifications and it's something we might go back 

and look at.

MR. WALKER: IFOAM has a lot of 

resources.

MR. ELA: All right.

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Thank you. Thank you, 

Stephen. We really appreciate it. We are going 
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to move on to Nicole Dehne, Garth Kahl, followed 

by Francis Thicke.

Nicole, please go ahead.

MS. DEHNE: Great. Thank you, Steve. 

My name is Nicole Dehne. I'm the Director for 

Vermont Organic Farmers and we represent over 800 

organic producers in Vermont. I want to thank the 

NOSB, as always, for all of your hard work and for 

the opportunity to give comment today on a few 

items. The first one that I want to talk about is 

hydroponic and container production. You know, 

the issue of certifying hydroponic production as 

organic, as Dave Chapman said, is not resolved. 

We disagree with the assertion that hydroponic 

operations have been allowed to be certified since 

the NOP began. If you look at past NOSB meeting 

transcripts, it shows that to be untrue.

So when I looked back, according to NOSB 

transcripts from April '95, the Board's 

recommendation was to consider allowing 

hydroponics to be certified if very strict 

conditions, that the Board would elaborate in 
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guidance material, were met. And this discussion 

of guidance and needing clarity around whether and 

how hydroponic operations could be certified 

continued until the 2010 NOSB recommendation. 

Then with that recommendation that clearly 

prohibited hydroponic production, they provided 

past discussion documents on the issue, they 

provided needed definitions, and they created a 

new section of crop standards that really defined 

how plants in containers and enclosures can be 

certified. So it's unclear to me why the NOP has 

not taken out the 2010 NOSB recommendation that 

prohibits hydroponics and add those suggested

parameters for container production to the crops 

section of the NOP rule.

As an industry I think you're hearing 

for many of us to say that we still need guidance 

on this issue that allows consistency, that 

provides transparency for consumers, and ensures 

a level playing field for producers. So we 

strongly recommend that the NOSB add this issue 

to their work agenda, that they collaborate with 
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the NOP to determine what clarity is still needed 

in order to finalize that 2010 NOSB recommendation.

The other issue I wanted to comment on 

was biodegradable bio-based mulch. We are 

grateful for the work that the Board has put into 

this very complicated topic and we do support the 

proposal. We agree that we want to be careful 

about the effect of synthetic polymers and their 

potential to accumulate into small particles of 

plastic in the soil. We believe research should 

continue on this. However, if we're honest with 

ourselves, then research should be extended to 

include other areas of risk for micro-plastic 

contamination as well, which would include, you 

know, the current allowed use of polyethylene mulch 

as well as the use of compost where food waste is 

a feed stock.

So we suggest that the current listing 

be amended to remove the phrase "must be produced 

without organisms or feed stock derived from 

excluded methods". Doing this would ensure that 

BBM is evaluated in the same way as other materials 
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on the national list. So it would still prohibit 

any products that rely on genetic modification, 

and instead would only allow materials with kind 

of incidental GE usage as long as there's no GE 

modification in the final product. That's it.

MR. ELA: All right. It looks -- yes, 

thank you so much. Looks like we have a question 

from --

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, you cut out 

there, but I think you called on Brian.

MR. ELA: Yes, I did call on Brian, so 

go ahead, Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay, thanks.

Thanks, Nicole. I'm wondering how 

hydroponic and container production systems would 

relate to our strong focus these days that organic 

promotes biodiversity and can aid with carbon 

sequestration.

MS. DEHNE: Yes, I would suggest that 

it does disservice to our messaging in the industry 

right now about the potential that organic farmers 

have to mitigate and prevent climate change. And 
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like you said, that the requirement to promote and 

maintain biodiversity -- I agree that allowing 

soilless production kind of hinders the strength 

of that messaging.

MR. ELA: We have another question from 

Wood. Go ahead Wood.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Steve.

Thanks, Nicole. I really appreciate 

your comments about a broader risk assessment 

framework for micro-plastics -- that was 

compelling to me. You said something provocative 

though, that got me got me concerned. Are you 

concerned about the use of compost that derives 

from food waste? Because I was -- that got me a 

bit concerned, because I --

MS. DEHNE: Yes. Yes.

MR. TURNER: I understand where you're 

going with that, but I'd love to hear you talk a 

little more about that, if you don't mind.

MS. DEHNE: Sure. I had a very kind 

of depressing conversation, which sometimes I 

ended up having with folks and I feel like, Oh God, 
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I almost wish I didn't know that information. But 

I had a conversation a few weeks ago with a 

composter in Vermont who's been composting for 25 

years, and he had been working really hard with, 

for example, grocery stores to make sure that they 

separated their food waste from their plastic 

containers, right? And Vermont, as a state is 

doing this wonderful thing -- we are now requiring 

that everybody in the state compost, which is 

great, but we're sort of industrializing the system 

at the same time.

And in order to do that, what's 

happening now is when they go to mix the food waste, 

instead of separating it at the source, they just 

put all the food waste with the plastic packaging, 

all together in one spot. Then it gets hauled over 

to Maine, where they have a new machine that 

depackages, and what that means is it, like, chops 

up all the food and sort of separates the plastic, 

and often you'll get like .3 percent to 1 percent 

of all the food waste is still plastic, right?

Then that comes to the composters at 
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the feed stock, and then they use it as an 

ingredient to make compost. And what they're 

starting to find is that, you know, that we're 

basically -- got micro-plastics in the compost now, 

and now we're applying those to organic farm 

fields. So there's, like, this, you know, this 

foundational belief that compost is what is good 

-- we've, like, grown with our understanding that 

organic farming means, like, amending the compost, 

but now we're creating a compost that is very 

problematic in that way, so --

MR. TURNER: Yes, I get the concept, 

I'm just trying to understand how big of a problem 

this might be, and I know we're getting ahead of 

ourselves in terms of this risk assessment that 

you're talking about, which -- I love that idea, 

but don't even get me started on PLU stickers.

MS. DEHNE: Yes. Right. I learned 

about those, too. I was like, Oh, God, I'll do 

better.

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, you're on mute.

MR. ELA: Sorry about that. I have one 
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very quick question before we move on. I didn't 

quite follow that you wanted the biodegradable 

mulch to remove the phrase about excluded methods; 

that the mulch couldn't contain excluded organisms 

but the process could. Did I hear that correctly?

MS. DEHNE: Yes. Well, I can just --

like, the layperson's version would be right now, 

when we add that annotation, we're actually making 

it so that BBM has a higher standard compared to 

other materials on the national list. So if you 

look at like microorganisms -- you know, sometimes 

it's easy to say this is genetically modified in 

this isn't, but sometimes it's harder and 

certifiers and material review organizations often 

have to make a call whether something's genetically 

modified or not, right?

So with the bacteria and the 

microorganisms, you know, it might be that the 

bacteria is being grown on genetically modified 

corn feed stock, right? They're consuming the 

corn, and we know it's gentically modified because 

most corn is, but because it's being consumed, and 
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then the bacteria that is not in the final product, 

that process is allowed. But by leaving this 

annotation in with the bio-degradable bio-based 

mulch, we are basically saying that that would not 

be okay for biodegradable bio-based mulch, even 

though it's okay for microorganisms and dairy 

cultures and all the other examples on the national 

list.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you for 

that clarification. I just wanted to make sure 

I followed your thought process there. Thank you 

so much for your comments.

MS. DEHNE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We very much appreciate them.

We're going to move onto the Garth Kahl 

and then Francis Thicke and then Jennifer Landry.

So Garth, please go ahead.

MR. KAHL: Thank you. Dear NOSB 

Members and NOP staff, thank you for the 

opportunity to comment, and as always, thanks for 

your service. In that vein, let me make a quick 

plug before the proposal to provide support staff 
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for NOSB members. I think this is an idea that 

is long overdue. My name is Garth Kahl and I wear 

many, many organic hats, among those being a 

certified organic grower stockman, IOIA, 

accredited inspector, inspector trainer, peer 

evaluator, contract reviewer, and together with 

my wife Angela, co-owner of the organic consulting 

company Independent Organic Services.

You already have my written comments 

on a variety of topics and I'm drinking my coffee 

this morning sweetened with organic stevia to 

remind you to please tread softly and not eliminate 

ion exchange resins from the organic toolbox. But 

what I really want to talk about this morning is 

human capital, specifically what I think are the 

bottlenecks preventing the education and 

development of new inspectors and the retention 

of existing ones. If you are not scared by the 

specter of the new SOE rule and the tidal wave of 

additional inspections it will bring, you are not 

paying attention.

As an IOIA trainer who has taught in 
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multiple countries, I truly believe IOIA has the 

best materials and the capacity to train hundreds 

of new inspectors a year, but this will not address 

the real bottleneck, namely apprenticeship. The 

current process for inspector apprenticeship is 

broken. Here's what I think can fix it. One: We 

need a well-funded, structured apprenticeship 

training that pairs veteran mentor inspectors with 

small groups of trainees and includes multiple days 

of mock and/or actual inspections.

IOIA has already created a pilot 

program for this and is seeking funders and hosts. 

This training must be supported by the organic 

industry -- yes, brands. This means you, the NOP, 

and organic certifiers. Brands can help by 

contributing generously to the IOIA and by agreeing 

to host groups of inspectors on their farms and 

facilities. Certifiers can and must help by 

permitting apprentices to attend inspections of 

their clients regardless of whether or not they 

are hiring new inspectors or not. This is a 

textbook definition of a pre-competitive factor.
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No amount of on-boarding new inspectors 

will help close the current gap and looming gap 

in the industry unless we work to retain them. 

No amount of credentialing will help unless that 

system leads to a more uniform pay rate between 

certifiers. Currently, credentialing 

accreditation makes virtually no difference in 

what inspectors are willing to pay, or certifiers 

are willing to pay. During the accreditation 

audits, NOP auditors should be looking at how long 

inspectors spend on-site and asking about the ACA's 

pay rates.

If inspectors are doing three to four 

hours on a dairy or a large multi ingredient 

processor are only earning $300 for that 

inspection, that inspector probably isn't 

qualified, or is too overworked to identify 

critical but little known threats to organic 

integrity, like milk withdrawal for flunixin, use 

of quats without adequate wash or rinse, and 

volatile amines in live steam. If you're 

scratching your head and reaching for your copy 
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of the rule, that's because this is specialized 

information and a skill-set that takes years to 

fully develop. We need --

MR. ELA: Well done, Garth.

MR. KAHL: -- to support and foster a 

professional class of inspectors.

MR. ELA: Are there questions for 

Garth? I have one with your lead off point with 

organic stevia. So do you think organic -- I mean, 

obviously the recharge materials needed to be on 

the national list and everybody agrees on that from 

what I can see -- but tell me again, on resins: 

Are you feeling like they should or should not 

appear on the list?

MR. KAHL: Well, I think there's a lot 

of FDA precedent that says they're a food contact 

surface in, I think we run the risk of going down 

an endless rabbit hole. So if we're going to call 

resins a food contact surface, but we're also going 

to need them to be on the list, then we also need 

to look at the resins inside barrels, the little 

o-rings, the flexible plastic inside transfer 
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pumps, you know, barrel liners -- there's myriads 

of plastics and materials that are classified as 

food contact surfaces.

If the Board does decide to take the 

approach to list resins -- obviously, you know, 

that's within your prerogative -- I would ask that 

you do so in a way that is not disruptive to the 

industry; that allows, you know, resins to get 

listed on the national list, and also allows, you 

know, processors and the food system in general 

to adapt and find those resin materials or 

substrate materials that are allowed. So, you 

know, if you need to do it, do it carefully so that 

you don't create disruptions in the supply chain.

MR. ELA: Great. We have one other 

question from Logan.

MS. PETREY: Hi. Thank you. Okay. 

I agree with you on the specialization of 

inspectors; think it's really important. Even 

regions have specializations within each commodity 

on the farmer, not on livestock or milk. Just a 

question: Do you think that specialization is more 
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important than location? Like having an inspector 

cover an area that's over a wide variety of 

different commodities or different types of 

industries?

MR. KAHL: That's a good question. I 

think that, in general, we need training that 

increases, you know, the capacity of inspectors 

in all regions. Obviously, you know, the pandemic 

has shown that we can't depend on flying inspectors 

all over the country. And that, you know, carbon 

footprint too -- I have probably, you know, there's 

a circle in, you know, Hades for me in terms of 

my carbon footprint as an inspector. But I think 

we need to do both.

So I think -- and Steve from MOSA 

actually talked about this. You know, we need to 

potentially look at doing risk assessment -- so 

maybe three years out of five, a normal inspector 

goes to that -- or an average trained inspected 

goes to that facility, but then, you know, two years 

out of five or one year out of five, maybe a 

specialized inspector who has particular 
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expertise, say, in auditing like Sue brought up, 

goes to that facility. I think there's ways to 

address that -- you know, obviously, we can't be 

bringing inspectors -- it's not sustainable to fly 

inspectors all around the country and all around 

the world.

MS. PETREY: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: We have another question from 

Nate.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you for your 

comment, Garth. I just wanted to ask: When we 

talked about the burden on farmers and the number 

of inspections being done, I was wondering, do you 

only find fraud in large operations?

MR. KAHL: No, absolutely not. You 

know, I find fraud and all scales of operations, 

and particularly, you know with dairy farmers, I 

find failure to meet the 30 percent DMI 

requirements all across the board; all scales. 

Everybody's facing economic pressures and 

hardship. So a lot of people say, Oh, well, you 

know, a large, thousand-cow dairy -- there's no 
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way they can be compliant. But honestly, I've seen 

issues -- feed audits that come up really funny 

looking or lack of sufficient DMI on people that 

are milking 60 or 70 head as well.

So no. Fraud is -- scale is not a 

barrier to entry for fraud, and in fact, just 

anecdotally, I find less fraud in larger entities 

simply because they have a brand to protect and 

cheating is going to be that much more costly to 

them. They don't want to damage their brand to 

save a few thousand dollars. Now, obviously, you 

know, this is not absolute, but -- no. Fraud cuts 

completely across the Board and can be found at 

all scales.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you so much for 

that. And just one more thing if I may follow up, 

Steve -- could you just speak a little bit more 

-- how mature is the program that IOIA is putting 

on to have a more structured mentorship for organic 

inspectors and are brands able to now participate?

MR. KAHL: Yes. So there is a pilot 

program; it came out of a very dedicated membership 
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committee of veteran inspectors -- the 

apprenticeship committee. There is a pilot 

program. There's a proposed budget and brands can 

go to www.IOIA.net and make a contribution, and 

they can contact IOIA Margaret Scoles and talk 

about how they can host one of these apprenticeship 

at their farm or processing facilities.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: Kim has a question -- Kim, 

can you make it quick?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes. Just quickly here, 

Garth, how long is that apprenticeship and what 

do you think is an equitable amount of time to 

decrease the learning curve for a new inspector?

MR. KAHL: So the current 

apprenticeship as proposed is five days -- we're 

calling it an apprenticeship boot camp -- so it's 

five days of on-the-ground inspections with a 

mentor inspector. So the students would write, 

you know, five inspection reports that would be 

reviewed by the mentor inspector, and then that's 

followed by one day of didactic learning that might 
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bring in experts. So for example, experts on 

fraud, experts on business management -- because 

let's face it, being an independent inspector is 

running a business -- experts on veterinary 

medicine, pasture management, and that kind of 

thing.

The other component of the 

apprenticeship, which is also key, is ongoing 

mentorship for one year after the apprenticeship. 

So that apprentice inspector, they're going to 

go out, they're going to start working, but they 

may have questions. They may have questions, --

you know, what do I at an unannounced inspection, 

or I have this grower who's really resistant or 

is really, you know, throwing up a lot of 

roadblocks. And they're going to have that 

inspector, basically, the mentor inspector on 

speed dial. So for the next year they can call 

them up and the mentor inspector will provide them 

with guidance and help and support, in addition 

to, of course, what the certifier would do, but 

oftentimes you can't get someone on the phone at 
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the certifier's inspection department. So the 

idea is long-term -- you know, a year or more of 

guidance and mentoring.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you for your comments, 

Garth. Very much appreciated. We're going to 

move on to Francis Thicke, Jennie Landry, and Aaron 

Gardner after Francis. So Francis -- former NOSB 

member during my term on the Board.

So go ahead, Francis.

MR. THICKE: Thank you, Steve. 

Actually, that's a good segue because what I'm --

oh, I didn't even say who I am. I'm an organic 

crop and dairy farmer from Iowa, and I'm going to 

read to you excerpts from a letter from former NOSB 

members to the Secretary of Agriculture, Tom 

Vilsack. This letter was just completed this 

morning; we have 40 former NOSB members who have 

signed on. And I don't know if I can -- this share 

screen thing works or not -- it's disabled. Okay. 

What I'm going to do is hold this up, if you want 

to look at who's doing it while I'm speaking --
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who's signed onto his letter. You may have to use 

a large screen. I'm just going to read excerpts.

Dear Secretary Vilsack, we the 

undersigned have all served on the National Organic 

Standards Board. Our tenure on the Board has 

covered the full span of the NOSB's existence from 

1992 until the present day. We are writing to 

share with you our concern that the integrity of 

the National Organic Standards has eroded 

significantly over the years. We think the 

erosion of the organic standards is in violation 

of the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990, and 

it is undermining consumer confidence in the 

integrity of organic food and the confidence of 

real organic farmers and the integrity of the USDA 

National Organic Program.

In the last 11 years, the National 

Organic Program has failed to bring a number of 

key NOSB recommendations to rule-making. We urge 

you to take immediate action on these 

recommendations. Number one, the production 

standard for terrestrial plants in containers in 
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enclosures. This recommendation called for the 

prohibition of organic production in the Organic 

Program. Number two, USDA published a proposed 

rule to close the loopholes relating to the origin 

of livestock in 2015. This rule would clarify that 

after a one year time, no new animals can 

transitioning to an organic farm.

Number three, the National Organic 

Program finalized a comprehensive set of animal 

welfare standards referred to as the Organic 

Livestock and Poultry Practices Rule in January 

2017. This has not been implemented. The OLPP 

should be immediately reinstated in its final form. 

A couple of other issues: The pasture compliance 

program needs to be fixed, and green fraud -- in 

spite of congressional funding, we still haven't 

had significant action taken to stop this fraud.

So while this letter contains key 

issues, there are other issues of importance not 

raised here. The National Organic Program can 

only thrive if it is built on public trust. We 

urge the USDA to act on these NOSB recommendations 
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aimed at enhancing the foundational goals as 

spelled out in the Organic Foods Production Act.

And so this letter will go to Secretary 

Tom Vilsack today.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Francis. Are 

there questions from the Board? I'm not seeing 

any. We always appreciate your comments and good 

luck on your dairy.

MR. THICKE: Thank you, Steve.

MR. ELA: We're going to move onto 

Jennie Landry, Aaron Gardner, and then Harriet 

Behar.

So Jennie, please state your name and 

affiliation.

MS. LANDRY: My name is Jennie Landry. 

I represent DSM Nutritional Products, 

manufactures Omega-3, EPA, and DHA based products 

from refined fish oil. DSM strives to support a 

renewable and sustainable environment, and we 

welcome the opportunity to provide comments to the 

NOSB regarding proposed fish oil annotations to 

address environmental concerns. Out of the three 
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options proposed in the handling subcommittee's 

discussion documents, DSM support options one and 

two that require a third-party sustainability 

certification because they directly impact and 

improve the sustainable sourcing official for 

human consumption.

They are also clear and enforceable and 

are not overly burdensome because many fish oil 

manufacturers already have reputable 

certifications in place. We agree with including 

organizations who can accredit certification 

schemes to meet global best practices, as in option 

two, although we'd like to emphasize that it is 

business critical to allow as much flexibility as 

possible. ISEAL and GSSI in combination would 

allow manufacturers more options with third-party 

certifiers, which is important for our diversified 

and complex supply chain.

DSM does have reservations with option 

three that relies on an assessment and reading from 

Seafood Watch because it is not as clear or 

enforceable. First of all, we found that the scope 
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of fish species in locations assessed is very 

limited, especially for small pelagic fish species 

that are typically used in fish meal production. 

There is no rating for many of the fish species 

in locations that are the primary source for food 

grade fish oil used in organic products. In this 

case, compliance cannot be verified. It is not 

known if a certifier would interpret this as a 

non-compliance, potentially and unnecessarily 

reducing the availability of organic-compliant 

fish oil.

Option three would be the most 

difficult to enforce because sources of crude oil 

are highly confidential for fish oil manufacturers 

and will not easily be available for organic 

processors or certifiers to verify. In addition, 

a fish oil manufacturer's supply chain can be very 

complex and widespread. Often, multiple blends, 

fish species, and sources are required to meet 

supply demands plus demands for Omega-3 EPA and 

DHA, which are naturally occurring and can vary 

with every lot of crude fish oil.
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It is not feasible for an mechanic 

processor or certifier to verify fish oil 

manufacturers' compliance. They would have to 

rely on the fish oil manufacturer to comply. 

Therefore, option three also creates additional 

complexity and obligation for fish oil 

manufacturers to manage and demonstrate 

compliance. This responsibility is not 

value-added as the fish oil supply has already been 

thoroughly assessed and certified as sustainable, 

as in the case with DSM. I'd like to thank the 

NOSB for your time and the opportunity to provide 

comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. Are 

there questions from the Board? I am not seeing 

any, so thank you so much for your comments. 

Greatly appreciate them.

MS. LANDRY: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to 

Aaron Gardner, followed by Harriet Behar, and then 

Meagan Collins.

So Aaron, please state your name and 
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affiliation.

MR. GARDNER: Thank you, Steve. Aaron 

Gardner; work for Organic Valley/CROPP 

Cooperative, certification senior specialist on 

the handling side of our business CROPP/ Organic 

Valley. And thank you, Steve, and current and past 

board members for all of your hard work and 

dedication to organics. CROPP is the nation's 

largest organic independent and farmer-owned 

co-operative, organized in 1988. We represent 

nearly 1900 certified organic farmers in 34 states 

and three foreign countries achieving over 1.1 

billion in sales in 2020, so we respectfully submit 

the following comments pertaining to animal 

enzymes and cellulose.

Animal enzymes -- we use them in the 

form of lipase in the production of our delicious 

organic blue cheese. Many aged cheeses do not hold 

up to the process when non-animal based, vegetarian 

rennet is used. To the best of your knowledge, 

there is no lipase formulation available derived 

from organic livestock and the loss of this vital 
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processing aid could greatly harm the organic 

artisan cheese market. These enzymes are accepted 

for use in many other countries -- Canada, the EEOC, 

Codex, IFOAM, and Japan. They're listed in the 

rule at 205605, and we support the continued 

listing of animal enzymes on the national list.

Cellulose. We use cellulose in two 

applications -- cellulose in casings for organic 

hot dogs and sausages, and also in shredded cheese. 

The casings are extremely important to the organic 

hot dog and sausage production. The casings are 

permeable to allow smoke, water, and air to pass 

through the hot dogs and sausages. They're made 

from virgin wood pulp and processed to dissolve 

the cellulose and reform it into casings. There's 

currently no organic source of raw materials. The 

only alternative are plastic casings and they don't 

function in the same way, as they don't allow water 

and air to flow -- to do that cooking process and 

flavoring.

Powdered cellulose is used by us as an 

anti-caking material for shredded cheese as well 
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as graded Parmesan cheese, and there are no other 

materials available that function in the same 

manner at this time. For this particular use, 

powdered is an acceptable term and we're not 

advocating for any descriptor to this material that 

may preclude the use of cellulose for peelable 

casings. We support the continued listing of 

cellulose on the national list for regenerative 

casings and as an anti-caking agent. So please 

keep cellulose as currently annotated the national 

list. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Good timing, Aaron. Do we 

have questions from the Board? Kim has one.

MS. HUSEMAN: Hi, Aaron. Thank you 

for your comment. Just out of curiosity, when we 

talk about animal enzymes and the availability of 

animal enzymes from organic livestock, can you 

expand on any opportunity that you've seen in that 

market space or what barriers might be there?

MR. GARDNER: I haven't seen that there 

is -- the number of organic livestock available 

and what I've been told by our specialist in product 
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development, the numbers just aren't there to 

provide us with the amount of the enzyme that would 

be needed for production.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you.

MR. GARDNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Other questions from the 

Board? I'm not seeing any, so thank you so much 

for your comments. Very much appreciated.

MR. GARDNER: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move onto 

Harriet Behar, followed by Meagan Collins, and then 

Tim Stemwedel. Harriet's another former NOSB 

member during my term. Please go ahead.

MS. BEHAR: Hello. Can you hear me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. BEHAR: Okay. My name is Harriet 

Behar, a recent former Chair of the NOSB, and my 

Wisconsin farm has been certified organic since 

1989. Ammonia extracts -- the NOSB needs to review 

all highly soluble fertilizers and develop a use 

policy. Rather than looking to restrict the 

percentage of use for any time, a better way is 
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to restrict the use to times of emergency, such 

as an exceptionally cold spring, or heavy rains, 

or other extreme conditions that are not typical 

for that region.

Organic producers are mandated to 

approach farming using systems first before the 

use of materials. By allowing highly soluble 

fertility inputs at any time, our regulations 

ignore this mandate and mirror conventional ag, 

which rely upon a few highly soluble nutrients 

rather than through the complex ecosystem of our 

soils. Both existing and especially new producers 

would be better served through clarifying that 

organic farming does not just substitute 

prohibited inputs for approved ones, but instead 

builds soil resilience as the farm matures.

The NOSB could use help in the 

development of their proposals, but please be 

careful -- NOSB members now express their own 

valued perspectives as well as the voices of their 

stakeholders, and it would be a tragedy if this 

was lost. NOSB members are not bureaucrats, but 
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bring a passion that is important to see in your 

documents. Please do not give you up your mandated 

responsibility in deciding on the review of ion 

exchange materials. It is a slippery slope to give 

the NOP more and more say over the materials list.

I urge you to build a more equal 

partnership with the NOP to gain more control over 

your work agenda. You are there to represent the 

important needs of the organic community, and that 

should not be thwarted by political road blocks, 

which have happened at the USDA at times. 

Specifically, the review of greenhouse and both 

field and indoor container production was approved 

by the NOSB as a work agenda item, and then abruptly 

ended by the NOP. This is an area where 

inconsistencies and problems are rampant and must 

be revived by your review.

Lastly, I asked NOSB to push the NOP 

to start rule-making on the native ecosystems 

proposal and congratulate the Wild Farm Alliance 

for their excellent comment on how to implement 

it, and that you referred to the NOC written 
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comments on paper pots and biodegradable mulch film 

for my thoughts on those materials. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Harriet. Much 

appreciated for your thoughts. Are there 

questions? Looks like Logan has one.

MS. PETREY: Hi. Thank you. That was 

a very interesting comment that you had about the 

use policy being on when needed. Curious -- how 

would you justify that need? Would weather data 

showing an amount of rain for a certain area 00 

would that justify the use or is that how you would 

measure that? Or would you be expecting a tissue 

analysis like we find in other products like 

calcium chloride with the deficiency and calcium? 

In my opinion, if you're low on nitrogen, that 

can be too late sometimes, especially if you're 

a leafy veg that's selling, you know, for a lot 

of aesthetics, but do you have a comment on that?

MS. BEHAR: Yes. So it's very similar 

to other items in our pest management hierarchy. 

You have to show that you tried through other 

systems, methods, to accomplish what you needed 
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to, but then they were climactic conditions that 

caused you to need this highly soluble fertility 

input, you know, at that time. And of course, if 

it's being used year after year after year, there 

must be an issue with the system.

And I would, you know, suggest that it 

go through the NOSB process where you get input 

from the public on what it might look like. You'd 

hear from certifiers, what they need to see, what 

producers can provide, and that sort of thing. 

So I think, rather than -- I know Steve was asking 

a lot of people what percentage of ammonium extract 

might be permitted; I think is needs to be looked 

at differently as used only when the system has 

failed, usually by outside, you know, climate or, 

you know, that's really most of the time -- weather 

-- that would make it so what you had done in your 

system did not provide the nitrogen you needed, 

and you had to then rely.

MS. PETREY: Correct. So in your 

opinion, would you be able to prove that you needed 

the product if you were able to show that you made 
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applications of these natural fertilizers that 

would be able to grow the crop, however, you had 

a climactic events. And these are emergencies, 

so typically there's there is a timeliness to it, 

and so the data had taken would just be the

climactic event and you can assume that things have 

leached out, you know, available nitrogen that's 

been made. So if you are adding the correct amount 

of nitrogen that you will need to grow the crop, 

however, come into a climactic issue, would that 

be enough to justify the use?

MS. BEHAR: Well, I think that would 

be one aspect, but again, I think it should go 

through the NOSB process and there's some -- you 

know, we'll hear from soil scientists and others 

who might have other aspects that would be useful. 

So we have good guidance to producers and 

certifiers on how an emergency use would be 

implemented.

MS. PETREY: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Harriet, quick question; my 

own. How would you define highly soluble 
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fertilizers?

MS. BEHAR: I know when you asked the 

other person. Well, I guess when we see it. I 

didn't really prepare for that. But, you know, 

it's mostly liquid feeding that would be given to 

plants that have a quick uptake.

MR. ELA: Okay. Great. Thank you so 

much, Harriet. Didn't need to put you on the spot 

there, but Brian had one quick question.

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, I actually 

don't think that's our Brian.

MR. ELA: Oh, sorry. Yes. I didn't 

look fully. So we're only taking questions from 

board members, so -- all right, Harriet. Thank 

you so much as always.

MS. BEHAR: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Appreciate your thoughts.

MS. BEHAR: Thanks to the full board 

for all you do.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

Meagan Collins, then Tim Stemwedel, and Daren 

Stemwedel.
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So Meagan, please go ahead. State your 

name and affiliation.

MS. COLLINS: Can you hear me okay?

MR. ELA: We can. Go ahead.

MS. COLLINS: Okay. Great. My name 

is Meagan Collins and I'll be commenting on behalf 

of the Accredited Certifiers Association. The ACA 

is a non-profit created to ensure consistent 

implementation of the USDA organic regulations 

through collaboration and education of accredited 

certification agencies. Our membership includes 

63 certification agencies worldwide, including all 

46 US-based certifiers. Thank you for the 

opportunity to provide comments to the NOSB on the 

most recent proposal on human capital management.

We would like to thank the NOP and NOSB 

for the work that went into developing this 

proposal. The proposal does an excellent job 

highlighting the barriers for inspectors to get 

started and the reasons inspectors leave. 

However, the issue is deeper than paying inspectors 

more for their work and this solution will not fully 
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address the inspector shortage issue. The organic 

certification process has become increasingly more 

complicated and globalized and represents a large 

diversity of operations from small farms to large 

processors. Thus, there's a greater need for more 

qualified inspectors and ongoing training. In 

order for certifiers to pay inspectors higher fees 

based on these qualifications, certifiers need to 

increase the costs they charge their clients to 

obtain certification.

Another issue to address is the cost 

differential between certifiers which creates 

competitiveness among certifiers and inspectors 

because there are no standardized fees. There are 

benefits to that, but also concerns. For 

instance, we do not know what certifiers pay their 

inspectors, and whether larger certifiers are 

out-competing smaller certifiers for inspectors, 

or whether inspectors are reducing their fees to 

secure work with certifiers. Because there is no 

uniformity among inspector pay, certifiers do not 

know where on the spectrum they fall for inspector 
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pay.

Furthermore, the industry should 

consider organic inspection and certification 

review as a professional career path to address 

the issue of how inspectors are treated in the 

industry. Standardization and education is 

needed. This may involve a certification or 

accreditation program for inspectors.

Finally, the pandemic has shone a light 

on what can be done differently to improve work 

conditions for inspectors, specifically requiring 

less travel. Many tools can be utilized now, 

including virtual inspections to improve reporting 

and resolve some of the issues related to flexible 

work-life balance for inspectors.

With that being said, we would like to 

emphasize that the organic industry needs 

additional financial support to address these 

human capital issues. The NOP should be funded 

in a more appropriate fashion through governmental 

policy and fiscal allocations. Organic food is 

important to the American people, and in order to 
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protect the industry from fraud, it should be 

supported by taxpayers. Increasing certification 

costs while reducing cost share programs can price 

small farmers out of certification and undermines 

their value to the industry.

The ACA welcomes opportunities to be 

involved in future working groups to develop 

collaborative strategies to increase the trained 

inspector pool, and can also work on educating 

certifiers on creating awareness of the value of 

experienced inspectors and reviewers. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Gold star for you, as well. 

Thank you so much for your comments. Are there 

questions from the Board? Brian has one.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes. Thanks, Meagan. 

I was really intrigued by your comment that 

basically the whole system maybe could be funded 

in a different way, and I wonder if you'd expand 

on that. And in particular, I've been thinking 

more and more lately about the sort of conflict 

of interest there is of organic farmers paying for 

their own certification, engaging specific 
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certifiers, and that sort of thing.

MS. COLLINS: Right. We did discuss 

this as a working group and I don't have, like, 

very specific examples of how it can be more 

appropriately funded, but right now we have this 

very, you know, capitalist system. So certifiers 

are competing against each other, they're reducing 

their fees to obtain clients, and that really falls 

on the inspector -- they're not getting paid enough 

to do their work, and at the same time, you know, 

farmers are being out-competed as well, because 

they can't, you know, get money for their crops 

because certification keeps increasing and things 

like that.

So it all really goes back to -- it 

either falls on the consumer, and so I think if 

we really value the organic industry, and --

because it shows that consumers really do value 

it, you know, congress should step up and start, 

you know, considering that. I mean, I don't know 

if that answers your question. I'm sorry.

MR. CALDWELL: Well, thanks. Yes. I 
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think there's a lot of different aspects to it and 

I appreciate your thoughts.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board? Thank you so much for your comments. 

We're going to move on to Tim Stemwedel and then 

Daren Stemwedel, and I think after Daren gives 

comments, we will take a short break. We're 

running just a little bit behind, so just want to 

point that out.

Go ahead, Time. You have the floor and 

state your name and affiliation.

MR. T. STEMWEDEL: Hi. I'm Tim 

Stemwedel, but first good morning and Happy Earth 

Day to all. I'm a certified crop advisor and owner 

of California Organic Fertilizers. I've spent 

most of my career developing and manufacturing 

organic products, including natural ammonia. I 

have three things to comment on: the petition, the 

technical report, and farm systems.

The NOSB has been asked to place natural 

ammonia fertilizers on a list of prohibited 

substances. Doing so would place one of two forms 
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of nitrogen utilized by crops into a category 

currently occupied by arsenic, lead, and nicotine. 

It would place an element essential for life on 

Earth onto a list of prohibited substances. The 

petitioner confirms AE as a natural product by 

filing this petition, but the documents provided 

are for synthetic ammonia. The petition's full 

of inaccurate information, most of which has been 

thoroughly discussed in written comments by PhD 

soil scientists and other stakeholders. I urge 

the NOSB committee to revisit these comments and 

to reach out to the authors for further 

clarification.

I asked you to reject this petition. 

It has no scientific or legal basis to move 

forward. The natural ammonia is the same as the 

ammonia in other common inputs. It stimulates the 

soil biome the same way, it meets NOP regulations 

and the spirit of organics by recycling, 

sequestering carbon, and building the soil to 

increase microbial activity. It does not have the 

social justice issues associated with many other 
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inputs. The TR states seven times that natural 

ammonia is the same as synthetic ammonia. If this 

for true, none of us would be talking about it 

today. It would already be prohibited.

How did we get to the point to where 

we're willing to believe that a natural material 

is the same as the synthetic way? That's like 

saying air and water are the same thing because 

they contain hydrogen and oxygen. The TR 

repeatedly states there is no information on AE 

and instead writes about synthetic ammonia. The 

committee asked for more information on natural 

ammonia -- that's not what you got. If this 

petition moves forward, the TR should be discarded 

and replaced by one done by qualified soil 

scientists to understand the soil food web and 

organic systems.

In closing, organic farm plans have a 

section on nutrient management. These plans will 

not allow AE to became the sole or main input. 

As a CCA, I always recommend diverse use of 

nutrients including compost, cover crops, and dry 
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fertilizers, leaving liquid products -- and

everybody's talking about soluble nitrogen 

products -- as a tool to be used as needed. Thank 

you very much for listening and for all of your 

services to organics.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Tim. Carolyn has 

a question for you.

DR. DIMITRI: Thanks very much for your 

comments, Tim. Could you clarify one point that 

you made, where you said it doesn't have the social 

justice problems that are associated with other 

inputs. Can you be more explicit about what you 

meant by that?

MR. T. STEMWEDEL: Well, we see 

products in the market -- things like seabird guano 

that's being scraped off of islands that are 

essentially being harvested by people that are 

being paid, you know, less than a few dollars a 

day to do that work. We also see a large amount 

of liquid fish materials coming in out of Asia, 

that's coming from areas severely damaged 

environmentally, as well as the people there that 
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are doing this work that, many times are under 

slavery.

DR. DIMITRI: Thank you for that 

clarification.

MR. ELA: Amy has a question.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. Thank 

you, Tim. I really appreciate your written and 

oral comments, and your experience as an agronomist 

as well. I was reading one of your comments that 

you've made and I'm just going to quote it real 

quick. You say, In California, organic produce 

farms commonly apply nitrogen or nitrogen 

manure-based inputs at levels that far exceed 

nitrogen input levels on conventional farms.

So I was really curious about that 

comment, and then in conjunction with your oral 

comments, how you spoke about the nutrient 

management process that was more comprehensive 

with cover crops and crop rotations and such. So 

when I was reading your written comments, it looked 

like the main fertility sources for strawberries 

were ammonia extracts and manure. So can you 
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highlight and connect what you said orally with 

what you wrote in your written comments for me?

MR. T. STEMWEDEL: Yes. There's a lot 

of things at play. We're -- you know, it's an arid 

region in California, in the West. So we have a 

lack of water, so we're seeing more and more drip 

irrigation systems coming into play. And many of 

these crops are on very long time frames -- like 

strawberries can be in the ground 180, 200 days. 

You know, trying to do a pre-plant on 

strawberries, to get through the whole crop isn't 

really possible so liquid products are really 

essential for that.

Relative to the excess fertilizer 

applications, what we see is -- it's kind of like, 

well, I guess it's best described as -- crop 

nitrogen demand is a curve that is not synchronous 

with the nutrient availability from all the sources 

that we put out there. This is why we needed 

different inputs. So to have enough nutrients 

available, we could pre-plant excessive amounts 

in order to cover demand periods, but that results 
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in excessive total nutrients being applied, and 

also into accumulation of insoluble nutrients such 

as phosphorus.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. Other questions 

from the Board?

Very quickly, Tim, I have one. 

Obviously, ammonia occurs in the soil and from 

other products. I think the ammonia extract is 

referred to as essentially a pure ammonia. How 

-- you know, for applying pure ammonia versus those 

other products that contain much smaller amounts 

of ammonia, are you saying the pure ammonia reacts 

the same?

MR. T. STEMWEDEL: Yes, it does. It, 

you know, it goes through a biological process in 

the soil. You have to look at it like -- soluble

nitrogen in general, other than sodium nitrate, 

doesn't bypass the soil. It doesn't matter 

whether nitrogen's soluble or not. If you're 

putting down an ammoniacal form of nitrogen, it's 

still going to -- it gets assimilated very quickly 
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into the soil biome by the microbes. There's 

nitrobacter, nitrosomonas microbes in the soil 

that are just waiting for nitrogen forms to be able 

to put them in a bioassimilation-type form.

So, you know, and also you're saying, 

well, pure form of nitrogen -- well, we're not 

talking about just anhydrous ammonia here; we're 

talking about an ammonia form of nitrogen that 

would be there with carbon dioxide, you know, with 

it, there would be different forms of carbon, 

there's citric acids -- there's all kinds of other 

-- you know, since ammonia is a weak base, there's 

going to be some acids in there along with it that 

counter that.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you for that 

clarification. All right. We're going to move 

on. We have Daren Stemwedel -- I'm not seeing 

Daren on the line. Tim, are you switching 

connections here? Yes? Okay. 

MR. D. STEMWEDEL: Hi.

MR. ELA: Perfect. We thought that 

might happen. So Daren, go ahead. State your 
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name and affiliation.

MR. D. STEMWEDEL: Okay. My name is 

Daren Stemwedel, also with California Organic 

Fertilizers. Thank you for the opportunity to 

comment today on natural ammonia. I oversee the 

formulation and manufacture of our products 

including testing, traceability, and 

record-keeping, and I worked directly with our MRO 

to conduct auditing of liquids with greater than 

three percent nitrogen.

I also happen to be an attorney, and 

in 2009 I published a comment and the San Joaquin 

Agricultural Law Review advocating for greater 

regulation and oversight of VIT (phonetic) fraud 

in organic fertilizer production. I'd like to 

speak to you today regarding this issue of fraud.

So as you know, fraud is an attack on 

the integrity of the organic brand and this means 

everything to California Organic Fertilizers. 

We're a family-run business; we are founded in 

1990, the same year the OFPA was enacted. We 

support growers who run the gamut from small U-pick 
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and CSA farmers to the major brands you see in the 

grocery stores. Our success completely depends 

on their success, which in turn depends on 

consumers continuing to choose organic, and the 

continuing viability of that organic brand.

The petitioner asked you to apply a 

fraud standard here that's unreachable for any 

organic input, singling out one particular class 

of organic fertilizer as a fraud risk is arbitrary 

and unfair, given that any organic fertilizer could 

be adulterated. The OFPA makes no provision for 

using fraud as a criteria to place the 

non-synthetic on the national list. An essential 

element like ammonia does not belong in a section 

of the national list traditional reserved for the 

likes of arsenic, lead, strychnine, and nicotine.

Natural ammonia products are no more 

susceptible to fraud than other organic 

fertilizers. In fact, due to the additional 

auditing of high-nitrogen liquids, they're less 

susceptible. For example, pelleted products such 

as chicken manures can be adulterated with 
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something like ammonium sulfate, which is easy to 

obtain and cannot be detected using lab testing, 

because chicken and your naturally contains both 

ammonia and sulfur.

This difficulty of lab verification is 

also true of other commonly used inputs with 

complex elemental profiles such as fish, corn 

steep, or sugar beet byproduct, many of which fall 

under the three percent auditing threshold. While 

input fraud is always possible, the truth is, 

instances of it are exceedingly rare. The MROs, 

certifiers, and growers do a great job of 

regulating the market, and due to food safety 

rules, you actually have a really high degree of 

trace ability on organic fertilizers. As you've 

heard from others, numerous safeguards exist to 

prevent fraud.

Finally, I just want to go on record 

with a formal request that the technical report 

on ammonia extracts be set aside and taken out of 

consideration. It was written by a chemist with 

no apparent agronomic or soil science background 
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and analyzed synthetic ammonia as a substitute for 

natural ammonia, with little to no effort to obtain 

data regarding the actual material sought to be 

prohibited by the petition. They certainly didn't 

contact us, one of the very few manufacturers of 

it. As proponents of organic, I would hope we can 

all agree that it matters a great deal whether 

material is synthetically or naturally derived. 

With that, thank you for your time and I'd be happy 

to answer any questions.

MR. ELA: Gold star for nearly exact 

time. Are there questions from the Board? One 

quick question: When you -- I'm a little confused 

by statements such as yourself where the natural 

and synthetic ammonia are different compounds. 

I don't see how they're different, so could you 

clarify, you know, what the difference is between 

the two?

MR. D. STEMWEDEL: It's kind of how you 

look at it. I mean, obviously, synthetic ammonia 

is going to be made using a Haber-Bosch process 

that has a lot of environmental cost with it. Our 
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product is made using a biological process similar 

to what would happen, you know, in a soil plant 

-- you know, in the soil food web. You know, you 

can also look at an organic carrot and a synthetic 

carrot and say, Well, these are both carrots, and 

they're made out of carrot, and they're the same 

thing. Well, it's not true. You know, the system 

and the process by which it's derived matters a 

lot.

You know, also, it's -- the context 

really matters here in how it's applied. You know, 

this is a product with a pretty low percentage of 

nitrogen that's diluted when it's applied. You 

don't end up with a massive amount of pounds of 

ammonia going onto the soil compared to something 

like anhydrous which is injected directly into the 

soil. So you really have to look at the greater 

context here of how the product's made, how it's 

stored, how it's handled, how it's used -- all of 

these things are different than synthetic ammonia. 

So if you take an approach that just says, Well, 

the molecule's the same in synthetic as, you know, 
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natural, you're really missing the greater picture 

-- and I mean, really, this is what organic is 

about, right? It's that greater picture of -- can 

you make something synthetically, or can you make 

it using natural processes? And I think you really 

need to take a closer look into that.

MR. ELA: Logan, you had your hand up. 

Did you want to ask a question?

MS. PETREY: I did; it was already 

answered. Thank you, though, Steve.

MR. ELA: All right. Just wanted to 

make sure we covered it. All right. We're going 

to take -- and Daren, thank you for your comments. 

We appreciate them. We're going to take a short 

break; we're running a little bit behind, so if 

we could just take a ten-minute break. After the 

break, we've got Rhoda Benson on deck with Nate 

Lewis and Sarah Pinkham coming up. So we will 

start with Rhoda, and we will be back in ten 

minutes. And that would be at the top of the hour. 

So -- all right. Take care.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 
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went off the record at 1:49 p.m. and resumed at 

1:59 p.m.)

MR. ELA: Okay. We're going to dive 

back into it. I do want to acknowledge -- I meant 

to do it several speakers ago -- that we now have 

Asa Bradman with us, as well. He joined, actually, 

I think three or four speakers back, but just for 

the record.

Okay, our first speaker is gonna be 

Rhoda Benson, followed by Nate Lewis, and then 

Sarah Pinkham. And, Nate, if you are on the line, 

could you let us know. We're not seeing your 

number right off here. So, Rhoda, please state 

your name and affiliation and you have the floor.

MS. BENSON: Good afternoon. My name 

is Rhoda Benson. I am the Technical Issues 

Specialist for the Northwest Horticultural Council 

representing organic apple, cherry, pear 

production in the Pacific Northwest. I appreciate 

the opportunity to speak today on the upcoming 

sunset review of organic materials listed in the 

most recent NOSB Materials Report. The Council 
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has submitted detailed written comments to which 

I direct your attention for more detailed 

information. In short, the Council supports 

continued listing of ozone, gas, peracetic acid, 

and the four chloride materials by the NOSB. Today 

I will highlight the importance of our growers and 

packers of these sanitizers and disinfectants 

under sunset consideration.

First, produce is grown in the open 

environment where dangerous and sometimes deadly 

pathogens exist and it is impossible to eliminate 

the potential for these pathogens to reach the 

surface of produce in the field and, therefore, 

it is critical for growers and packers to have the 

tools necessary to combat these pathogens before 

produce reaches a consumer. This includes 

cleaning the produce itself, as well as cleaning 

and sanitizing all food contact surfaces, 

including water, to reduce the potential for 

cross-contamination. Protecting public health is 

the top priority for the tree fruit growers and 

packers we represent. We encourage the NOSB to 
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not make it more difficult for them to deliver a 

safe and healthy product to consumers by limiting 

the availability of safe and effective materials 

used to manage microbial contamination.

Growers and packers need to access more 

than one type of sanitizer to achieve the critical 

objective of delivering a safe and healthy product 

to consumers. Each sanitizer and disinfectant has 

specific benefits that make it the most effective 

and appropriate choice in certain circumstances. 

It Is also important to note that different 

products with different modes of action are 

regularly used in post-harvest handling to cover 

the vast array of public health micro-organisms, 

which include viral, protozoa, and bacterial 

targets. Therefore, growers and packers must have 

access to multiple products to combat the full 

plethora of pathogens of human health concerns.

For example, a grower may use peracetic 

acid to sanitize food contact surfaces in the 

field. Once the fruit reaches the packing house, 

the packer may use calcium hypochlorite as a wash 
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water sanitizer and peracetic acid in spray bars. 

At the end of the day, the lines may be sanitized 

using chlorine dioxide or ozone, while sodium 

hypochlorite might be used to sanitize the cold 

storage rooms. This regiment changes when 

environmental monitoring data show that 

effectiveness of sanitation on particular food 

contact surfaces is reduced.

In addition to the need to manage these 

pathogens from multiple directions, the 

maintenance of multiple sanitizers is also 

important because of concerns that reliance on a 

single type of sanitizer could lead to evolution 

of pathogen resistance. Finally, it should be 

noted that in addition to protecting human health, 

these sanitizers are needed for growers and packers 

to comply with the requirements of Food Safety 

Modernization Act rules. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Well done, Rhoda. Do we have 

any questions from the Board? I am not seeing any, 

Rhoda. Thank you so much for your comments. We 

do appreciate it.
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MS. BENSON: Thank you very much.

MR. ELA: We next up have Nate Lewis, 

followed by Sarah Pinkham, and Maria Ignosh. Did 

we find Nate, Michelle?

MS. ARSENAULT: I am not seeing Nate 

on the call with us. 

MR. ELA: Okay. We will jump over. 

So we're gonna have Sarah Pinkham, followed by 

Maria Ignosh, and Bill Denevan. So, Sarah, you 

have the floor. Please state your name and 

affiliation.

MS. PINKHAM: Thank you. Hello. I'm 

Sarah Pinkham with OEFFA Certification at the Ohio 

Ecological Food and Farm Association. Thank you 

for all your work to support and nurture organic 

production, and for the opportunity to speak today. 

My comments will touch on a number of issues of 

interest to OEFFA as the certifier and to the 

organic producers our organization represents, all 

of which are united by the spirit of continuous 

improve.

The Crops Subcommittee has several 
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items before it that throw in to relieve crucial 

issues of consumer trust, organic integrity and 

the entire notion of organic agriculture. If we 

are to hold the line on livestock antibiotics, 

despite humane concerns for animal health and 

according to the clear wish of organic consumers, 

we cannot add kasugamycin for crops. Ammonia 

extracts and other highly soluble sources of 

nitrogen are a shortcut that feeds the crop, not 

the soil. Biodegradable biobased mulch film is 

highly desirable, but the proposed annotation 

allows products made partially from petroleum. 

We cannot confidently say that the long-term 

effects on the soil food are benign. And unlike 

other plastic mulches, these films cannot be 

removed from the field after harvest. Continuous 

improvement requires us to say no to these inputs 

and focus instead on building healthy farm 

ecosystems.

OEFFA participated in an ACA working 

group to interpret the NOP's June 2019 memo on land 

transition. The group was stymied by the lack of 
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functional standards for greenhouse and container 

production. Certifiers also have inconsistent 

policies on outdoor access, dairy herd 

conversions, mushroom production, apiculture, and 

aquaculture. Lack of consistency undermines 

consumer trust and damages the livelihoods of 

organic farmers who don't take shortcuts. These 

inconsistencies cannot be resolved without action 

by NOP to finalize rulemakings, including origin 

of livestock and the organic livestock and poultry 

practices. Continuous improvement means NOSB 

must not abdicate its responsibilities under OFPA. 

It must finish making recommendations to NOP for 

these missing standards and request that NOP 

provide an update on all previous recommendations.

Continuous improvement means that as 

the organic industry grows and becomes 

increasingly complex, we find new ways to cover 

the cost of increasing oversight and expertise and 

do not pass them onto the smallest farmers. Please 

refer to OEFFA's extensive written comments on the 

Human Capital Management proposal. Just like 
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organic agriculture itself, the NOSB work agenda 

must focus on practices, not inputs. Organic is 

only as good as the practices used. We must focus 

on soil building and nutrient cycling, protecting 

native ecosystems, and engaging the expertise of 

diverse groups, especially black, indigenous, and 

farmers of color, to build a truly sustainable food 

system that is accessible to all. Thank you for 

considering my comments and thank you also to the 

excellent sign language interface.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Sarah. 

Are there questions from the Board? I am not 

seeing any, so thank you for your comments. We 

do appreciate it.

We're going to move on to Maria Ignosh, 

followed by bill Denevan. Bill, we're not seeing 

you on the line. And then, let's see here -- I'm 

trying to think. Oh, and Nate Lewis has joined 

us, so we will go back to Nate. So we'll do Sarah, 

and then Maria, and come back up to Nate. So, 

Sarah, please go ahead. I'm sorry. I just did 

that wrong. That's what I get for not marking 
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something on my list. Let me correct myself. 

We're gonna do Maria Ignosh, followed by Bill 

Denevan. Bill, we're not seeing you on the line. 

and then we're going to go to Nate Lewis. So I 

apologize. Go ahead, Maria.

MS. IGNOSH: Good afternoon. My name 

is Maria Ignosh and I'm the Vice President of 

Controlled Environment Research and Development 

at Shenandoah Growers. Shenandoah Growers would 

like to comment on the discussion topic of ammonia 

extract. We believe that if this input is 

prohibited or restricted from soil application, 

an annotation should be made for certain uses which 

do not impact soil health and are aligned with 

organic crop production regulations. Shenandoah 

Growers is a producer of certified organic culinary 

herbs and greens with a 20-plus year history of 

good standing. Collectively, SG annually packs 

135 million units of fresh culinary herbs, which 

are supplied into leading retailers across the 

country. Eighteen of the top 20 retailers depend 

on the company as a source of premium organic herbs. 
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To honor this commitment, SG maintains 15 

facilities and employees over a thousand people. 

Since 2007, SG has been striving to perfect our 

bioponic production method for which the 

development of a proprietary nutrition system has 

been key.

Our organic nutrition program is built 

around a biofiltration process that converts 

ammonia extract to nitrate. This is the backbone 

of our nutrition program and allows us to move away 

from other inputs, such as sodium nitrate. Our 

biofiltration system uses natural organisms to 

convert the ammonia extract fertilizer feedstocks 

into plant available nitrate and increases the 

biodiversity present in our growing media. It is 

only after the conversion process that the nitrate 

solution is used as a foundational component of 

our nutrient solution and subsequently provided 

to the crop. This process prevents the direct 

application of ammonia extract fertilizers to our 

crop and fosters the microbial diversity of our 

growing media. The biofiltration method of 
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ammonia extract conversion was developed 

specifically to allow Shenandoah Growers to 

operate in accordance with NOP regulations, and 

has been perfected ever 14 years of certified 

organic production of culinary herbs and greens.

We respectfully request that if ammonia 

extracts are prohibited or restricted for soil 

application, then an annotation be added to the 

CFR that allows for use as a feedstock for nitrate 

conversion through the biological process. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Maria. 

Are there questions from the Board? It looks like 

we have one from Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks, Maria. Am I 

correct, from listening to what you just said and 

seeing what's behind you there, that you're mostly 

or maybe solely, sort of, indoor production or 

greenhouse production?

MS. IGNOSH: We do both indoor and 

greenhouse production.

MR. CALDWELL: And so, I guess, I asked 
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this of one of the other people today, as well. 

How do your production methods jive with 

requirements for biodiversity and soil carbon 

sequestration? I mean, I guess, carbon 

sequestration is not a requirement, but it is 

something that the organic community is touting 

as sort of an advantage of organic production.

MS. IGNOSH: Right. So when I think 

about it, I think about the fact that it is a very 

efficient growth method to stack plants vertically 

and these facilities. It gives a small footprint, 

so we're not converting much land for the amount 

of crops that we grow. And actually a lot of our 

facilities are built, our growing facilities, are 

built inside of existing facilities. We also do 

a lot of conservation of water and nutrients 

because the amount of water that you need to use 

in a facility like this is greatly reduced and it 

also lets us be able to recirculate our nutrient 

solution. So we're not, you know, releasing any 

nutrients into the environment. And the other, 

you know, proponent of this, I guess, is we grow 
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where we need the product to be, so it decreases, 

you know, the transportation costs and there's an 

efficiency gain there, as well.

MR. CALDWELL: Thank you.

MS. IGNOSH: Thank you.

MR. ELA: I have one quick question, 

Maria. You noted that if we were going to prohibit 

the ammonia extracts, we should put an annotation 

on that would allow them if they're going to be 

bioconverted into nitrate. Doesn't that happen 

in the soil, as well? I mean, if we put that 

annotation on, wouldn't that pretty well just allow 

ammonia extracts and sidestep the whole 

prohibition?

MS. IGNOSH: Well, I have to say my 13 

year career at Shenandoah Growers has been devoted 

to controlled environment ag. I think one of my 

colleagues would be better suited to address that 

and be happy to. But, yeah, I mean, I think you're 

right. That is what happens in the soil.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you so much 

for your your comments. We do appreciate it.
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MS. IGNOSH: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Okay. Now that I've 

thoroughly confused myself here, we're gonna go 

to Bill Denevan, and then back up to Nate, and then 

we will go down to Jackie DeMinter. So, Bill, 

please go ahead and state your name and 

affiliation.

MR. DENEVAN: Hi. My name's Bill 

Denevan and I work for Viva Tierra, and I'm part 

of the Board of Directors of the California Apple 

Commission, and I work as a consultant, and I grow, 

on top of that. So, my talk has to do with 

kasugamycin and it's a product that's before the 

Board right now and I wanted to talk a little bit 

about it?

So, as a field rep, I can truly say 

there's no bug infestation, no fungus, no freeze, 

no bad market that can destroy a grower as quickly 

as fire blight. Under the right conditions, 

blight bacteria can double in 96 minutes. It's 

pathogen ooze can survive for a year, be moved by 

wind, be picked up by flying insects and rain, and 
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move from flower to flower. Within a season, 

blight bacteria can spread across an entire 

orchard. Kasugamycin can help stop this.

Anyway, as I said, I'm a field rep for 

Viva Tierra and I've grown commercial quantities 

of apples and pears since I was first certified 

with Happy Valley Farm back in '76. For 30 years, 

I leased, packed, and sprayed up to eight organic 

orchards a year in Watsonville and Santa Cruz. 

2006 was my last year of borrowing lines of credit 

and putting my money where my mouth is. Today I 

still farm, but no longer grow for the fresh market.

My apples and pears go for hard cider and juice. 

Crystal clear in my mind, I still remember all 

the risks that I took to pull in a good crop of 

quality packed fruit. Now I mainly work as a 

grower rep and meet with farmers who walk the same 

financial path that I once did. During my time 

as a grower, I had blight so bad on my 2000 plus 

Bartlett trees, I had to cut, burn the damaged and 

loose fruit, and only leave the main leader 

branches and retain those, and retrained the trees 
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over again. It took many years to pay back my 

defaulted loans and come back to the black.

California growers face the additional 

challenge of being dramatically affected by global 

warming. Pear and apple trees grown here 

frequently do not get the required winter chill 

hours below 44 degrees, as a result. Now there's 

a less compact, more extensive rat tail bloom 

period. We're obviously more vulnerable to blight 

infection for many more weeks than orchards in 

cooler areas. Not to say that blight is not a major 

problem for those people in cool areas. Since 

2014, when antibiotics were banned by the NOSB and 

unproven organic materials and controls were 

hurriedly introduced and put into practice, 

there's been a surge in blight damage.

MR. ELA: During my yearly travels to 

many states, I've seen thousands of acres of severe 

blight damage and tree death. To try to get a 

handle on that problem, I've gone to seminars and 

talked to many growers attempting adjust to the 

use of the new materials and growth models. 
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Anyway, I guess, as organic pear and apple growing 

becomes more difficult with resistance to 

materials like copper, warmer Springs, we have a 

great need to have additional materials to use in 

our spray rotations. Normally eight to 10 blight 

sprays are used per year and a mix of alternating 

materials are needed to help prevent resistance. 

All trials using kasugamycin have demonstrated 

the product should be an essential part of the mix. 

According to exhibit --

MR. ELA: Bill, I'm gonna jump in here. 

Your time is actually up. We have a question from 

Brian.

MR. DENEVAN: Yeah. Go ahead.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks, Bill. 

So, in the many orchards that you've looked at, 

are there combinations of scions and rootstocks 

that are showing better performance against fire 

blight than others?

MR. DENEVAN: I didn't see any 

difference in that. What I did see was basically 

climate had a lot to do with it. The fact that 
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you don't have the winter chill, at least in 

California, but then in Washington, you know, it's 

a crap shoot. Every single year, you're presented 

with a bunch of different situations. You have 

the weather, you have the new materials that are 

coming out, and, my god, there's probably 10 or 

12 different materials that are presented for 

blight that supposedly work. So I would say more 

than the rootstock or the scion, it has to do --

we don't even have dry bore -- trees rootstock for 

pears yet. We do on apples. And the scion --

there's really no resistance, so it's a crap shoot, 

whether you're going to be able to control with 

the various weather situations and new materials.

So what I really wanted to say in my 

talk -- I wasn't timing it correctly -- was that 

we have all these experiments and we ended up 

russetting. We overspray because we're afraid 

we're going to get blight. And so, as a result, 

we have two situations: we either underspray and 

get blight or we overspray and make a cosmetic 

mistake that causes fresh pack to be nonexistent. 
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So it's --

MR. ELA: Amy's got a question for you, 

Bill.

MS. BRUCH: Yeah, just a quick question 

for you, Bill. Thank you for your oral comments 

today. Kind of tagging onto what Brian was asking, 

you know, is there some common threads here? It 

seems like maybe more prevalent fire blight happens 

in the Pacific Northwest California. There was 

a grower earlier that said maybe minimal problems 

in the Midwest. We talked about different 

varieties. You mentioned climate, as well. Is 

there a soil health component with this? Are you 

seeing, you know, sometimes crops are more 

susceptible to stresses such as disease if there's 

a soil deficiency. Are you seeing any soil 

deficiencies in these areas, as well?

MR. DENEVAN: No, I have to say it has 

nothing to do with the soil deficiency. It has 

to do a lot of times with over fertilizing. It 

has too much nitrogen. If the tree is -- the funny 

thing about this is, if you put too much nutrition 
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on the tree and it's a young tree, it can die faster 

than an older tree with less nutrition. So, in 

other words, you've got to measure; you've got to 

do some soil tests; you have to do some leaf 

analysis; you have to have the appropriate 

fertilizer amount. It can't go over the top. 

Same thing with the sprays. You can't go over the

top. You have to have this happy medium that'll 

work.

MS. BRUCH: Sure. That makes sense. 

In agronomy, we have a law of maximums and a law 

of minimums, so that makes complete sense. Okay. 

Thank you, Bill.

MR. DENEVAN: Sure.

MR. ELA: Bill, we have one last 

question here. How do you reconcile the NOSB--

you know, they voted against streptomycin, 

tetracycline, however many years ago, and has 

pretty well, pretty consistently voted against any 

use of antibiotics, whether, you know, and 

especially in crop use. So how do you reconcile 

that, going against all that precedent, we suddenly 
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add kasugamycin?

MR. DENEVAN: Well, number one, you 

know, those of us who wanted to have a more secure 

situation using the old-fashioned antibiotics, we 

lost by one vote in El Paso and the situation was 

that they were worried about -- at the time, a 

doctor from Johns Hopkins came in and he said, oh, 

we may have an antibiotic. This could get into 

society and people that -- it could affect people. 

But it was proven that this kasugamycin is a 

different kind of product than those two products. 

They're not used in any kind of medicine or any 

kind of human or animal use. And also, the way 

that this kasugamycin is created, it has a totally 

different process. It's described in the 11 pages 

that were put together by the California Apple 

Commission. So if you read those 11 pages, you'll 

find out everything you need to know about the 

scientific details of that.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you for 

answering that. We are going to move on, Bill. 

Thank you for your testimony. Always 
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appreciated. We are now going to go to Nate Lewis, 

and then we'll come back to Jackie DeMinter and 

Todd Linsky. So Nate, please go ahead and state 

your name and affiliation.

MR. LEWIS: Hello, folks. My name is 

Nate Lewis. I'm a farmer in Olympia, Washington. 

My wife and I farm organic crops, beef, lamb, 

chicken, eggs. My sister is deaf, so ASL is my 

first language, so I'm using a little bit now. 

I will trade off with Nick here, so I'm really very 

happy to see ASL interpreters on this webinar. 

Awesome. Thumbs up. Thank you.

Behind me is a picture of my farm. We 

farm on the sacred lands of the Squaxin Island 

Indian tribe and, as I mentioned, we have a pretty 

diverse operation. I want to talk to you today 

about a couple of things. First, ammonia extracts 

products. I encourage the Board to move swiftly 

with a full prohibition on that. Those products 

are incompatible with a system of sustainable 

agriculture and they're not necessary. We have 

plenty of high-nitrogen fertilizers, some of which 
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I know might release a little more slowly than these 

do, but organic production is based on a system 

where we have plant roots interacting with soil 

microbes and they do the nitrogen cycle. So I 

just, again, encourage you folks to move forward 

with a full vote for prohibition in the Fall 

meeting, also recognizing that we have an entire 

rulemaking process ahead of that. So any, sort 

of, adjustments we need to make to the definitions 

or specific types of products that are being 

prohibited can -- we'll have a number of times to 

revisit that, just through the notice and comment 

rulemaking process, just to do a little nuts and 

bolts reminder for folks.

And then secondly, I would really 

encourage -- this is maybe a little more for the 

program, but I would love to see the Board support 

this. -- that NOSB take a leadership role in 

President Biden's Equity Commission as a FACA Board 

raising his hand for looking at personal bias, 

organizational bias, and really developing an 

action plan so that we know that all of our 
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recommendations coming out of the Board don't have 

these biases included in it. And I see the NOSB 

as a leader and a potential pilot in how FACA Boards 

that advise the Secretary can ingrain equity into 

everything that the USDA does. So looking for 

financial and resources from the program to support 

that, and then also engagement and support from 

the Board members to engage in such a topic. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Oh, man, Nate, I think you're 

the only one so far that exactly hit it on the money. 

Thank you for your comments and are there 

questions from the Board? Real quickly, Nate, how 

would you say, in terms of the diversity issues, 

what would be the one thing the Board could do to 

at this point to move things forward?

MR. LEWIS: Drawing from my experience 

at the Washington Farmland Trust, where we have 

engaged in a multi-year diversity equity inclusion 

process, in an all-white organization engaged in 

Food and Agriculture, which is a area that's 

fraught with equity issues, I think the one thing 
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the Board can do is to request that the NOSB provide 

a budget to hire an outside consultant to guide 

the program and the Board through that process.

MR. ELA: Great. I appreciate that 

thought. We know that's an issue, especially with 

another nomination cycle coming up. So I 

appreciate your thoughts. All right. I'm not 

seeing any other questions, so thanks again, Nate. 

We are gonna move onto Jackie DeMinter. Peggy 

Miars is on the list, but has canceled, to my 

knowledge. So, Peggy, if you change your mind, 

let us know. But we're gonna go to Jackie 

DeMinter, followed by Todd Linsky, and then Emily 

Musgrave. So Jackie, please go ahead.

MS. DEMINTER: Hello. Can you hear 

me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. DEMINTER: Okay. Perfect. 

Hello. My name is Jackie DeMinter. I am the 

Certification Policy Manager at MOSA. We certify 

almost 2,100 organic operations throughout the US, 

including over 1,800 with crops, 765 with livestock 
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and 325 handling operations. I will be 

summarizing our written comments on mulch film, 

paper-based planting aids, and sunset materials. 

Thank you for your work and for providing this 

meeting in a virtual format.

Paper pots. We continue to support the 

listing of paper for use as a plant production aid 

and are excited to see the decision coming to a 

close at this meeting. We encourage the NOSB to 

pass the proposal. Our written comments outline 

a few technical corrections we think should be 

made, but those should not hold up voting to pass 

the proposal. We encourage all manufacturers to 

plan for swift rulemaking action and to list their 

products with a materials review organization and 

with the USDA's BioPreferred program. We will 

quickly re-evaluate materials allowed at MOSA to 

ensure continued compliance with the new 

regulation.

SPEAKER 4: Mulch film. Almost 500 

MOSA certified operations report using a mulch 

product. This alternative would be appreciated 
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by farmers. We support the proposal to change the 

biobased content requirement from 100 percent to 

80 percent, and we do not support the commercial 

availability requirement. We feel that revision 

to the standard proposed is necessary. First, 

consistent language should be used and plastic 

should not be referred to. The defined term 

biodegradable, biobased mulch film works. The 

commercial availability requirement should be 

removed. It does not reflect the intention that 

greater than 80 percent biobased material be used 

when available, and also includes 100 percent 

biodegradation requirement and compliance 

verification is unclear. We encourage a review 

of currently manufactured mulch film products to 

see if there are any with potential for compliance 

with all parts of the standard, the new proposed 

biobased content, biodegradation, and compost 

stability. If not, we think the listing should 

be allowed to sunset at the next review.

Of the livestock sunset materials, 

calcium borogluconate and calcium propionate are 
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commonly used electrolytes. The individual 

listings are not necessary, but also do not affect 

our decision-making. Injectable vitamins under 

nutritive supplements are widely used. 

Surprisingly, we don't have any clients using zinc 

sulfate for hoof care. We do not see any misuse 

of mineral oil or kaolin pectin for intestinal 

disorders.

This concludes my comments. Thank you 

for the opportunity to comment and I'm happy to 

answer any questions you have.

A gold star for you, as well, Jackie. 

Are there questions from the Board? Asa has a 

question.

MR. BRADMAN: Yeah. Sorry, I'm just 

joining here in the program. Could you talk a 

little bit more about your concerns about the use 

of the word plastic with the biodegradable mulch? 

I mean, it is a form of plastic, and noting also 

that 500 of your crop certifiers you said used 

plastic mulch. Out of 1,800, that's over 25 

percent. Is there a trend of growing use of 
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plastic and, particularly, polyethylene films and, 

again, if you could clarify a little bit more on 

your suggestions for the definition here, and why 

not use the word plastic?

MS. DEMINTER: I want to clarify real 

quick. Please refer to our written comments for 

exact numbers on the breakdown of how the mulch 

products are used at MOSA. We have 183 clients 

that use synthetic plastic mulch, and the rest of 

the mulch products that add up to the 500 are other 

types of mulch. So 500 in total that use a mulch 

product, not just synthetic plastic mulch 

products. So that's one clarification. And the 

clarifica -- it's not necessarily anything against 

the word plastic. It's just for consistency in 

the use of the terms in the rule. The rule 

currently defines -- uses the term -- I'm scrolling 

-- uses the term biodegradable, biobased mulch film 

and that term should be used consistently 

throughout the proposed regulation. If you start 

mixing up the terms, then it just breeds 

inconsistency in interpretation, is my feeling.
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MR. BRADMAN: Just a quick follow-up. 

Have your clients raised concerns about the 

petroleum content in an 80 percent biobased 

requirement and also, to segue over to plastic pots 

-- I know you have a potential fear of actually 

-- paper pots, I'm sorry, not plastic, paper pots 

-- introducing plastic materials, 

non-biodegradable plastic materials directly into 

the soil. Have there been concerns raised about 

that?

MS. DEMINTER: Anecdotally, I have not 

heard any concerns coming from staff or from 

clients directly about either of those. Our 

clients that use paper pots greatly support the 

inclusion of paper pots as a planting aid on the 

National List. For mulch film, we've anecdotally 

gotten responses that alternatives to the use of 

plant -- or plastic, the synthetic plastic that 

must be removed, it would be a viable alternative. 

It would be good for them.

MR. ELA: Okay. We have another 

question from Brian.
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MR. CALDWELL: Thanks, Jackie. Just 

a quick one, and that is you said that none of your 

livestock folks were using zinc sulfate. Do you 

think they're using copper sulfate instead?

MS. DEMINTER: Actually, let me pull 

up my written comments here. We have 100, I think, 

-- I'm looking for zinc sulfate. It is in our 

written comments, under zinc sulfate. We 

surprisingly report that our database shows that 

we have no clients using a zinc sulfate foot care 

input and we have almost 100 clients using a copper 

sulfate input.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Any other questions for 

Jackie? I have one quick one, Jackie. You know, 

and Asa followed up on it, but the use of the word 

plastic. I think we were worried about the paper 

mulches that are already out there possibly falling 

under this definition and growers being forced to 

use the paper mulch because it is a biobased mulch, 

and so we put in the plastic comment. Would you 

kind of respond to how we would differentiate the 
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paper mulches that are out there versus, you know, 

these biodegradable plastic mulches?

MS. DEMINTER: I would feel like the 

paper would fall under the paper listing, whereas 

biodegradable or biobased mulch films would fall 

under this listing. So I would have to probably 

give that some thought and comments with a proposed 

rule. I hadn't thought of that being the reason 

for delineation including the word plastic. But, 

again, the rule defines biodegradable, biobased 

mulch film, and that guides it's entire three-step 

compliance factors in the standard.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you, Jackie. 

We are going to move on to -- let's see, Peggy's 

not on the line. We're gonna to go to Todd Linsky, 

and then Emily Musgrave, and then Gina Colfer. 

So, Todd, you have the floor. Please state your 

name and affiliation.

MR. LINSKY: Thanks, Steve. Good 

afternoon. My name is Todd Linsky with TLC Dot 

Organic. Thank you to the NOSB and the NOP for 

providing a platform to share my perspective and 
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plant some seeds for future thought in the ongoing 

discussion about organic certification of next 

generation farms. As an active member of the 

organic community for over 35 years, my career has 

taken me from small natural food store to the 

boardroom of more than a dozen companies. I found 

farmers across the spectrum from soil to emerging 

ag technologies and everywhere in between, working 

to honor the purpose and core values of organic, 

feeding more people better food while working to 

heal the earth. This simple message is powerful, 

and its impact has truly changed the world. Where 

we're heading today concerns me because instead 

of embracing our uniqueness and our membership, 

we're working to disassociate for what I see is 

the next generation of farmers. Attempting to 

exclude these non-traditional farming methods from 

the organic table has a potential to hurt, 

misrepresent, misinform, and will cost us consumer 

confidence and ultimately market share.

I'm here today as a reminder that there 

is room at the table. Whether we like it or not, 
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the next generation of organic farms is no longer 

just in the dirt. It's also in a greenhouse, a 

cargo container, a downtown space, or maybe even 

in a parking lot. But look what these 

non-traditional farms are accomplishing. They're 

pesticide free, herbicide free, non-GMOs, in some 

cases never being touched by human hands. And to 

top that, they can grow almost anywhere using a 

fraction of the space and a fraction of the water. 

They have a platform and a story to share. I think 

the part that we fail to see is this next generation 

farmer can dilute the organic message and lessen 

organic's impact. Recognizing that these folks 

have huge ideas, huge brains, and even bigger 

checkbooks, if we exclude them, we're in effect 

forcing them to establish their own certification 

and a narrative that's alt-organic. Currently, 

some conventional growers in this space are saying 

they are beyond organic, and I believe you cannot 

be beyond organic unless you have the organic seal 

to start with.
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The move to exclude non-traditional 

growers seems to be in opposition to the mission 

and values we've always portrayed at our core. 

Again, I emphasize, feeding people better food 

while healing the planet. More importantly, these 

growers have even greater social impact right now 

as there's millions of people going without 

adequate nutrition and millions every night going 

hungry. I love our industry and its mission and 

purpose. I love the dirt and I'm proud of my 

personal contributions to help grow this industry. 

This isn't about right or wrong now; this is about 

common sense. I'd like to continue to honor the 

investment of those who took the time and energy 

in building the runway we now walk so freely. Soil 

is one element of the ecosystem, and I'd like to 

think that we can step back and take a bigger 

picture view of all the components that are needed 

to support life. Let's all step up and raise the 

bar on ag technology by bringing them into the world 

of organics. Because I certainly don't see that 

there's gonna be any less demand for fresh food 
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going away anytime soon. Thank you and I will 

yield my eight seconds back.

MR. ELA: Thank you much, Todd. We 

appreciate that. Are there comments or questions 

-- any questions from the Board? Excuse me. I 

have one quick one for you. I appreciate your 

thoughts. One of the things we're governed by, 

of course, are the OFPA regulations. Anything we 

do has to be governed by those, even though we may 

individually feel differently one way or the other. 

So, with your comments, how would we -- in terms 

of complying with OFPA -- how do we reconcile what 

you're saying with the OFPA regulations?

MR. LINSKY: Steve, I think that we've 

all got to sit down and we need to come together 

as a group and talk this thing through. That's 

the bottom line issue I see. The greenhouse 

growers cut their own throat. Everybody's got a 

physician, but nobody's talking together. And I 

think that's our biggest fault that we have right 

now. As I've shared with other people before, I 

believe this issue is going to require people 
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sitting together and having a beer and talking this 

thing through because this technology is not going 

to go away. There's $26 billion invest in 2020.

It's coming, and we have to recognize that. And 

I'm more concerned about us hurting the organic 

arena by not coming together than anything else, 

because that's what ultimately is going to happen. 

And I think that's my biggest fear and that's where 

I come from with my perspective.

MR. ELA: Thank you for your thoughts 

on that.

MR. LINSKY: Thank you for the 

question.

MR. ELA: I do not see any other --

yeah, I'm not seeing any other comments or 

questions from the Board, so thank you for your 

comments --

MR. LINSKY: Appreciate it.

MR. ELA: -- and we do appreciate it.

Next up is Emily Musgrave, followed by 

Gina Colfer, and then Peter Johnson is the next 

person. Peter, we're not seeing you on the call, 
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so if you are there, could you please let Michelle 

know? So, Emily, please go ahead.

MS. MUSGRAVE: Can you all hear me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. MUSGRAVE: Good morning. My name 

my name is Emily Musgrave. I'm the Organic 

Regulatory Manager at Driscoll. I would like to 

thank the NOSB for their commitment to protect the 

integrity of the organic program and uphold the 

vital regulatory processes of the NOSB. My 

comments focus on the following: the need for a 

biobased alternative to plastic mulch and 

requesting the Crops Subcommittee further develop 

the ammonia extract petition as it is too broad 

and does not clearly distinguish between the two 

different manufacturing techniques.

First, Driscoll supports the 

subcommittee's push for an alternative to plastic 

mulch. We support the annotation to allow BBMFs 

that are at least 80 percent biobased if 

manufacturers can actually meet this requirement. 
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You heard from some commenters that BBMF is not 

ready to be utilized by organic growers. We 

disagree. Organic growers need a tool to reduce 

the amount of field plastic usage, and this tool, 

BBMF, has been delayed long enough. Commenters 

also mentioned that current petroleum-based 

plastic mulch is being removed while biodegradable 

mulch is not removed and we do not know the 

long-term effects on soil health. While this is 

true, it is also a double-edged sword. Although 

the current plastic mulch is being removed, it is 

all going straight to the landfill. My colleagues 

have spoken to dozens of researchers and dozens 

of recyclers, and there is no recycler who will 

take the plastic mulch. And yes, more research 

is needed on the effects of biodegradable mulch 

on the soil. However, this research is already 

in the works. Folks from Washington State 

University and others are already working on these 

studies and collecting the data on the long-term 

soil health impact of BBMF. The Board must weigh 

in on this quandary. The longer we wait means 
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continuing with million pounds of plastic mulch 

from organic farming going to the landfill each 

year.

Lastly, we believe the petition to 

prohibit non-synthetic ammonia extract for use in 

crop production is too broad. The TR mentioned 

the two different manufacturing processes, 

ammonium concentration versus ammonium stripping, 

but then does not distinguish between those two 

processes when seeking to prohibit ammoniacal 

nitrogen. This is a complex issue and needs 

further attention and clarification on the two 

different manufacturing processes. A few public 

commenters suggested a working group or task force 

on the subject. A task force in which the Board 

could hear from the experts on the manufacturing 

processes on both sides would be a reasonable way 

to navigate this complex issue and ensure you are 

making a decision based on sound science. I thank 

the National Organic Standards Board for your 

service and for consideration of manufacturers.

MR. ELA: Another one exactly. 
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Everybody's doing great today. Much appreciated. 

It makes my job much easier. We have a question 

from Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Emily, hi. Thank you for 

your written and oral comments. I had a question 

for you on the biodegradable biobased mulch. One 

of the proposed annotations is -- actually, I'm 

gonna read it for you -- that the mulch demonstrates 

at least 90 percent biodegradation, absolute or 

relative, and then it goes on. So that question, 

that 90 percent biodegradation in less than two 

years -- my question for you is how many consecutive 

years of plastic are some of your fields using on 

average, and will that be hard to quantify that 

biodegradation in that two-year time frame if 

there's a significant annual usage of this plastic?

MS. MUSGRAVE: That's a great 

question, so I mean, I think it depends on what 

kind of crop you're talking about here, right? 

For strawberries, you're removing -- currently 

with petroleum-based mulch, we're removing the 

plastic annually. But then you've got perennial 
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crops, right, where, you know, if you're using 

plastic mulch, say, in blackberries or 

blueberries, that is obviously there for a lot 

longer. So that is a really good question. And 

we have a group on our agronomy team that's actually 

working with Washington State University on some 

of this research. So I think that is a question 

that we can take back to the group with WSU and 

really give that some further look. I'm not a 

complete expert. I know bits and pieces, but I 

want to leave that to our soil scientists and 

agronomists, but I will relay that question and 

get back to you.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Emily. I 

appreciate it. 

MR. ELA: We'd love to hear that 

information. Emily. I have a question on your 

comments about the ammonium extracts, of the two 

different methods. In terms of the ammonia 

concentration versus stripping, would you like to 

see one of them prohibited and not the other?

MS. MUSGRAVE: Yeah, that's a really 
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good question, and I think coming up, you're gonna 

hear from a few -- Allen, I think, and a few others 

with PhDs -- but from what I know, again, I'm not 

an expert here. This is kind of complex. But from 

what I know, I think ammonium concentration, in 

my opinion, should be able to be allowed versus 

ammonium stripping, which is a totally different 

process and may be not allowed. However, I really 

that there just needs to be a much more focused 

discussion on this. But, yes, from first 

preliminary glance, I would say ammonium 

concentration manufacturing process, yes, versus 

ammonium stripping, no. But I also think you 

should ask that question to Allen coming up 

shortly. I think he'll be able to give you a much 

more robust answer. I'm still learning all of 

these technical issues, so... I appreciate it, 

though.

MR. ELA: Fair enough. I guess I've 

just given them a heads up to answer that question. 

Thank you so much, Emily. We do appreciate your 

comments.
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We are going to move on now to Gina 

Colfer. We're not seeing Peter Johnson. Again, 

Peter, if you're on the call, please let us know. 

After Gina, we'll go to Marie Bertram or Burcham, 

and then onto Jim Koan. So Gina, please go ahead 

and state your name and affiliation.

MS. COLFER: Thank you. Good 

afternoon. Thank you to the NOSB members for your 

time and dedication. I would like to add my 

comment in support for the use of ammonia extract 

products in organic foods production. My name is 

Gina Colfer and I'm here representing Wilbur Ellis 

Agriculture, a company built on high ethics and 

integrity, celebrating our 100th year in business 

this June. I'm a licensed pest control adviser 

and certified crop advisor, specializing in 

organics with a passion for soil health and 

biodiversity. For over 30 years, I have dedicated 

my work in the sector of organic farming, 

consulting, and research on the Central Coast and 

Salinas Valley of California.

Organic growers in this region rely 
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mostly on pelleted and liquid organic fertilizers 

to build their soil fertility and do not rely on 

cover cropping for a myriad of reasons, one being 

the inconsistent nature of how and when a cover 

crop residue breaks down and releases its nitrogen 

in the form of plant available ammonia and nitrate. 

The dry pelleted fertilizers these organic 

growers rely on are made from chicken litters, 

proteins like meat and bone meal and Peruvian 

seabird guano. The nitrogen mineralization rate 

from guano is fast and consistent, as is meat and 

bone meal, both of which contain phosphorus that 

is mostly unavailable in the western states, which 

can result in excess nutrients. Depending on the 

crop, use rates range anywhere from 1,000 to 3,000 

pounds per acre per crop, which is between 60 to 

240 pounds of nitrogen and phosphorus per acre per 

crop, respectively.

With a product like ammonia extract, 

a grower could feel more confident in planting a 

vegetable crop following a cover crop and/or a high 

carbon to nitrogen ratio compost without 
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compromising nitrogen availability to that crop. 

Ammonia extracts are designed to be spoon-fed to 

the crop at rates where the uptake is most 

efficient. Ten gallons per acre supplies 7.4 

pounds of nitrogen per acre, giving the crop food 

when it needs it. This can help to incentivize 

growers to incorporate more soil building cover

crops and high carbon to nitrogen ratio compost 

into their system plan to help mitigate climate 

change by sequestering and storing more carbon in 

the soil. Ammonia extracts are also not 

comparable in any way to sodium nitrates. I would 

never recommend sodium nitrate to any of my 

growers.

The issue of fraud is real throughout 

the entire input in production change, so I think 

thorough and unannounced audits by qualified 

inspectors should be part of the approval process 

for all inputs. Strengthen the regulations to 

prevent fraud. Please consider my comments. 

Ammonia extracts are from a biological process and 

are sustainable and are important for the future 
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of organic farming. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Another gold star on timing. 

We have a question from Brian for you, Gina.

MS. COLFER: Great.

MR. CALDWELL: Hi. Thanks. And I'm 

just wondering why the sodium nitrate products 

would not be acceptable, but the ammonium ones 

would be.

MS. COLFER: Well, the sodium nitrate 

products are mined from old seabeds in Chile and 

Peru, and they contain as much sodium as they do 

nitrogen. So, when applied to the soil, usually 

in a liquid form, they go into solution readily 

as a sodium nitrate. And then you're receiving 

a quick nitrate application, but you're also 

receiving a sodium application at the same time, 

which will displace your potassium and calcium on 

the soil cal-life and increasing the salinity in 

that soil. So that's why sodium nitrate is so 

detrimental to the soil. It's the sodium content.

MR. CALDWELL: Great. Thank you, and 

just a quick follow-up. What is the percentage 
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in the products -- of the ammonium products that 

you're using -- and what kinds of other components 

are in them?

MS. COLFER: In the ammonia products, 

they're 8 percent at this time and they are half 

ammonia, half nitrate. And they're from a 

biological system from a manure waste stream.

MR. ELA: Asa has a question for you.

MS. COLFER: Sure.

MR. BRADMAN: I have some questions 

here, but they're all related.

MS. COLFER: Okay.

MR. BRADMAN: You said about 1,000 to 

3,000 pounds per year.

MS. COLFER: Per crop, not per year. 

And in the Salinas Valley, we can have up to two 

to three rotations. So it's per crop.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay, thanks. And you 

mentioned pelleting and liquid sources. I once 

met with one of the owners of some of the -- one 

of the bigger growers in the Salinas Valley and 

his comment is we don't have enough manure -- he 
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didn't use the word manure -- but we didn't have 

enough manure to expand organic and fulfill all 

the needs of organic. So I have a couple of 

questions here.

MS. COLFER: Okay.

MR. BRADMAN: One, you mentioned 

pelleting -- are there also, you know, general 

unpelleted manure applied and, two, what is the 

source of the manure components? You mentioned 

chicken, I assume, perhaps, steer, also, in the 

pellets for general use. Are those coming from 

organic operations or are they coming from 

conventional operations where the animals are 

essentially processing non-organic grain and other 

food into, you know, an organic approved product? 

And then in terms of the liquid sources, what are 

the liquid sources? Is it --

MS. COLFER: Okay. So let me start --

I've got to keep this straight. So a lot of the 

pelleted products that are used right now are 

manufactured with a base of, like, a chicken litter 
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that's brought in from different areas throughout 

the United States into a manufacturing plant. And 

then that chicken litter can act as the base of 

a pelleted product, but then there are other 

protein meals that are added to it. Say, like, 

meat and bone meal, feather meal, blood meal. So 

there's a myriad of proteins that can be added to 

that pellet and then applied to the soil as a 

pre-plant at these high rates, and then the 

mineralization process breaks down those organic 

nitrogens into the inorganic forms. And, you know, 

they're put down at pretty high rates at pre-plant, 

and then -- the problem I see is, as the 

mineralization process goes along and as the plant 

is growing, there are different nitrogen 

requirements from that plant and it can't take up 

big slugs of nitrogen all at one time. So what 

happens to the remaining nitrogen that's been 

mineralized? You know, if an irrigation occurs, 

that excess nitrogen can be leached out. So, I 

mean, that can be an environmental hazard at that 

point. And the phosphorus can runoff because 
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there are high amounts of phosphorus in these 

products, also.

MR. BRADMAN: It sounds like most of 

the nitrogen is coming -- originated from the 

Haber-Bosch process, much farther upstream though.

MS. COLFER: No, no, no, there's no 

synthetic nitrogen that's being applied.

MR. BRADMAN: Right, but --

MS. COLFER: It's all animal --

MR. BRADMAN: Right, but the animals 

ate crops that were probably raised with, you know, 

synthetic nitrogen?

MS. COLFER: Correct.

MR. BRADMAN: And for the liquid 

sources, are we talking like hydralazed soybean 

--

MS. COLFER: Fish.

MR. BRADMAN: -- or fish?

MS. COLFER: Fish, molasses, soybean 

protein hydrolysate, yeah.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay.

MS. COLFER: Fish is predominant.
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MR. BRADMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Amy has a question for you.

MS. COLFER: Yes.

MS. BRUCH: Gina, quick question for 

you. In your written comments, you mentioned that 

if you see a product that has a 1300 analysis and 

comes out at a certain price point, a red flags 

should be raised. This is kind of in the fraud 

section. Can you just elaborate on that piece so 

I can understand a little better?

MS. COLFER: Well, it's not easy to 

make these types of products. A lot of technology 

and monies and infrastructure has gone into making 

these ammonia extracts, and it's not an inexpensive 

process. So, you know, for the return on 

investment for these manufacturers, they are going 

to have to charge a certain amount. And there's, 

you know, we're talking anywhere in the $11.00, 

$12,00 per unit of nitrogen that is going to be 

charged for these products. Whereas, a, you know, 

ammonia product could be a dollar, you know, the 

synthetic, the Haber-Bosch type of ammonia. The 
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synthetic ammonias can be really inexpensive. So, 

yes, I think if someone's out there selling an 8 

percent ammonia extract that they are representing 

at, you know, way below, really, market value then, 

yeah, a red flag should go up, right? If it walks 

like a duck and talks like a duck, it's usually 

a duck. So that's the thing. If it's too good 

to be true, it usually is. So I think growers need

to, you know, use their due diligence and have that 

red flag go off in their brain and say, this is 

not right. There's an issue here if this product 

is priced way under, you know, under value, what 

the market value breaks.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Gina. 

Appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Thank you for your comments 

and answers to the questions, Gina. They are much 

appreciated.

MS. COLFER: Great. Thank you for 

having me here.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on. 

Michelle, I'm assuming Peter Johnson still hasn't 
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shown up on the call list?

MS. ARSENAULT: I haven't seen him.

MR. ELA: No. Okay. We will move on 

to -- Yeah, we'll move on to Marie Burcham, followed 

by Jim Koan, and then Ryan Brandt. So Marie, 

please go ahead.

MS. BURCHAM: Good afternoon, members 

of the NOSB and NOP. My name is Marie Burcham. 

I am the Policy Director for the Cornucopia 

Institute. We were pleased to see research 

priorities touching on climate change concerns, 

including identifying the most effective practices 

to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and rebuild 

resilience. The industry can and should do more 

to support climate smart practices within the 

label. While reduction in fossil fuel use is of 

primary concern for the climate crisis, it will 

be impossible to meet the Paris Agreement's goals 

without major reductions and emissions from food 

and agriculture, as well. Agriculture produces 

approximately 10 percent of total greenhouse gas 

emissions. Organic producers who already 
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emphasize their stewardship of the land hold the 

key to making all agriculture, whether organic or 

not, more environmentally resilient. In fact, 

organic systems produce about two-thirds less 

emissions than conventional, almost entirely due 

to the avoidance of synthetic fertilizers and other 

chemicals.

However, there are some internal 

conflicts in the organic standards and application 

of those standards that conflict with the climate 

health goals. The lack of regulatory progress to 

keep up with the changing marketplace is of serious 

concern. You've already heard the Wild Farm 

Alliance speak to the issue of native ecosystems. 

We support their comments in full. The NOSB's 

recommendation on this issue has languished since 

2018. The organic label cannot credibly speak 

about sustainability, protection of biodiversity 

and climate resilience, while still allowing the 

destruction of native ecosystems in the name of 

organic farming. Native ecosystems provide 

services for the public good that we cannot afford 
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to lose.

The Wild Farm Alliance and the NOSB have 

already done the hard work in creating 

comprehensive guidance and tool kit. It's time 

to push for this regulation on all levels. The 

stated purpose of OFPA is to establish national 

centers that will then be used to govern the 

marketing of organic products to assure consumers 

that organic products meet consistent standards, 

and to facilitate commerce in organic food. 

Ultimately, OFPA gives NOP broad authority to enact 

regulation that furthers the aims of the statute. 

Regulatory improvement is expected and often 

necessary to meet OFPA's edict. Most of the 

regulatory change recommended by the NOSB is needed 

to cure unintended loopholes or existing problems 

in the current regulations. For example, the 

origin of life-cycle rulemaking would cure a 

systemic issue in organic dairy. The Organic 

Livestock and Poultry Practices Rule was also 

intended, in part, to make the livestock standards 

more consistent. We do not have these fixes in 
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place yet, despite the majority of stakeholders 

calling for them again and again.

This is the task of the NOP and the NOSB. 

Recognizing immense challenges in developing 

comprehensive enforceable regulations, we support 

greater funding for the NOP to create and enforce 

the law. Part of this work can and should include 

better uniformity among accredited certifiers as 

the driver of consistency within the label. 

Consumers choose organic food for many reasons. 

As an understanding of the system continues to 

increase, we need to meet that. The Cornucopia 

Institute supports authentic organic farmers and 

we need our regulators to support them, too. Thank 

you very much and have a great afternoon.

MR. ELA: Another perfect time. This 

is, I think, a record for a public comment webinar. 

Thank you, Marie. Are there questions for her? 

I am not seeing any, so thank you very much for 

your comments. They are very much appreciated.

MS. BURCHAM: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are gonna move on to Jim 
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Koan, followed by Ryan Brandt, and then we have 

several speakers after that that we are not -- well, 

actually, then we'll have Allen Philo. So, I'll 

talk about the other speakers after we get through 

these next few speakers. So Jim, please go ahead 

and give your name and affiliation.

Jim, we're not hearing you, if you are 

there.

MR. KOAN: Hello?

MR. ELA: There we go, Jim. Go ahead.

MR. KOAN: Can you hear us now? Okay. 

Great.

MR. ELA: We do.

MR. KOAN: I had to have my son be the 

technician here. Thank you. Okay. I have an 

organic 80 acre apple orchard about 80 miles north 

of Detroit. I grew apples conventionally for 20 

years and have now grown them organically for 24. 

The first few years of my organic production, I 

averaged about 20 percent to 30 percent loss to 

coddling moth and now have only 2 percent to 3 
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percent damage because of mating disruption using 

pheromones. All my apples, about 25,000 to 30,000 

bushel, are sold on the farm to the public. 

Nothing is sold to processor companies. We sell 

our apples for only $1.00 a pound. I could easily 

get double, or maybe even triple, that price, but 

take pride in making available good organic food 

at a very reasonable price that families can then 

afford. Many people travel from Ohio, Indiana, 

Illinois, Chicago to get my apples and apple 

products, making big purchases to take back to 

their home and to their friends. I'm not sure that 

anyone can comprehend, except maybe Steve, the joy 

I get from growing good, healthy food for others. 

If you took mating disruption from me and I had 

to return to 30 percent to 40 percent damaged fruit, 

I would have to at least double my selling price 

to my customers. Many would have to go back to 

having to eat conventional apples and others would 

have to make sacrifices someplace else in their 

budget to continue buying the higher priced, $2.00 

a pound apples. So we're looking at $42.00 now, 
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$84.00 later. All farming practices -- a bushel.

All farming practices negatively 

impact the soil and the environments. We all know 

that. My definition of sustainability is 

negatively impacting the environment as little as 

possible while growing food for others. Every 

input has both positive and negative consequences. 

Sustainable methods means growing food with the 

least negative impacts to our earth. Using 

pheromones and mating disruption, where 

Lepidoptera moths and leaf rollers falls dead 

center on that definition, I can easily see this 

as an organic apple grower. But unfortunately, 

most others do not have to do battle with these 

bad pests like I do and they cannot. Any other 

tool that I can use to control these pests by 

keeping pest population levels below an economic 

threshold would be far less sustainable. I 

understand that you may be considering kasugamycin 

as organic use. NOSB made a big mistake, in my 

personal growers opinion, but probably not from 

the political perspective. I ask you to please 
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consider kasugamycin carefully using good science 

in your decision-making foundation. I have -- Can 

I finish the sentence?

MR. ELA: You can finish the sentence, 

Jim.

MR. KOAN: I personally lost hundreds 

of trees and tens of thousands of dollars due to 

streptomycin being allowed to sunset. Hopefully, 

you will consider kasugamycin and pheromone 

dispensers as great, sustainable organic tools.

MR. ELA: Thank you for those comments, 

Jim.

MR. KOAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Are there questions from the 

Board?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah, Steve.

MR. ELA: I am not seeing any -- oh, 

go ahead. 

MR. GREENWOOD: Steve, it's Rick. I 

put up my hand. I guess it didn't show.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Yeah, Jim, 
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thanks for your presentation and interested in your 

comments about kasugamycin. And I guess the 

question is, in looking through the written 

comments, there were literally hundreds of written 

comments about keeping antibiotics out of the food 

chain, and I was just wondering, based on your 

experience, and you say, consumers come to your 

property, how do you think they'd feel if you were 

spraying kasugamycin? 

MR. KOAN: Some of them may understand 

and some of them may not. My concern is that you 

make decisions based on good sound science. That 

was my point.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah.

MR. KOAN: If you feel as the Board that 

when you understand the science behind that, that 

it's not good for the environment, then, you know, 

by all means, don't allow it. But if good science 

is there, I think then we look at it a second time 

and ask, okay, maybe we need to do education here 

to the consumers, because most people make 

decisions not based on education, but emotion. 
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Education is the key here.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah. No, I agree and 

it's obviously a useful tool. I mean, I'm a farmer 

also and you want all of them -- but there is pretty 

good evidence that it does change the soil 

microflora after it's used very quickly. Now I 

don't know how significant that is, but there is 

a noticeable change that was written up in the TR. 

But, anyhow, thanks for your comments.

MR. KOAN: You're welcome. Thank you 

for asking.

MR. ELA: Jim, I'll ask a real quick 

question. Do you have any alternatives for fire 

blight control?

MR. KOAN: I transitioned over to a lot 

of varieties that are more fire blight resistant. 

We do an awful lot of monitoring. We have to use 

copper close to bloom and a minimum amount of growth 

in the trees to keep the nitrogen levels down, which 

then answers the fire blight susceptibility. And 

then we diligently patrol the orchard manually 

several times after bloom, knowing when the first 
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strikes are gonna be coming out, and then cut those 

out and disinfect the cuts with copper. So we 

still lose trees, but it's just accepted. It's 

not a game changer. It would just be nice to have 

that in the toolbox because it does cost me a lot 

in my bottom-line without it.

MR. ELA: All right. I don't see any 

other questions.

MR. KOAN: That was my point is, I 

think, also, we need to grow apples as cheaply as 

we -- or food, organic food -- as cheaply as we 

can so, to make it available to everybody.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Jim. Very 

much appreciate your comments.

MR. ELA: We are going to move onto Ryan 

Brandt, then Allen Philo, and then we've got a 

couple of speakers that we don't see. Jodi Rodar 

and Linda Lake, if you are on the line, could you 

please let us know. And if those two aren't on 

the line, then the third person on deck is Chris 

Schreiner. So let's go ahead with Ryan Brandt.

Ryan, are you out there? If you are, 
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you're on mute.

MR. BRANDT: Steve, can you hear me 

now?

MR. ELA: Now we can hear you. Go 

ahead.

MR. BRANDT: All right. Thank you 

very much. Thank you for the opportunity to 

comment on the petition to prohibit ammonia 

extracts for use in the National Organic Program. 

I strongly oppose the petition and believe that 

the definition is too broad and needs to be more 

refined. NuOrganics is the manufacturer of both 

dry and liquid organic fertilizers. Our 

biological manufacturing process uses 100 percent 

non-synthetic ingredients and is currently 

OMRI-listed. We utilize an ingredient that is 100 

percent renewable as our sole feedstock, which is 

animal manure. Manures have traditionally been 

used by organic farmers and are a valuable source 

of micro and macro nutrients and carbon. Their 

use in unmodified form, however, is inefficient 

and has its own host of challenges which include, 
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one, difficulty in applying manure with varying 

moisture contents; two, the inability to transport 

the manure through the logistical costs; and, 

three, restricting the use of the manures based 

upon the limiting micro or macro nutrient. In some 

area, manures are used for nitrogen needs and 

phosphorus can be over applied into the soils, 

leading to soil imbalance.

We've created a novel technology that 

better utilizes the manure by unlocking the 

phosphorus from the nitrogen, allowing for a more 

efficient delivery of nutrients in separate 

products. By taking raw manure and creating the 

dry form of fertilizer and a separate liquid 

fertilizer, the manure derived products may be 

applied at different prescribed amounts. This 

allows the organic farmer to minimize the potential 

for over application, while also using the manure 

in a way that optimizes its use.

Further, our manure-derived liquid 

fertilizers come with soluble organic carbon, 

which fingerprints our product. This provides the 
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ability to confirm the product's authenticity, 

which is a fraud prevention strategy. The soluble 

organic carbon also helps support the microbial 

organisms in the soil. This is a major 

differentiator compared to synthetic ammonia, 

which does not support soil health. When used and 

directed and in coordination with organic 

certifiers, manure-derived liquid fertilizer 

products can provide a needed source of nitrogen 

at the right time while minimizing the potential 

for nitrogen leeching. Manure-derived liquid 

fertilizers provide a secure natural and domestic 

source of organic fertilizer. When processing the 

value-added products, these products can 

supplement the other organic nitrogen projects on 

the market, creating a more robust system and 

allowing organic farmers the ability to have 

options to fit their needs accordingly.

Manure-derived products are uniquely 

transportable, being able to reach customers in 

different US regions where transport was not 

possible in the past due to cost. This allows 
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organic farmers access to these products when they 

could not in the past. These benefits decrease 

pressure on the environment from a production 

standpoint and since these products can be used 

in a way consistent with precision agriculture 

strategies, we believe the products can greatly 

improve organic operations and improved efficiency 

impacts to the environment. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Very well done on time, as 

well. You're a member of the gold star family. 

Are there questions from the Board? I don't see 

any others, but I do have one for you. Your 

statement -- let me go back, I was trying to take 

notes -- that the ammonia extracts unlock other 

nutrients in the soil, but whereas ammonia 

applications in conventional agriculture don't, 

could you say that again and clarify why one would 

unlock it and the other would not?

MR. BRANDT: Well, Steve, in our 

process, what we do is we take raw manure and we 

separate the ammonia from the solid fertilizer, 

and being able to do that and unlocking that ammonia 
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from the phosphorus and the potassium, it allows 

you to then prescribe that ammonia or the 

phosphorus and the potassium at a different 

prescribed rate. So that provides more of an 

environmental win and more of a precise application 

of the nutrient to the crop. That's what I was 

referring to.

MR. ELA: Yeah, but then later you 

said, in terms of -- I think you were talking about 

carbon and my notes -- I didn't get the great notes 

here -- when you apply the ammonia extract to the 

soil, since that's not including the carbon that 

manures would -- how are you -- I guess how are 

you promoting carbon sequestration or carbon 

development in the soil?

MR. BRANDT: Got it, and I think my 

point on this -- and luckily, I have my colleague 

following up here in another hour to talk a little 

bit more about this. But there is a soil organic 

carbon source within the liquid fertilizer, and 

my point was, is that having some of that soluble 

organic carbon in the liquid fertilizer itself 
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helps support the soil microbes in the soil itself. 

So that's what I was pointing out and that's unique 

to a manure-derived liquid fertilizer. 

MR. ELA: It's not true ammonia 

extract, but it does include carbon in it. Am I 

hearing correctly?

MR. BRANDT: Yes. We have a small 

amount of soluble organic carbon in the ammonia 

product, in the liquid ammonia product.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you for that 

clarification. Any other questions? Thank you 

so much for your comments. They are much 

appreciated.

MR. BRANDT: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are going to move on, and 

are Allen Philo or Jodi Rodar -- well, Allen, you're 

here. I'm sorry. Looking at my lines wrong. So, 

Allen, we're going to go to you next. But if Jodi 

Rodar and Linda Lake are on the line, please let 

Michelle know. If they are not, we're going to 

go to Chris Schreiner and then Michelle Miller 

after Allen. So, Allen, please go ahead and state 
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your name and affiliation.

MS. ARSENAULT: Allen, you're on mute.

MR. ELA: Allen, we're not hearing you 

yet.

MR. PHILO: Good now?

MR. ELA: There you go.

MR. PHILO: All right.

MR. ELA: Yep, you're good now. Go 

ahead.

MR. PHILO: Thank you. My name is 

Allen Philo and I am speaking for BioStar 

Renewables, one of the companies named in the 

petition as a producer of novel ammonium products. 

I think many of the Board members and members of 

the organic community that are listening to these 

comments were surprised by Dr. Martin Burger's 

comments on Tuesday, first regarding fraud and how 

the CDFA tracks and regulates our OMRI-listed 

product. Second, about the effect of nitrogen 

fertilizers on soils and long-term studies. I 

want to encourage everyone to read the white paper 

written by Dr. Jerry Hatfield and myself, which 
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summarizes the latest scientific understanding of 

how ammonium acts in soils and contains a meta meta 

analysis that draws on over 125 scientific papers 

over the past several decades and reaches the same 

conclusion as Martin Burger. This was submitted 

in the written comments.

Next slide, please. It has been 

repeatedly stated during these comments that 

ammonium fertilizers bypass the soil system, by 

which I am assuming that they mean the soil 

microbial system, and are feeding the plant 

directly. The short pithy version of the 

statement being they are feeding the plant and not 

soil. Today, I'm sharing with you field trial 

results from this past growing season. These 

trials were done at a third-party research farm, 

Agri-Tech Consulting, LLC in Whitewater, Wisconsin 

by Dr. Tim Maloney. Due to time constraints, 

please see the slides for the total amounts of 

nitrogen credited for base fertility applications.

Next slide, please. The total 

supplemental nitrogen applied with our product and 
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the predicted and actual yields from this trial. 

In this trial, the total nitrogen released from 

the base fertility application increased by 86 

percent as a result of stimulating soil biology 

early in the growing season with six pounds of 

ammoniacal nitrogen and a combination of other 

organic products. This is a recognized phenomenon 

in soil science known as the positive priming 

effect.

Next slide. Please, to be pithy about 

it, we fed the soil and not the crop. Also, these 

yields matched the highest yields on the research 

farm and beat the county average by 90 bushels.

Last slide, please. The proponents of 

this position have acting in their favor a set of 

longstanding assumptions and narratives inside the 

organic community about how soils and fertilizers 

function. This data-driven example, along with 

the comments provided by Dr. Martin Burger, show 

that these narratives do not always stand up to 

the latest scientific understanding available. 

The proponents of the petition have also repeatedly 
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asked that the regulation process be expedited, 

which further stands in the way of allowing this 

scientific information to be made available and 

understood. We are asking the NOSB to slow the 

process down and form a working group or task force 

where more detailed and extensive comments can be 

given and discussed to allow for all of the 

scientific and technical information regarding 

these products to come to light.

Also, due to the constrained nature of 

the oral comments, I have not had time to provide 

information about a number of other issues, namely 

that none of the products named in the petition 

are pure ammonium products, as has been stated 

repeatedly during these comments. But the 

technical review makes a major distinction between 

ammonium concentrate and ammonium extract

manufacturing processes and that an ammonium 

extract differing in its manufacturing process 

from our own ammonium concentrate was listed by 

OMRI in December of 2020 on a line of reasoning 

that could allow for a whole new set of chemistries 
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to enter organics that have always been recognized 

as synthetic in the past. To be clear, I do not 

think OMRI erred here, but this process as 

disclosed a possible loophole in the regulations 

regarding synthetic/non-synthetic distinctions. 

Thank you for your time.

MR. ELA: Okay. Thanks Allen. Are 

there questions from the Board for Allen? Amy has 

one for you.

MR. PHILO: Amy, you're on mute.

MS. BRUCH: Shoot. I got hit by that. 

Sorry about that. Thanks for your comments, 

Allen. There's a lot of information there. Just 

a big picture question. When you were performing 

these tests and comparing them to other plots of 

land, what were the soils that you were working 

on? Were they balanced? Did they have access, 

did they have deficiencies? Because it's really 

hard to understand when you get a bushel increase 

when you don't understand the base conditions. 

So what were those?
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MR. PHILO: The base conditions of 

these were 4 percent organic matter soils. Very 

good soils for the Whitewater, Wisconsin area. 

Generally, they had a pH of around 7 or just below 

that and they were pretty well balanced. I'm sorry 

to go through the slides so fast, but again, this 

format just does not allow for good explanation 

of what's going on here. You know, they were all 

provided with a base application rate of basically 

two tons of chicken manure. There was a credit 

from soybeans and there was a credit from soil 

organic matter. Mineralization, just naturally. 

What ended up happening was when we applied six 

pounds of nitrogen, typically based on a 0.75 

pounds of nitrogen to one bushel yield increase, 

you would expect that to result in eight pounds 

-- or eight more bushels, and we ended up with 42. 

So basically what happened is this this ammonium, 

when we put it in here like this, was not directly 

feeding the crop. That would have just resulted 

in that eight bushel increase. What it did, was 

it stimulated biology to break down many more of 
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the recalcitrant features of the basic fertility 

programs, specifically probably the chicken 

manure. And that's where we got the extra nitrogen 

from. In all of these things, were seeking to put 

a product out there, often in accommodation with 

other products, that stimulates soil biology and 

works together with that. That's where we get our 

biggest factors.

MS. BRUCH: Okay, so 7 percent pH and 

4 percent organic matter?

MR. PHILO: Yeah. I can send you the 

actual study --

MS. BRUCH: Sure.

MR. PHILO: -- if you'd like.

MS. BRUCH: If you could do that, 

that'd be great. Thank you.

MR. ELA: I have two follow up 

questions on that. First of all, were those soils 

certified organic and then the other --

MR. PHILO: No, but --

MR. ELA: -- follow-up --

MR. PHILO: Okay.
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MR. ELA: It helps us. Did you do 

these studies over the long-term or it's just the 

one-year view?

MR. PHILO: Okay, so the first answer 

is no, but it's almost impossible to find a 

third-party research entity that will do an organic 

trial or has the ability to do that. We are simply 

forced to deal with what is out there. We do the 

best to have them follow organic protocols during 

the system. What is interesting about that is it 

actually works not in our favor because the organic 

systems are based on having active good biology 

in them to be able to release nutrients from the 

base fertility program. And in these studies, 

it's actually some of the only places where I've 

seen microbial products actually have a huge 

impact. And in this case, we were actually putting 

our product on with an acromial product to help 

repopulate the soil with the microbes to help 

breakdown those base fertility loads.

And yes, this was only one year of 

research, but we have repeated this across, I 
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think, six different crops types and we're going 

on three years of research. We have seen this 

repeatedly in almost every single crop that we have 

researched this in and in every single application.

MR. ELA: So do you want to speculate 

if this were applied year-after-year? You were 

talking about it releasing some of these, you know, 

other base nutrients, but if you applied it 

multiple years, year-after-year, would you run out 

of those other base nutrients to release?

MR. PHILO: No, because the base 

nutrients that I'm talking about were actually the 

nutrients that were further applied as two tons 

of chicken manure as part of the fertility program. 

What we're allowing is for the fertility that's 

being applied to act in a more efficient manner. 

Typically you only credit 30 percent of the total 

nitrogen that you're going to get out of a chicken 

manure when it's applied to the soil. We basically 

raised that credit to 56 percent instead of 30 

percent. Does that make sense?

MR. ELA: It makes sense, and I'm still 
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curious that in subsequent years you have less of 

that. If you're entering 30 percent, your 

figuring 30 percent the next year, 30 percent the 

following year, but if you release half of it right 

then, you don't have that other nitrogen the 

following years.

MR. PHILO: I'm sorry. I'm sorry, but 

that's actually not what the research shows and 

those are not the amounts that are generally 

credited year-after-year. The credit falls off 

very quickly. It's less than 15 percent the 

following year.

MR. ELA: Okay. Thank you so much. 

And if you would send those research studies. The 

best way is sent it to Michelle and she will send 

it out to the Board so they can see that 

documentation. Thank you so much for your 

comments. We'd really appreciate it.

Next up we have -- sorry, I've got to 

get my -- so we're not seeing Jodi Rodar or Linda 

Lake, so we're going to go on to Chris Schreiner, 

followed by Michelle Miller and Michael Hansen. 
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So Chris Schreiner, please go ahead.

MR. SCHREINER: Thank you. I'm Chris 

Schreiner, Executive Director of Oregon Tilth, a 

leading non-profit organic certifier, educator, 

and advocate, and I'm here to discuss human capital 

strategies with a focus on the scarcity of organic 

inspectors. My comments reflect our unique 

perspective as a certifier that recently 

redesigned our inspection team from being 

primarily independent contractors to a department 

of full-time staff. While much focus is on how 

to increase the number of people entering organic 

certification as a profession, we must recognize 

building the pool of qualified inspectors is 

contingent upon reducing the number of people 

leaving. A strong retention strategy relies on 

creating opportunities for connection 

developments and a long-term career path. In the 

last six months, we've persuaded experienced 

inspectors to continue their organic careers by 

offering them full-time employment, responding to 

concerns about benefits and quality of life that 
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inspectors gave as reasons for exiting the field.

By creating a staff inspections team, 

we offer career stability, insurance coverage, 

localized travel, training opportunities, and 

competitive salaries. This helps stabilize the 

existing pool of qualified or experienced 

inspectors and we gained highly valued personnel. 

Organic inspectors are on the front lines 

protecting trust in the organic label. Let's keep 

the best we have and incentivize the rest by 

establishing a career path and a workforce pipeline 

for certification professionals. The NOP can 

financially assist the school in several ways.

First, as more universities develop 

certificate programs and degrees and organic food 

and ag, work with them to create access to grants 

and student loans. Second, support IOIA and the 

ACA by funding development of additional or organic 

integrity learning center content and curriculum 

for more advanced level inspection courses. 

Third, provide funding to support the creation of 

online platforms for mentorship matching and 
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one-on-one apprenticeship and mentoring services. 

Finally, as organic certification becomes more 

complex and globalized, the costs are increasing 

to ensure comprehensive compliance and protect 

organic integrity.

Let's use what we've learned during the 

past year of conducting inspections during a 

pandemic as an opportunity to evaluate new 

procedures that serve the goals of keeping 

certification accessible by controlling costs, 

while also ensuring integrity and accountability. 

Going forward, we believe there are opportunities 

to explore continued use of remote virtual 

inspections, in conjunction with on-site and 

in-person inspections, based on client-specific 

risk assessments. We need more well-trained and 

committed inspectors to match the organic sector's 

continued growth and to ensure its success, and 

we need to ensure existing inspectors are supported 

in new ways to retain their expertise. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Well done, Chris. Questions 

for Chris? Nate has one for you.
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MR. POWELL-PALM: Hi, Chris. Thanks 

for your comments. Could you speak a little bit 

to your feelings on this idea of creating a more 

standardized and, kind of, full buy-in from 

stakeholders on a mentorship program, kind of 

bringing it out of the more one-on-one mentorship 

to a more standardized program that would be 

administered by the IOIA?

MR. SCHREINER: Yeah, Nate. I mean, 

I think that consistency is key. As certifiers, 

we want our work in the field to be consistent. 

We need our inspectors to be using consistent 

procedures and have consistent levels of 

qualifications, and so credentialing this and 

having a standardized system, I think, will just 

help advance that consistency across the field in 

terms of the service experience our clients have, 

as well as just the experience that apprentices 

in organic have, as well. So I think, you know, 

I've heard this idea of, like, certification 

programs, like, for credentialing of inspectors 

is a common theme. And I think there's real 
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opportunity to just build the professionalism in 

that space.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Question from Brian for you.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks, Chris, 

for sharing that information. And I'm just 

wondering, did that increase your costs and then 

did you have to also -- I mean, the change in 

employment status, did that increase your your 

costs and did you have to pass that on to the farms?

MR. SCHREINER: Yeah. This is a brand 

new thing, Brian, so, in short, it certainly hasn't 

shifted our costs from a lot of more direct costs 

that we were paying Independent contract 

inspectors, those are shifting into our payroll 

and benefits costs. And, of course, when we were 

paying contract inspectors, we weren't having to 

pay payroll taxes and we weren't paying benefits 

for health insurance and those sorts of things. 

So we've seen increased costs. However, and this 

is the experiment that's occurring right now with 

our clients and with us at Oregon Tilth, is we have 
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now standardized an hourly rate for our inspection 

services. And so from our clients perspective, 

they won't see as much variation year to year based 

on which contract inspector that we use, because 

sometimes contract inspectors are charging us, or 

were charging us, at different rates. And so we 

are expecting a more consistent price experience 

for our clients and we've set a standardized hourly 

rate that we anticipate to cover our total increase 

in cost for payroll and benefits, but we'll see 

if the math plays out at the end of this year.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks very much. 

That's really helpful.

MR. ELA: Kyla has a question.

MS. SMITH: Hey Chris, great comments. 

My question is in regards to working with 

universities. I live in a town with a land-grant 

university and it's sometimes been a challenging 

relationship to get organic courses in there to 

even talk about this as an optional career path. 

And so I wondered if you had any experience or 

any thoughts or recommendations what that outreach 
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could look like to help bolster that as even an 

option. Thanks.

MR. SCHREINER: Thanks, Kyla. Yeah, 

I guess I can offer our experience. We're 

fortunate here in Oregon to have a really strong 

land-grant university partner with Oregon State 

University. Oregon Tilth has had a ten-year 

partnership with them. And, you know, at OSU, they 

do have organic classes and they just actually 

launched an online organic certificate program 

that students can take. In terms of how to build 

those relationships -- I know there are other 

land-grants that are doing this. I've been in 

touch with -- we have a board member that's on the 

faculty at the University of Madison, Wisconsin.

Here's my advice to organic advocates 

in states where their land grants aren't quite on 

the leading edge of organic. Engage, show up, 

bring the credible science and, you know, and the 

voices of the farmers who those land grants are 

designed to serve. And engage administrators, 

engage faculty and, you know, just participate. 
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Part of it is just showing up, engaging, and being 

a valued partner. And part of our partnership with 

OSU, to be perfectly frank, has been investment. 

We have invested in their center for small farms 

and regional food systems. We've invested in the 

launching of their organic extension program. And 

because we've shown some financial commitment to 

the work that they do and the services they 

provided, that, you know, grants us some access 

and some influence in setting the research and 

education agenda going forward.

MS. SMITH: Thanks for those thoughts.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you so 

much, Chris. We really appreciate your thoughts.

MR. SCHREINER: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We'll move on to Michelle 

Miller, and after that, Michael Hansen and then 

Ramani Narayan. After Ramani, we're going to take 

a short break. So, go ahead, Michelle, and state 

your name and affiliation.

MS. MILLER: Okay. I'm Michelle 

Miller. By the way, thank you for having this 
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meeting by zoom. So myself, I just want to give

you a bit of background. I have a bachelor's, 

master's, and a philosophy degree from UC Berkeley. 

Years ago, I was a tech entrepreneur, licensed 

software public company at a young age. I was 

healthy, very athletic, and won trophies from 

competing and sea swim events. I should've lived 

happily ever after, but instead I was an innocent 

bystander in a mosquito abatement operation and 

nearly died. And despite it being 20 years later, 

I have had permanent damage. In my case, it was 

documented by metabolite test from Pacific 

Toxicology Labs.

And I say all this to say there's a way 

to live healthier, and I do. For many years, we 

remodeled properties using various safer materials 

and methods, and I still live that way and it works. 

And I tell that to say, please don't compromise 

the organic food standards. It's just not worth 

it. I feel like for problems, people can be 

creative and find some other way to solve the 

problem rather than compromise our standards. So, 
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in particular right now, it's the antibiotic I'm 

going to mispronounce, kasugamycin. Please don't 

allow it. And with the biodegradable biobased 

mulch film, BBMF, please don't change the 

definition. And with the ion exchange, I think 

it should be labeled.

I appreciate that you guys are doing 

a great job and just would appreciate the organic 

standards not being compromised. Thanks.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much for your 

thoughts, Michelle. We really appreciate you 

taking the time to reach out to us on your own 

personal thoughts. Are there questions for 

Michelle? I am not seeing any, so thank you, 

again, Michelle for taking --

MS. MILLER: Okay.

MR. ELA: -- the time to testify before 

us.

MS. MILLER: Yeah. Thank you guys, 

kindly.

MR. ELA: We next have Michael Hansen, 

and then Ramani Narayan, and then, like I say, after 
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that, we will take a break. So Michael, take it 

away.

MR. HANSEN: Hi. I am Michael Hansen, 

Senior Scientist with Consumer Reports, and 

independent non-profit organization that work 

side-by-side with consumers to create a fairer, 

safer, and healthier marketplace. I will speak 

on carrageenan, kasugamycin, and excluded methods.

On carrageenan, we oppose it's 

relisting on the National List. We strongly 

supported the Fall 2016 NOSB vote to remove 

carrageenan from the National List due its lack 

of essentiality. It has no nutritional benefit 

and, due to potential health effects, which we 

explored in detail in our Fall 2016 NOSB comments. 

We urge NOSB to once again recommend removing 

carrageenan from the National List due to lack of 

essentiality and potential adverse health effects.

On kasugamycin, we oppose it's listing 

on the National List. Our 2015 consumer survey 

found a large majority, 80+ percent, of consumers 

think that reducing use of antibiotics in food is 
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important and that organic should mean no use of 

antibiotics or other drugs. Thus, kasugamycin is 

not compatible with organic production. We also 

note that kasugamycin is not permitted for use and 

organic production in Canada, EU, Japan, and Codex 

Alimentarious. There is also the potential threat 

of antibiotic resistance for both human health and 

the environment, although there is insufficient 

evidence to properly evaluate the issue. The TR 

notes that the normal use of kasugamycin has 

already led to resistance in several plant 

pathogens and even notes that there is good reason 

to believe that fire blight will become resistant 

to kasugamycin. Finally, kasugamycin is not 

needed, as alternatives exist, including cultural 

and biological controls. Thus, we urge NOSB to 

oppose listing of kasugamycin due to 

incompatibility with organic, potential impacts 

on environment and human health, and due to the 

fact that alternatives exist.

On alternative methods, we applaud NOSB 

for moving forward on this topic. We note that 
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the recommendations of NOSB since Fall of 2016 have 

been unanimous. We urge NOP to take up these 

recommendations and codify by publishing a 

guidance document for the NOP Handbook of the four 

evaluation criteria used to determine if a method 

should be excluded or not, the 11 listed methods 

that should be prohibited in organic, and the five 

listed methods that should be allowed in organic. 

We also urge NOSB to vote on the six methods on 

the To Be Determined list at the Fall 2021 NOSB 

meeting. NOSB should also develop specific 

definitions for each of the methods on the 

excluded, not excluded and TBD list to make clear 

what is and is not being excluded. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Michael. 

Are there questions? We have one from Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks Michael. 

We have a strong impetus to try to make decisions 

about the TBD list and the excluded methods, and, 

very briefly, I'm just wondering whether you feel 

like cell or protoplast fusion would qualify as 

an acceptable method? Like, say, if it was new 
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today, should it be approved?

MR. HANSEN: Well, if you look at the 

definition of modern biotechnology, which is what 

we've always put forward, that does ban cell 

fusion, but above the level of the family. And 

the reason that was done is because there have been 

these techniques used in the cold crops for quite 

a while. So if you use the definition of modern 

biotechnology, it would be permitted. But there 

are some people, like I'm for one, that don't think 

that it should be used at all. So, that should 

be debated. Although from our perspective, using 

the term modern biotechnology, cell fusion would 

be allowed, but below the level of plant family. 

But anything above that would be considered 

excluded.

MR. ELA: We have a question from 

Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Hi. Thank you for your 

comments, Michael. I'm wondering if Consumer 

Reports has current consumer survey data about 

consumer expectations around excluded methods in 
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organic?

MR. HANSEN: No, we have -- every time 

we'd asked in 2015 and elsewhere, It's actually 

been very clear one of the highest things is 

anything that's considered genetic engineering 

should be excluded, along with, you know, 

pesticides and drugs. But, no, we have not done 

that survey in the last couple of years. 

Hopefully, there'll be one done this year, but we 

shall see.

MR. ELA: Jerry has a question for you.

MR. D'AMORE: Hi, Michael. I, too, 

thank you for your comments and I appreciate your 

expressed concerns about human health. And I was 

wondering if you go beyond that and have looked 

at any environmental concerns for the carrageenan?

MR. HANSEN: Well, we didn't look at 

that issue, although I noticed others, both NOC 

and Beyond Pesticides, have put forward arguments 

that there could be adverse environmental effects 

from the, you know, from carrageenan production. 

But that's not something that we looked into in 
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any detail. We just noticed, given a lack of 

essentiality, the fact that most other organic 

programs don't allow it and that there are human 

health -- clear human health effects, that those 

are enough.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you, sir. 

Appreciate it.

MR. HANSSEN: Sure.

MR. ELA: Any other questions from the 

Board? Thank you so much. We appreciate your 

comments.

MR. HANSEN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are gonna move on to Ramani 

Narayan, and he'll be the last speaker before the 

break. So Ramani, please go ahead. Michelle, are 

we seeing Ramani?

MS. ARSENAULT: Yeah, he's on the call 

with us. We've just asked him to unmute himself.

MR. ELA: Okay.

MS. ARSENAULT: We have a bit of a delay 

here. Here we go.

DR. NARAYAN: All right. Now I am set. 
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Thank you. I am Ramani Narayan from Michigan 

State and I thought I would offer some comments 

to the group on mulch film. So today, USDA organic 

regulations permit the use of synthetic PE mulch 

film, provided it is removed at the end of each 

growing season. However, PE will become brittle 

due to weathering and fragment into small pieces 

that even micro plastics. And is well documented 

in literature that they have adverse effects on 

soil. So the use of certified verifiable soil, 

biodegradable mulch films, which is based on 

approved NOSB requirements for biodegradability, 

should be permissible even with today's 

regulation, I think, provided it is recovered at 

the end up season for on-farm composting. But it 

could also be plugged back into the soil because 

it will ensure complete removal of the carbon of 

the mulch film.

The problem which is sort of holding 

this back is the issue of biobased content, and 

I would like to submit to the Committee that the 

biodegradablility requirements is that all the 
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carbon is removed by microbial assimilation to CO2. 

That is the requirement. So there is no biocarbon 

or any carbon remaining and if biobased content 

is essential or needed, a minimum biobased content, 

as is per the USDA BioPreferred Program, would be 

useful, valuable. But to put up a 100 percent 

biobased content is essentially holding back this 

valuable technology which would prevent any 

accumulations of resistance of PE in the soil and 

this, as I understand, is now CA regulation also. 

So I'm open to questions. I just wanted to bring 

this back to the table before this committee. I 

think these documents have been there in my report, 

as well. 

MR. ELA: Thank you very much. Asa has 

a question for you.

MR. BRADMAN: Yeah, I mean, this is 

issue though a lot of us on the Board are torn on. 

We're proposing right now the idea of allowing 

20 percent non-biobased, but biodegradable, and, 

you know, many of the concerns are one, 

philosophically allowing a petroleum material 
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directly added to soil, although we already do that 

in at least one other area of NOSB regulations or 

NOP regulations.

The other is that, you know, if climate, 

and especially in arid areas or cold areas, are 

such that even with the biodegradable mulches, 

whether in my mind, a 100 percent biobased or 

partially synthetic, can break down more slowly 

and we can find micro plastics and other particles 

forming that are persistent, especially maybe if 

it gets into a water, aquatic or other environment 

blown off-field. And so these are, again, the 

continuing concerns with biodegradable mulch. 

I'd be curious about your thoughts on that.

DR. NARAYAN: Yeah. Those are all 

absolutely valid comments. This is why I thought 

that today since you've permit PE mulch film full 

recovery, and then whatever is done with it, please 

as an interim, you could say if you use a 

biodegradable mulch film, you recover it and then 

you dissolve, on-farm composting, or whatever you 

do with it. The rationale for this is that if there 
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are any fragmentations or small fragments of 

particles which are foamed because of degradation 

in the soil, it will completely biodegrade. And 

you have to be verifiable and certified, 90++ 

percent carbon to CO2. So I just think that it 

could be useful to get it. It is valuable for 

agriculture because you don't leave any persistent 

particles, which today you do irrespective because 

the regulations allows mulch film. If you said 

no mulch films, then yes, it could be a harder 

argument to make. Does that makes sense?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. And this is kind 

of what we're, really what we're grappling with.

DR. NARAYAN: The other comment, if I 

quickly offer, is the biobased carbon has nothing 

to do with whether it biodegrades, doesn't 

biodegrade, end of life. It is of value for 

agriculture and should be there to some extent, 

but you would not be having any technology if you 

wanted 100 percent biobased because the monomers 

in all are not in place still, and it would take 

you a long time for this to get implemented, which 
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would seem, you know, unnecessarily taking it 

backwards.

MR. ELA: Amy has a question.

MS. BRUCH: Dr. Narayan, thank you so 

much for your contributions on this topic. I had 

a question for you on the biodegradation. You 

mentioned about plowing, and I guess my first 

question with that is, if you're plowing, you're 

gonna be going quite deep into the soil, six plus 

inches, and I'm concerned with the amount of 

microbial activity that exists at that level 

because, from my information, and you can calibrate 

with me on this, I think 95 percent of the microbes 

are actually in the top four inches of the surface. 

So for plowing this biodegradable biobased mulch 

at a deep level, what's the idea on the timeline 

on this biodegradation?

DR. NARAYAN: Unfortunately, I am 

going to be honest on this and say that there is 

not perfect data on what happened. These are more 

anecdotal data, right? This I understand, which 

is what we are trying to correct. That, yes, I 
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plow it and no, I don't see any part. And I think 

we are -- at least I, please, I am pushing for --

maybe USDA is listening -- to say you need a project 

which says what actually happens and what is the 

exact data on it, which is why I am suggesting --

and this is my own personal comment because I don't 

think industry likes this and neither does the USA 

probably -- but if you permit it to be removed 

because the instruments of removing is there and 

then you do on-farm composting, then the amount 

of the fragments which goes into the soil is not 

going to accumulate. And that I always thought 

was a valuable benefit, as opposed to polyethylene 

films. So you're not changing anything. You are 

improving what exists today to a better material 

that, even if it gets fragmented and goes into soil, 

It's not going to be persistent. That is 

definitely proven because the soil 

biodegradability tests are all done and removing 

it and composting it, I think, is a doable 

proposition. It is on-farm.

The question you are asking, do you have 
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definitive proof that when you plow it into the 

soil, will it all be completely removed? What is 

the time frame? Soils are different, like it was 

pointed out. Desert conditions was with this. 

It will have an effect and the two projects, which 

was funded by the USDA, basically confirmed that. 

They said that if it was done in Washington State, 

it biodegraded very quickly and that was not a 

problem. If you did it in Tennessee, it was much 

slower. In Texas, it's slower. So you'll have 

these variations.

But the belief is that within a two-year 

time-frame, which is the turning of the soils, that 

nothing should remain and, therefore, as a part 

of this approval of standard in the California 

regulation, it does require a pilot state test to 

be done by the farmer to prove and satisfy himself 

that there is no persistent particles remaining. 

So that's the only answer I can give you for that, 

Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: We have a question by Brian, 
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and then a question by Asa.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, sorry to keep 

pounding on this biodegradability issue, but, so 

I'm a little confused. Are you are you saying that 

the products that are out there right now, there 

are products that are a 100 percent biodegradable?

DR. NARAYAN: Yes, as per the 

standards.

MR. CALDWELL: I'm sorry. So, as per 

the standards, is that the same as 90 percent 

biodegradable over two years or am I not 

understanding that?

DR. NARAYAN: So let me let me --

MR. CALDWELL: Apparently not 100 

percent.

DR. NARAYAN: Let me clarify that. 

Because 90+ percent is the statistical value set 

on it. And this is where the confusion rests. 

It does not mean that you can add 10 percent of 

a non-biodegradable stuff. It also doesn't mean

that you can add a polymer which will not biodegrade 

and only 90 percent biodegrades. But if you look 
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to your setting an absolute value, because the 

error in biology of this test method is plus or 

minus 10 percent, to set an absolute value, you 

set as 90 percent. In fact, the standards actually 

require that if you add any polymer, organic 

polymer, between 1 percent and 10 percent, you 

should test it separately. So this question of 

what if you put 5 percent non-biodegradable, you 

won't be able to detect it, is eliminated because 

if you're adding that, you must test it separately. 

So I know it sounds like conflicting, but the 90 

percent absolute level is corresponding to 

complete removal of the carbon from the 

environment. That is what that 90 percent is. 

It has not got anything to do with 10 percent being 

allowed to be non-biodegradable.

MR. CALDWELL: Thank you.

DR. NARAYAN: And you could use a 

statistician on this, that there is a fundamental 

difference on saying, you are permitted 100 percent 

plus or minus something or yours is 90 percent plus 

or minus. He could have said 90 percent plus or 
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minus 10 percent. But if you said 100 percent, 

there's no way you're going to achieve 110 percent. 

So statistically when you're setting these 

numbers, you set it 90 percent because we know that 

you cannot go over 100. But to avoid that problem, 

which I think is so very prevalent everywhere, it's 

not an exemption to add 10 percent 

non-biodegradable and therefore, to overcome that, 

the requirement is that when you are certifying, 

you have to prove that the 1 percent to 10 percent 

is also completely biodegradable. Hopefully that 

helps.

MR. ELA: Let's move on to Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: So one of the comments 

from the people in Washington was that after a 

season, the biodegradable mulches become too 

brittle to handle and remove, and it would be 

challenging to gather up the material and move it 

to on-farm composting. And I'm curious if you have 

any experience with that or comments on it?

DR. NARAYAN: I am sure that the 

technology could make that last for one year at 
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least. So this is the balance, right? If you want 

to plow it back into soil, of course you want to 

make it brittle so that it's easy to plow it back 

into soil, and so the industry would make it that 

way. If you said that, no, I want you to recover 

it, I am sure they would find a way to be able to 

make it last long enough to be pulled out. I still 

think the ideal solution, which is where I feel 

sort of ambivalent about, the ideal solution for 

farming is still to plow it in and to prove that 

nothing persists. But if you ask me, as a 

scientist, do you have data statistically proving 

that this PE value I can say every time so much 

is not going to be left, I don't have that data. 

But in a large-scale, it has been shown that within 

the two years, there is no carbon remaining. That 

is for sure. Now, how do you define the rules so 

that you want to be between what you're doing 

real-world versus what you do in the lab, that's 

why I thought this interim step of allowing this 

and getting more data, so they come back and say 

I can plow it in would be a doable proposition.
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MR. BRADMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much. I have 

one kind of yes or no question for you. Do products 

exist on the marketplace that would meet this 

annotation? Let me say that again.

DR. NARAYAN: Say that again.

MR. ELA: Do products exist on the 

market that would meet this annotation?

DR. NARAYAN: Sanitation?

MR. ELA: Annotation. Do products 

exist that -- do products exist on the market that 

are compatible with this listing?

DR. NARAYAN: Yes, except for your 

biobased content requirement, which I am not sure 

where it stands, but it says 100 percent, I think. 

That was the last time I heard about it. If you 

removed that one -- not remove it in totality, but 

if you did not require 100 percent biobased 

content, then there are products in the marketplace 

today which can -- not just from one supplier, but 

multiple suppliers -- who would meet the 

biodegradability requirements, which I can tell 
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you is pretty aggressive to me, which is now 

embodied in the NOSB requirements. Absolutely it 

will. The part which is holding it back is 

biobased content, and that I don't think has 

anything to do with the end of life. Sorry. You 

told me to say yes or no. When you ask a professor 

a question, you can't answer in one word, so...

MR. ELA: So you're just --

DR. NARAYAN: That was remarkable. 

I'll have to record it in my library.

MR. ELA: So you're saying there are 

not products available now that have the 80 percent 

biobased content?

DR. NARAYAN: Yes. That would be 

difficult to meet, and have the soil 

biodegradability requirements, yes.

MR. ELA: Okay. Great. Thank you so 

much. Appreciate your thoughts.

DR. NARAYAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We are gonna take a break now 

for 10 minutes. So after break, we will have Denae 

Ranucci, and then Barbara Wingler and Sam Welch 
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after the break. So we will start at nine minutes 

after the hour.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 3:59 p.m. and resumed at 

4:09 p.m.) 

MR. ELA: All right. We're going to 

start with Denae Ranucci. Denae, I'm sorry. I'm 

going to kill your last name here. Ranucci 

followed by Barbara Wingler and then Sam Welsch. 

So, go ahead, Denae.

MS. RANUCCI: My name is Denae Ranucci 

and I am the audit team leader at QAI. I came to 

talk to you folks today about the issue of human 

capital and wanted to state that I am in agreement 

in regards to the lack of qualified inspectors in 

the industry. I wanted to say that I believe that 

it's only going to get worse with the 

implementation of the strengthening organic 

enforcement rules. We are completely behind the 

enforcements and improvements that the SOE has 

created as far as the standard qualifications and 

the overall improvements that it will make for the 
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industry.

However, I have really big concerns 

that this strengthening of qualifications and 

enforcement of it is happening at the same time 

that we're seeing increased strain upon our 

inspector group. Increased experience, the 

increased experience requirement, allotting to the 

year of apprenticeship required per scope and scale 

will be a large barrier to the entry for any new 

inspectors. And I feel that the time restraint 

on the experience is not as telling as other 

quantifiable measures. The amount of work that 

an individual puts in over the course of a year 

could be varying and may not be the best teller 

of actual experience and ready for inspection 

credentials.

I think that the implementation of this 

as written will create large differences in how 

certifiers consider someone qualified and 

additional certified operations that will be 

included in the SOE will mean increased 

inspections, increased inspections with the 
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dwindling workforce will create overworked 

inspectors that will not be able to accurately 

identify issues when expectations are high without 

enough time for them to accurately address things.

I appreciated the LSP's analysis 

remarks and why inspectors are leaving and have 

communicated a lot of this and work with some of 

my inspector pools as well. Travel time, 

unfortunately, is a big issue and something that 

we can't get away with any inspector industry, but 

we currently encourage the NOP to approve of the 

hybrid inspection types that are currently being 

used to do to COVID regulations; and believe that 

this additional flexibility regarding audit format 

for certain inspections will allow for reduced 

travel and hopefully help with some of this travel 

burden. I have had communications with many of 

my inspectors regarding the professionalism that 

is seen in the industry and the lack of the respect 

that they continue to get as organic inspectors 

as opposed to other food safety or other 

certification auditors.
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We believe that the NOP should 

re-enforce the certifier's responsibility to 

create non-compliances when clients are unwilling 

to commit to an inspection date or an inspection, 

as well as come up with additional guidance on how 

to address inspection refusals. This way that we 

can really help back our inspectors and make sure 

that they're given the respect that they do 

deserve. Additional education provided to the 

public and the client would also help with these 

inspectors and reviewers to make sure that the 

guidance and the regulations are actually 

understood.

As far as ensuring qualified auditors, 

we work to really open communication between 

inspectors. and will continue communications 

with other ACAs and industries and work to help 

include inspectors in these talks going forward.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you so much for 

those thoughts. Are there questions? I am not 

seeing any, so thank you so much, so much, Denae, 

and giving me the proper pronunciation of your last 
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name. Next, we're going to move on to Barbara 

Wingler, followed by Sam Welsch, and then Ib 

Hagsten. Barbara, please go ahead.

MS. WINGLER: Hi, I'm Barbara Wingler. 

Thank you for the opportunity to share with all 

of you and I'm with Nu Organics. And I'm an 

environmental engineer and spent most of my career 

working in the field of water and wastewater 

treatment and environmental protection.

I'm addressing the current concerns of 

fraud and liquid organic fertilizer products by 

proposing the use of spectroscopy as a method to 

identify fraud and in these products. I was glad 

to hear this topic introduced by few people during

Tuesday's session and I want to let you know that 

Nu Organics does not sell spectroscopy equipment 

or services. We're in the business of recovering 

nutrients from manure for environmental benefit 

and production of organic fertilizers.

We are, however, using currently 

spectroscopy on raw manure and dry process manure 

as a way to measure moisture and nutrients and we've 
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had a lot of success. It came to mind that we can 

also use this technique for fraud detection on 

these materials and also on liquid fertilizer 

products. We're now developing the process to use 

on our liquid. Next slide, please.

What are liquid organic fertilizers? 

The sources of these organic fertilizers could 

be fish, beef, different types of manures, soy 

products among others. These products in general 

have nitrogen that is made immediately available 

to plants and are meant to be applied in seasons 

by plant-available nitrogen. Next slide, please.

Liquid organic fertilizers are derived 

from plant and animal matter and as such, all have 

carbon compounds that are unique and 

characteristic of the plant and animal material 

that they come from. Could you roll through the 

next slide, please?

Near-infrared spectroscopy is widely 

used in the food industry and has the following 

advantages: It's fast and that results can be 

obtained in minutes; it's relatively inexpensive, 
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reproducible, and precise. Minimal operator 

training is required. For example, the slide 

shows some spectra that we produced and they're

the first ones to be produced in our lab with right 

minimal operator training. For example, the 

spectra shown on the top graph is two examples of 

our product at different stages of concentration.

As you can see, there's a distinct 

fingerprint produced. The shape is maintained 

through the concentration process. The bottom 

slide shows comparison organic liquid fertilizer 

with a synthetic fertilizer or the same 

concentration. You can see on the top, the 

synthetic fertilizer produces a very flat line, 

whereas the organic fertilizer, it shows a distinct 

shape. Next slide, please.

We propose to use this technology in 

the following manner: to sample and perform a scan 

of the liquid that represents the batch of products 

sold; store the sample and the scan as the original 

fingerprint of the product; provide a chain of 

custody for manufacturer to distributor to farmer; 
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sample liquid product at any point in this 

distribution chain; and compare that scan to the 

original fingerprint. Thank you for your time. 

Any questions?

MR. ELA: Well done on your timing. 

Are there any questions from the board? I am not 

seeing any, Barbara, so thank you very much for 

your presentation. We do appreciate your 

comments.

MS. WINGLER: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to Sam 

Welsch, followed by Ib Hagsten, and Yesenia 

Fuentes. Go ahead, Sam.

MR. WELSCH: Thank you. I'm Sam 

Welsch with OneCert. The final rule was published 

with an effective date of April 21 of 2001. That 

was exactly 20 years ago yesterday.

The preamble to the rule includes the 

statement during the 18 month implementation 

period. The NOP intends to publish for comment 

certification standards for agriculture, 

mushrooms, greenhouses, and aquatic animals. The 
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absence of those missing standards has resulted 

in huge inconsistencies among certifiers.

The certification of soil-less systems 

is one of the most egregious. Such systems can 

only be certified by designating all the 

soil-related provisions in off EPA and the 

regulations as not applicable. Designating soil 

provisions is not applicable to soil-less systems. 

That resulted in the three-year transition 

requirement also being considered non-applicable 

by some certifiers. That was the logical result 

because the soil on that land was not part of the 

production system.

In response, the NOP issued a memo 

titled Certification of Organic CROP Container 

Systems in June 2019, clarifying that the 

three-year transition period applies to all 

container systems built and maintained on land. 

That memo created more confusion and 

inconsistency amongst certifiers. The ACA formed 

a working group, to address the inconsistent 

interpretation of the memo.
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The working group concluded that the 

memo only clarified that it is prohibited to spray 

synthetic herbicide to the land, apply a layer of 

plastic, put containers on the plastic and certify 

the production system as organic. The working 

group also identified many areas of inconsistency 

for certification of greenhouse and container 

production. Clear and specific standards are 

needed.

The group wrote: This needed clarity 

and specificity cannot adequately be achieved 

through certifier consensus or additional NOP 

guidance. We need the NOP to draft regulations 

based on the NOSB recommendations on greenhouse 

and container production from 20 and ten years ago, 

respectively. The group wrote: These are areas 

of inconsistency, and related concerns need to be 

addressed through formal rulemaking and the 

publication of greenhouse and container production 

standards.

I want to comment briefly that ion 

exchange is a method that creates chemical change. 
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That's why it's called ion exchange. Regarding 

so-called biodegradable plastic mulch, remember 

that OFPA clearly states for a farm to be certified 

under this chapter, producers on such farm shall 

not use plastic mulches unless such mulches are 

removed at the end of each growing or harvest 

season. Finally, please review my written 

comments on clear legal writing and the rules of 

textual interpretation.

MR. ELA: Well done, Sam. Right on the 

money there. So other questions from the board 

for Sam? I am not seeing any. Sam, thank you for 

much for your comments as always. We're going to 

move on to Ib Hagsten, followed by Yesenia Fuentes, 

and then Margaret Scoles. So, Ib, please go ahead.

MR. HAGSTEN: Thank you. Good 

afternoon. NOSB members who work exceedingly hard 

on our behalf and to Michelle who has kept us and 

you on track for many years. I, Ib Hagsten, have 

three issues that all fall under the category of 

human capital which Dr. Tucker so eloquently 

championed.
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I recognize the credential system for 

inspectors. Having been an organic inspector for 

16 years, conducted an excess of 4,000 inspections, 

I, as a seasoned accredited independent organic 

inspector, deserve to be well-paid; yet I'm not 

paid adequately for the continual expanded 

training I've invested in.

I have never expected to make a killing 

as an organic inspector, yet I do expect to be 

treated with courtesy by the certifiers, to have 

life uplifting events in the Elms Buggy or around 

the corporate boardroom. Provide professional 

quality data of review and audits into visit 

operations studying to assure NOP organic 

integrity will be maintained. Thus I do encourage 

the NOSB, the NOP, and IOIA to help develop a 

recognized credentials program that gives credit 

to inspectors who raise the bar on behalf of USDA 

NOP organic logo, the NOP reputation and the 

organic integrity.

Secondly, formalized apprenticeship 

for new inspectors. Having mentored two dozen 
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IOIA-trained inspectors, I've never asked for 

payment. My life followed the initial crop 

training, has been such that human enriching, 

professionally expanding, and exponentially 

fulfilling journey that I'm happy to pay forward 

to inspectors. In anticipation that they may find 

the profession of organic inspector meaningful and 

reasonably profitable. Thus, as there are 

insufficient numbers of qualified mentoring 

inspectors, we must recognize or encourage NOSB 

and NOP to formalize an effective organic inspector 

program apprentice program.

Thirdly, an encouraging comment about 

the three pending laws to guide livestock and 

poultry management practices as met the NOP 

preamble and guidelines. For someone who has been 

known by the NOP preamble and initial industry 

standards from the beginning, and I visited 

thousands of small family farms who raise the dairy 

herd and poultry flocks according to the 

regulations, it has been disheartening to see the 

deviation from the NOP standards by a small to 
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number of farms of a very large size, thus make 

the topsy-turvy the national product production 

penalties. This debate has gone on too long in 

my perception, and therefore I have a put on the 

table a clean manner a recommendation: get off the 

receptacle and dedicate. Thank you for listening. 

Thank you for your work and thank you for serving 

on NOSB.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much for your 

comments. Sue has a question for you.

MR. HAGSTEN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Sue. You need to 

unmute.

MS. BAIRD: Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. 

Hi, Ib. Thank you for your comments on this, and 

I recognize your work and being President of IOIA 

for many years. You've been an inspiration to a 

lot of people. And I agree you couldn't be 

conducting apprenticeship trainings and you need 

to be paid for. And you've done it for free for 

all these years now. I've done it for free in the 

past.
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My question, though: You said that you 

urge NOP and NOSB to develop the criteria, -- and 

what we have heard and will hear from Margaret next 

is that IOIA should be doing that -- how do you 

respond to that or did I misunderstand what you 

said?

MR. HAGSTEN: No. No. I just said 

everybody needs to work together on this because 

IOIA can only do so much and we need a buy-in from 

the other guiding regulatory segment. That's all.

MS. BAIRD: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: I don't see any other 

questions. Thank you so much for your thoughts 

and comments on this.

MR. HAGSTEN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We were going to move on to 

Yesenia Fuentes, then Margaret Scoles and Melody 

Morrell. Yesenia, please go ahead.

MS. FUENTES: My name is Yesenia 

Fuentes, working with BioSafe Systems. Thank you 

for your service and your consideration for the 

needs of all stakeholders. Please review my 
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written comment on behalf of BioSafe Systems for 

more information. BioSafe Systems is a 

family-owned manufacturer of biodegradable 

disease control products since 1996.

The mission of BioSafe is to provide 

disease control solutions utilizing reduce risk 

chemistries that do not negatively impact the 

health and safety of people and the environment. 

Peracetic acid, PAA, is an important tool in the 

prevention of food-borne illness through its use 

in crop production, water treatment, food 

processing, and as a hard surface sanitizer and 

disinfectant. It has been approved both as a food 

contact and surface contact material.

PAA is critical in increasing food 

safety and the implementation of the Food Safety 

Modernization Act, FSMA. We strongly support 

continued use of peracetic acid on the National 

List as listed for use in disinfecting equipment, 

seed asexually propagated planting material, and 

to control fire blight bacteria. PAA is not 

manufactured; it is formed in suit between hydrogen 
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peroxide and acetic acid. PAA formulations are 

fast-acting, oxidizing, broad-spectrum 

microbicides that are effective against 

broad-spectrum of microorganisms including 

bacteria, yeast, animals, protozoa, algae, and 

viruses. It should be noted that as a strong 

broad-spectrum microbicide, PAA has been found to 

be affected when it apply it as a standalone 

product, especially under low to moderate disease 

pressures situation.

PAA has a long history of use in organic 

production. The uses that are listed in the sunset 

review have been allowed since the first amendment 

in the National List in 2003 and have consistently 

had the overwhelming support of organic grower ever 

since. We appreciate your consideration for our 

position. Thank you for the opportunity of 

commenting during this phase of sunset process. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Yesenia. 

Are there questions? I'm not seeing them. We 

really appreciate your comments and taking the time 
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to talk to us.

MS. FUENTES: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move onto 

Margaret Scoles, followed by Melody Morrell, and 

then Kelly Taveras. Go ahead, Margaret.

MS. SCOLES: Margaret Scoles, 

Executive Director International Organic 

Inspectors Association. Members of the Board, NOP 

colleagues: I will comment on the human capital 

proposal. Thank you to the board and the NOP for 

bringing this to the forefront. We submitted 

extensive written comments including the outcomes 

of an inspector survey conducted by our policy 

committee.

We listed the challenges we see and 

suggested robust solutions. We are the leading 

worldwide training and networking organization for 

organic inspectors. In 2020, IOIA trained 867 

participants in 60 separate events, representing 

28 distinct courses with 13 partners, 

universities, non-profits, certifiers for 

profits.
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The lack of a strategy to recruit and 

maintain enough well-qualified Inspectors and 

Certification staff creates great risk for Organic 

Integrity. The time to correct this is short. 

The main problem is not that we're training too 

few people, but that too few are successfully 

becoming inspectors and staying in the field.

Our survey supports this. A 

significant number of those completing IOIA basic 

training stated that they were unable to obtain 

work because they couldn't obtain mentorship. We 

urge the NOSB to urge the NOP to invest in 

inspectors. People and institutions invest in the 

things that they value. Inspectors are the 

gatekeepers of the industry. Without quality 

inspectors, you can't have a good certification 

process. IOIA urges NOP funding for, first, a 

state of the industry study that captures and 

publishes the data for contractors and staff. How 

many inspectors/reviewers are there? Their 

demographics: how many inspections/reviews did 

they do? Why do they stay in the profession?
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Second, feasibility studies for 

apprenticeship and credentialing programs. 

Apprenticeship: onboarding inspectors has been 

identified as a key bottleneck due to lack of widely 

available, consistent quality mentorship. 

Apprentices must have an affordable opportunity 

and mentors must be compensated appropriately. 

Credentialing: creating universal standardized, 

measurable metrics for determining inspector 

competencies to ensure that inspectors are 

assigned appropriately as critical.

Third, support for exploring pilot 

programs with universities or colleges to increase 

awareness of inspection as a career, access, 

broader funding and varied training formats. 

Also, reduce duplicate annual training and 

increase consistency with widely accepted annual 

update trainings. Diversity, equity and 

inclusion must be part of any solutions. Our 

industry is not training too few inspectors. In 

the past four years, IOA trained 653 entry-level 

participants in the US alone. Lots of 
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inexperienced inspectors and high inspector 

turnover all contribute to the risk. Our industry 

needs to come together.

Unreasonable solutions: with growth in 

the organic market and SOE, we face an imminent 

shortage of competent inspectors. Attracting 

more and better candidates is an 

oversimplification that will not solve the 

problem. Thank you again for your work.

MR. ELA: Well done, Margaret. You're 

in an elite group of ending exactly at the right 

time. We will open it up for questions from the 

board. Sue has a question. Sue, that little 

unmute button is going to be your undoing.

MS. BAIRD: Every time. Not last --

I said I read with great interest your lengthy and 

very in-depth comments, and I really appreciate 

it -- you doing the survey and getting the responses 

back. I guess my question is: -- and it sounds 

like you've already moved forward on 

apprenticeships and receiving funding. I heard 

yesterday from Organic Valley may be willing to 
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put the monies towards that apprenticeship program 

-- can you elaborate on where you're at on that 

program?

MS. SCOLES: Very much in the early 

stages. We have been working for about six months 

on developing a pilot program, mentorship, 

qualifications, application process. And the 

funding is proving a little bit trickier than we 

expected, but we have started and Organic Valley 

actually was our first donor for the program. But 

what we're trying to do is fund as a pilot program 

where the participants might even not pay anything. 

They would pay a low fee. And the reason for this 

is it allows us -- it's kind of like a scholarship 

program. People would apply.

We can pick the really -- candidates 

that look very promising, and they, and require 

that they give us feedback over time and how useful 

the training was. In other words, participate in 

the process. They won't just be getting free 

training.

MS. BAIRD: To follow up -- and so I 
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appreciate that for the participants -- but what 

about the trainers?

MS. SCOLES: I'm sorry? More about 

the training?

MS. BAIRD: What about the trainers? 

You're saying that your participants won't pay 

anything but is there built into your pilot a way 

to pay the trainers for doing the --

MS. SCOLES: Yes. Well, yes. That's 

the scholarship. The funding will come through 

the scholarship program. The participants will 

apply and may or may not pay. We don't know that 

yet. But the training itself definitely the 

mentors will be paid appropriately, the same rate 

as what we pay our lead trainers is currently the 

plan.

MS. BAIRD: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Nate, you lowered your hand. 

You had it raised. Do you want to ask anything?

MR. POWELL-PALM: I think Sue kind of 

covered it. I'm really excited about this 

mentorship program. I think it highlights this 
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bottleneck. I just wanted to thank Margaret for 

emphasizing how -- it's sort of rare to have so 

much consensus in a global organic community about 

who the best treating organization is.

And so the fact that Hong Kong and Korea 

and America all go to IOIA for training for organic 

inspectors is, I think it's something to 

acknowledge and celebrate that we've got the 

organization here domestically. And new 

inspector creation isn't the problem is what I'm 

hearing, but more, how do we get them through that 

mentorship program into work?

MS. SCOLES: The latter it has to --

the runs are too far apart.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes. Thank you so 

much for your comments.

MS. SCOLES: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Margaret. We do 

appreciate it is always. We're going to move on

to Melody Morrell, then Kelly Tavaris, and then 

Joanna Miranda. Let's go with Melody here. 

You're on the floor.
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MS. MORRELL: Thanks. My name is 

Melody Morrell and I am the Executive Director of 

the Cornucopia Institute. Thank you, NOSB 

members, for your important efforts. Cornucopia 

is steered by numerous organic farmers, all of whom 

take careful pains to feed the soil biota, which 

feeds the plants via an array of complex and 

independent relationships. Authentic organic 

green farmers may choreograph more than a dozen 

crops in a rotation, interrupting pest and disease 

cycles, helping prepare nutrients for each 

succeeding crop right there in the soil. Building 

humus and life below the surface and holding water 

rather than allowing it to run off.

But Cornucopia also hears reports of 

grain farmers attracted to organic production for 

the higher-price-point, short-circuiting their 

organic rotations to include only two or three 

crops. Without thoughtful crop rotation, 

off-farm inputs become crucial from fertilizer to 

pest control. The availability of ammonia 

extracts discourages continued improvement in soil 
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biological activity, biodiversity and farm 

management practices. Conferring nitrogen 

directly to the plant roots is the quick fix. 

Ammonia extracts and other highly soluble nitrogen 

fertilizers are not compatible with organic 

agriculture. Cornucopia supports the petition to 

add non-synthetic ammonia extracts to 205.602.

Cornucopia is equally interested in 

protecting the microbiome inside the body. We 

have been in touch with hundreds of individuals 

who have suffered colitis and incapacitating gut 

pain from ingesting carrageenan. With this 

handling material up for sunset review in 2023, 

industry continues to insist that this ingredient 

is safe. Can we trust this assertion when it's 

rooted in the same studies that these companies 

fund? Independent research, including several 

studies published after the 2016 TR, suggests 

carrageenan is harmful to human health.

We request that the board watches for 

potential conflicts of interest in studies 

published by industry. Despite its reputation as 
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a safe and natural product of seaweed, commercially 

available carrageenan is extracted via volatile 

synthetic solvents. The NOSB would've 

reclassified carrageenan as a synthetic substance 

in 2016 had they not recommended its removal from 

the National List. But despite the NOSB 

recommendation, the NOP reenlisted carrageenan in 

2018. Industry claims it is necessary.

Meanwhile, more than a dozen companies 

including Organic Valley, Orgain, Horizon, Silk, 

and Eden Foods, have reformulated their products 

in order to remove carrageenan. Some have 

suggested that carrageenan is easily avoided by 

reading the label ingredients statement. 

Consumers contacting Cornucopia disagree. 

Unfortunately, when used as a processing aid, as 

in beer, or when used in cream, that is itself an 

ingredient in another product such as ice cream, 

carrageenan will not be listed on the label. 

Cornucopia requests the NOSB removed carrageenan 

from the National List. Chemical fixes are 

endemic to the food system, but they have no 
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business in organic. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Gold star for you as well, 

Melody, on timing. Are there questions from the 

board? I am not seeing any, so thank you so much 

for your time and presentation. We appreciate it. 

We have Kelly Taveras, then Joanna Miranda, and 

then Gwendolyn Wyard. Go ahead, Kelly.

MS. TAVARES: Thank you. Good

afternoon. My name is Kelly Taveras, and I serve 

as the digital specialist for the Organic Trade 

Association. On behalf of OTA, I'd like to welcome 

the new board members and thank you for beginning 

a five-year journey of critical and greatly 

appreciated service to the organic sector. My 

colleagues will speak on specific agenda topics 

and you have our detailed written comments. So 

my remarks will focus on OTA's membership, our NOSB 

comment process, and the work that we continue to 

do as it relates to sunset material review.

To begin, I'd like to thank NOSB and 

the National Organic Program for continuing to 

offer virtual opportunities for not only public 
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comment but for the NOSB meeting itself. This is 

a great service and opportunity for the entire 

organic sector, and ultimately it's increased 

accessibility to the NOSB public process. We 

certainly have a strong preference for in-person 

meetings and hope to see everyone in Sacramento 

in the fall. But it's great to know that we also 

have this virtual option if we need it.

A bit about the Organic Trade 

Association to start. So one of our biggest, one 

of our strongest assets are the diversity and 

breadth of our membership. Unlike many trade 

associations, we're uniquely structured to include 

the full value chain for the organic industry, 

ensuring that all segments from farm to marketplace 

have a strong voice within our organization. OTA 

brings farmers and growers, ingredient suppliers, 

processors, manufacturers, distributors, 

certifiers, retailers and others together so that 

we can promote and protect the growing organic 

sector.

We represent over 9500 businesses in 
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all 50 states. Half of our members are small 

businesses reporting less than 1,000,000 in 

organic sales per year. Our members are 

represented either through direct membership or 

through strategic partnerships with the regional 

organic farmer organizations across the US through 

our Farmers Advisory Council, which we call FAC. 

Smaller or organic farmers who have current 

membership of the participating organizations 

belonging to FAC are able to obtain full OTA 

membership with all the associated benefits for 

a minimal fee through our farmstead membership 

category.

The comments that we submitted are on 

behalf of our membership. In order to do this, 

our regulatory staff, who you'll hear from soon, 

carries out an extensive process of membership 

engagement so that we can understand how NOSB 

recommendations will impact certified farmers and 

handlers on a day-to-day basis. All members are 

provided with an opportunity to weigh in and inform 

all of our final comments. They'll help 
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facilitate a thorough comment and review process 

for sunset materials.

OTA created an electronic survey for 

each individual input under review. The surveys 

are confidential, user-friendly, and they're 

available to every NOP certificate holder. They 

include about ten questions addressing the 

necessity or essentially of the National List input 

that's under review. You have our written 

comments which include all the survey responses 

we received to date. We were able to collect a 

total of 57 unique responses from organic 

businesses across the US and we will continue to 

collect responses to inform the vote that will take 

place in June. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Perfect. My bag of gold 

stars is getting low today. This is impressive. 

Other questions for Kelly? Thank you so much, 

Kelly. I'm not seeing any. Appreciate your 

comments. We are going to move next to Joanna 

Miranda, then Gwendolyn Wyard, and then Zen 

Honeycut. So, Joanna.
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MS. MIRANDA: Okay. Hi everyone. 

I'm Joanna Miranda, the Farm Policy Director for 

the Organic Trade Association. Today I'll be 

commenting on three topics from the crops 

subcommittee. On paper, we support the continued 

allowance of paper-based crop planting aids. Our 

written comments identify a few minor technical 

clarifications still needed and the proposed 

regulatory language, but we see these as 

non-substantive. Therefore support the Board in 

passing this proposal at this meeting.

On biodegradable mulch, it's unclear 

whether or when the regulatory solution presented 

at this meeting will achieve the intended goal of 

allowing biodegradable alternatives to plastic 

mulch. We'd like to better understand the 

viability of the proposal to bring practical 

solutions to farmers. And we support continued 

research and regulatory efforts to create 

opportunities for organic farmers to reduce the 

reliance on plastic mulch.

On ammonia extract, OTA submitted our 
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first set of comments on ammonia extract at this 

meeting. Our comments reflect our initial 

outreach and information collection efforts with 

the goal of ensuring that the NOSB has a thorough 

understanding of the technical detail and scope 

of substances implicated by the petition and a 

solid grounding in the legal evaluation framework 

to effectively carry out a sound decision-making 

process. On this topic, there's clearly a range 

of manufacturing processes and products that are 

identified across the petition and the technical 

report and in the public comments.

NOSB needs a firm grasp on which 

products are synthetic and already prohibited, 

which products are not synthetic and subject to 

evaluation under the scope of the petition, and 

which technical components of these different 

types of ammonia extracts are contributing to how 

you will review the accessibility of those products 

under the author criteria for the National List.

Part of that criteria is evaluating 

whether this substance is consistent with organic 
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and its compatibility with a system of sustainable 

agriculture. This can be subjective. So we 

encourage the board to be transparent and 

communicative in your deliberation and rely on the 

existing guideposts in your policy and procedures 

manual. Our comment development process revealed 

several concerns about the compatibility of the 

petition substance with organic.

And in our comments, we've tied these 

concerns to specific references in the policy and 

procedures manual and two historical precedent of 

past NOSB decisions. Having a robust deliberation 

on this topic means addressing these concerns 

head-on, so we flagged them in our comments for 

your attention so you can take them into account 

during your evaluation. Thank you for considering 

our comments and for your continued dedication to 

these issues.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Joanna. Another 

gold star. Are there questions from the board? 

Joanna, I'll just ask, you know, obviously touched 

for a moment on extracts, wide range synthetic, 
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versus non-synthetic, versus criteria with OFPA. 

You said you flagged points and policies and 

procedures and such for us to rely on. Is there 

anything that jumps out at you that -- I mean, 

obviously, you've got your written comments -- but 

in terms of those policies, I don't often hear you 

reference those particularly; So it kind of raises 

my antennae on this topic. What jumps out at you 

that we need to follow up?

MS. MIRANDA: So in terms of the policy 

and procedures manual, I'm referring to the 

appendix that references NOSB recommendations from 

2001 and 2004 on the compatibility of organics 

with, sorry, the compatibility of substances with 

organic principles and consistency with organic 

farming. So these are your predecessors who have 

tried to give you insight on questions to ask 

yourselves as you're evaluating the compatibility. 

This is one of the most objective criteria in OFPA 

but it's really important.

So as you bring your experiences and 

expertise to this deliberation, use these 
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foundational guideposts to help in your 

determination and it will ultimately lead to a 

stronger deliberation process, because 

stakeholders can see how you've taken a subjective 

question but applied a rigorous evaluation 

framework.

MR. ELA: Great. Amy has another 

question, please. Amy, you have the floor.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you so much for your 

written comments as well as your current oral ones. 

I had a question. You kind of indicated in the 

comments about being consistent with international 

organic regulations and guidelines, and you 

referenced, you know, sodium nitrate and some of 

the challenges externally when those products --

we canceled anything that had sodium nitrate 

applied to Canada, for example: Do you have any 

concerns about some of these ammonia extract 

products and just exports that we might have as 

farmers?

MS. MIRANDA: At this point, the 

concerns are speculative. I'm drawing 
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comparisons between shared characteristics that 

sodium nitrate, which has proven to be a trade 

barrier, shares with ammonia extract in terms of 

being highly soluble. So as you proceed into your 

deliberation, you know, think about that past 

precedent and balance it in accordance with your 

other evaluation criteria. But at this point, 

it's simply speculative and certainly significant 

point for considering whether the substances 

compatible with organic and consistent, because 

your policy and procedures manual asks for you to 

consider whether the substance would be consistent 

with international organic standards.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Joanna.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Joanna, we 

appreciate your comments and thoughts on that. 

We are going to move on to Gwendolyn Wyard, followed 

by Zen Honeycut, and Evan Axelbaum. And I'll just 

make a note: we're running about 20 minutes behind. 

So I expect will go a little bit longer than five 

o'clock and then we'll make a decision on the 

waitlist depending on where we end up. So go 
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ahead, Gwen.

MS. WYARD: All right. Can you hear 

me?

MR. ELA: We can.

MS. WYARD: Okay. Excellent. Well, 

good afternoon, and Happy Earth Day. I'm 

Gwendolyn Wyard, the Vice President of Regulatory 

for the Organic Produce Association and I'll be 

highlighting off-line messages from -- for the 

topics that we submitted written comments on 

starting with excluded methods terminology.

Given the complexity of the topic and 

the turnover of NOSB members, we appreciate your 

thoughtful approach to re-establishing the topic. 

We support the recommendations that have passed 

to date and we maintain that the technologies 

listed as excluded methods and the terminology 

chart are consistent with our existing regulatory 

definition that we need to stay tethered to and 

therefore prohibited.

We also remain supportive of moving 

recommendations for to NOP that will not only keep 
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GMOs out of organic seed, feed, and crops, but also 

clarify the standards and definitions used for 

making clear and consistent compliance 

determinations. With this in mind, our written 

comments highlight the substantial number of NOSB 

recommendations for practice standards and 

guidance that USDA has not acted upon, this being 

one of them and the need to prioritize rulemaking 

to clarify and update the organic standards.

We also call into question whether the 

continuous work on the terminology chart is helping 

or hindering NOP adoption. We certainly 

understand that evaluating new and emerging 

technologies will be ongoing, but for the Fall 2021 

meeting, it may be time to put a period at the end 

of the sentence and tie a bow around the 2016 and 

subsequent recommendations and deliver a package, 

so to speak, to USDA with a call for action.

Next on the petition to add Zein 606 

as an agricultural ingredient. Were not taken a 

position on whether or not it should be added to 

the National List, but I will say that we haven't 
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heard from any OTA members that are asking for or 

need of it, and in our written Comments, we 

responded to the NOSB questions and we explore 

several evaluation considerations about the 

agricultural or non-agricultural status of Zein 

and the implications of adding or not adding it 

to either 605 or 606 of the National List. It's 

an educational and hopefully helpful read and I 

highly encourage each NOSB member to spend some 

time with it if you haven't already.

Finally, in exchange, we support the 

continued allowance of ion exchange filtration as 

an organic processing method. And we maintain our 

position that the recharge materials must be on 

the National List and consistent with the 2002 NOP 

policy on food contacts, substances, the use of 

ion exchange, including the recharge materials and 

the resins, must be documented and approved in the 

certified operators organic systems plan.

With respect to the resins, we can 

appreciate the subcommittee's quandary around the 

interactions of offload, the FDA regulations and 
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the food contact policy. This is always been the 

crux of the issue. And as we pointed out in our 

comments on Supporting the Work of NOSB ion 

exchange is a perfect example of where regulatory 

and legal support from USDA is appropriate and 

needed to inform workable recommendation. Above 

all, we support a sound and fair process of 

transparency, and time of action to ensure 

consistent certification decisions. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Gwen. Your 

colleagues were a little more exact on time. But 

you still are right on the money.

MS. WYARD: I still have a few seconds 

you left up.

MR. ELA: Questions for Gwen. I'm not 

seeing any, Gwen, so thank you so much for your 

comments. All right. We are going to move on to 

Zen Honeycut, followed by Evan Axelbaum, and then 

Veronica Borne.

MS. MILLER: Wait, did you miss Kyla?

MR. ELA: Please, go ahead, Zen.

MS. ARSENAULT: Wait.
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MR. ELA: Did I miss Kyla?

MS. ARSENAULT: Yeah.

MR. ELA: Oh, I'm sorry everyone.

MS. SMITH: It was just a thank you for 

the correct pronunciation of zein because we've 

been struggling with that for months. So anyway, 

thank you, Gwendolyn.

MS. WYARD: Absolutely. Zea as in the 

corn. Zea. Zein.

MR. ELA: Perfect. Thanks, Kyla, for 

catching me. I'm sorry I missed it. So, Zen, 

please take it away.

MS. HONEYCUT: Great. Thank you, 

everybody. Hi, my name is Zen Honeycut and I'm 

the Director of Moms Across America, a nationwide 

network of unstoppable moms.

And rather than repeating many of the 

things you've already heard, I'd like it noted that 

we agree with all of the statements made by Beyond 

Pesticides on Tuesday. In addition, we suspect 

a connection between the heavy metals in baby food 

and glyphosate acting as a key leader in irrigation 
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water or manure, drawing heavy metals from pipes, 

pesticides and industrial pollution and 

transferring it into food. So we ask that the 

organic industry increases testing for glyphosate 

and heavy metals to identify the source and remedy 

this serious problem.

We also ask that fracking water and CAFO 

manure be banned from organic production, for any 

fish oils used to be tested for heavy metals and 

contamination before use, and for the Organic 

Standards to phase in regenerative practices to 

maintain the integrity of the soil.

I also want to share with you some

experiences from our moms, a single mom in Rhode 

Island told me that her teen was severely autistic. 

She switched to all organic food in the spring 

and when he entered high school in the fall, not 

one of his teachers could tell that he was ever 

autistic. Another mom from California told us 

that her child had numerous health issues, with 

the risk of being held back in school. When he 

went all organic, his eyesight, asthma, and rashes 
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cleared up within weeks, and his grades are now 

at the top of his class.

A father told me that when his mother 

treated his son to ice cream with red food dyes 

from the ice cream truck, every time he would be 

punching holes in the wall. They went organic and 

his violent behavior stopped.

A Hispanic mom from an under-served 

area told me that her son had mental health issues 

and threatened to blow up the school when he was 

nine. The school psychiatrist asked her if she 

knew about toxins in conventional food. She 

didn't, but she went all organic. And within two 

weeks, his teacher said that he was a new person. 

Recently he turned 16 and she said that she knows 

he would have been one of those kids that bought 

a gun and killed his classmates and teachers. But 

he won't, because he's mentally healthy now.

He has a new future. His classmates 

have a new future because he eats organic and avoids 

synthetic chemicals. They get to live and they 

will go on to invent new things, run for office, 
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create community and relationships that will 

change the world.

So essentially we all have new futures 

because of what you do. So no matter what is before 

you, I ask you to keep these children in mind and 

exercise the precautionary principle. Vote 

according to what is best for the health of the 

child and the future of our country not what is 

best for the convenience of the farmer or the profit 

of the food company.

Please have faith in our farmers. They 

are ingenious. Farmers have farmed and people 

have eaten food without synthetic chemicals for 

thousands of years. They do not need them. Every 

parent in America struggling with a child with 

behavioral and learning issues needs you to make 

decisions on their behalf. Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: Thank you. I appreciate 

your comments. Are there questions for Zen? I'm 

not seeing any. I have not seen any. Thank you 

so much for your comments.

MS. HONEYCUT: Thank you for your time.
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MR. ELA: And I apologize that your 

name and the word Zein were coming up at the same 

time.

MR. ELA: It's okay. Thank you very 

much.

MS. HONEYCUT: Thanks for what you do. 

I appreciate it so much.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on next 

to Evan Axelbaum, then Veronica Borne, and then 

Jessica Knutzon. So, Evan, please go ahead.

MR. AXELBAUM: Thank you. Hello, 

board members and guests. I'm glad to have the 

opportunity to address you today. I own and manage 

the Certified Organic Festival operation, Front 

Axle Farm, located in central Ohio. We sell to 

grocery stores, restaurants, and through our CSA. 

In addition, I'm a member of the Ohio Ecological 

Food and Farm Association.

Today I have concerns about the 

direction of the organic food movement. I believe 

that the consumer is more confused than ever about 

what they are buying and eating and what practices 
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they're supporting.

Organic products line the shelves of 

their grocery stores and supermarkets, yet almost 

no one knows what any of it means. In addition, 

I see more and more small producers forgoing 

certification, in part due to the perception that 

the organic label means less and less. I'm 

concerned about the board's failure to follow a 

formal process regarding container production.

We, as a community of stakeholders, 

must work together to establish what the guidelines 

are and which practices fall inside and outside 

of those lines. In this vein, I urge you to ensure 

that the NOSB has control of its work agenda. Put 

the question of the permit stability of container 

production systems and various kinds back on the 

NOSB's agenda so that confusion on this topic can 

be addressed and clarity reestablished. Thank you 

for your time.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Evan. 

Other questions for Evan? I'm not seeing any, but 

thank you for taking the time to present to us, 
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Evan. We very much greatly appreciate that.

We're going to move on to Veronica Borne 

and then Jessica Knutzon. And then I'll just 

quickly go back through-- just looking here, if 

Peter Johnson, Jodi Rodar, or Linda Lake are on 

phone, could you please let us know we skipped over 

you earlier? If they're not, we are going to go 

down to our waitlist.

We know we're going to go overtime, so, 

but the board seems to be okay with going 30 to 

45 minutes overtime. Which is a lot, but we're 

going to try and get to as many people on our 

waitlist as we can. It's a lot for the board, but 

I think we appreciate all the stakeholders' 

comments so much that they're willing to take that 

extra time. So, Veronica, go ahead.

MS. BORNE: Hello. I'm Veronica 

Borne, Manager of Technical Service at America's 

distribution at CP Kelco. And I'm here today to 

review on why carrageenan is essential to the 

organic industry and I appreciate all of your time. 

As you can see from my image on the slide, 
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carrageenan is a naturally occurring hydrocolloid 

that is extracted from red seaweed. It's valuable 

for its gelling, thickening, and stabilizing 

properties. Next slide, please.

There are references of carrageenan 

being used in food that date back as far as 600 

BC. It was traditionally used to prepare jellies 

and milk puddings. At the turn of the century and 

the twenties, it was optimized for use in ice cream 

and chocolate milk. And then 20 years from there, 

got used in condensed milk, gelled water desserts 

were added. By the 1950s, applications included 

some air fresheners, toothpaste, instant puddings, 

and then by the seventies, you know, pet food really 

relied heavily on this ingredient and so did 

refrigerated ready-to-consume dairy desserts.

The last major breakthrough that we had 

was in the eighties with processed meat and poultry 

products. And then today all of these 

applications still rely heavily on carrageenan. 

My point being, carrageenan is widely used in the 

food industry. It offers organic formulators an 
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abundance of options in systems that would be very 

limited or deprived of any. And that's due to its 

unique properties that are not available from 

alternative ingredients. Next slide.

Because carrageenan is a large molecule 

of thousands of galactose units, it allows for 

countless possibilities, instructional 

variations, and the ability to work 

synergistically with many other gums. It works 

across a wide range of applications, providing 

texture viscosity or mouthfeel, and it has the 

ability to be cold soluble. This is very, very 

unique in the food industry.

Lambda iota and kappa carrageenan have 

different attributes and uses. From left to right 

on this image you can see the left one being for 

viscosity, the middle one being a soft elastic gel, 

and the right one being a firm brittle gel. These 

can be combined in different amounts for different 

textures and just gives you a wide variety of 

product. De-listing this ingredient would have 

detrimental effects to products that rely on 
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stability and texture because of the uniqueness 

of carrageenan. Next slide, please.

Carrageenan has the ability to form 

gels in the presence of cations. This allows us 

unique functionality, particularly in meat and 

plant-based applications. So a formulator can 

achieve many different textures by controlling 

these ions. And this is detrimental to 

protein-based products. And this attribute is 

becoming very quickly invaluable to the 

plant-based meat market. Another attribute is 

this tri-dimensional network that entraps the 

casein micelles, fat globules, and minerals, and 

it makes it an ideal hydrocolloid for natural PH 

pro-dairy protein drinks. This also supports 

stability and mouthfeel in alternative dairy 

products.

So my point here being as carrageenan 

is very detrimental to the organic industry and 

we would very much so like for it to remain listed. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Veronica. 
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Are there questions? Amy has a question for you.

MS. BRUCH: I -- Veronica. Sorry, 

Just a quick one. Yesterday we touched a little 

bit on Irish moss. Could you elaborate on your 

comments and how maybe that's related or not 

related to the composition of carrageenan that you 

just discussed?

MS. BORNE: So Irish moss is one of the 

different products that carrageenan is actually 

extracted from. It's just one of the seaweeds that 

it's made from.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Could it be used as 

a substitute instead directly or not necessarily?

MS. BORNE: I'm not too sure about that 

and I can definitely ask some of our carrageenan 

experts. Are you meaning can you just use Irish 

moss instead of extracting the carrageenan from 

it?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MS. BORNE: I would think initially --

just thinking about this -- you would have a really 

strong seaweed taste that would be very alarming 
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to your products, and it probably wouldn't be a 

good substitution. But like I said, I can go and 

inquire further if that's something of interest 

to the board.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Yeah. Sure. That 

would be great, Veronica. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Brian has a question.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks, Veronica. I 

think in the written comments there was a mentioned 

that of the three different types of carrageenan 

that some might be more might cause more human 

health problems than others. And could you 

address that?

MS. BORNE: I actually cannot address 

that. I have no knowledge of that information. 

And if that's something you want further comments 

on from CP Kelco, I certainly can try to get that.

MR. CALDWELL: Well, that'd be great 

if there could be some clarification on that.

MS. BORNE: Sure. I'll get that taken 

care of.

MR. ELA: Yes. If you get that, just 
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send it on to Michelle and she can send it up to 

the rest of us. Any other questions? All right. 

Thank you so much, Veronica. We appreciate your 

comments to us. We're going to move on to Jessica 

Knutzon and then on the waitlist. Let me shuffle 

through my waitlist here. We'll have Jennifer 

Taylor and then Sandy Mays coming up. So, Jessica, 

please go ahead.

MS. KNUTZON: Thank you. Hi. I'm 

Jessica Knutzon from CP Kelco. Thank you-all for 

your time and attention today, As my colleague, 

Veronica, kicked off, we are submitting comments 

for the carrageenan sunset review. Next slide, 

please.

Companies that produce carrageenan 

have created seaweed farming around the world like 

CP Kelco has in Zanzibar. Since 1990, CP Kelco 

has been working with communities in Zanzibar to 

create seaweed beds in the ocean, where seaweed 

is harvested to produce carrageenan. This 

collaboration includes educating locals in how to 

create, cultivate, and harvest seaweed beds.
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This has provided women in Zanzibar who 

previously had limited or no opportunity for 

employment, the ability to enter the workforce. 

Additionally, there are peripheral benefits, to 

these opportunities such as improving school 

conditions in these communities. Today, 

approximately 12,000 people in Zanzibar, 70 

percent of whom are women, are seaweed farmers. 

The anti-carrageenan movement based around 

consumer sentiment and not on facts has 

tremendously affected seaweed farmers around the 

world. Next slide, please.

In 2012, the NOSB was presented a study 

claiming carrageenan causes inflammation of the 

gut, or in the gut and is unsafe for use in human 

food. The study used a degraded form of 

carrageenan called poligeenan. Poligeenan cannot 

be replicated in any known manufacturing process 

and poligeenan is not allowed food additive. The 

study has been refuted and that presentation was 

brought to the NOSB in 2016, I believe. And at 

the time of the previous sunset review, both IFAC 
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and Marinalg in support of CP Kelco, issued 

statements refuting the bad science, encouraging 

consumers to read all the research.

Any negative press on carrageenan came 

from claims that were refuted and decisions made 

to formulate carrageenan out of consumer products, 

promoting anti-carrageenan claims and to delist 

from around consumer perception and not facts.

Removing carrageenan from many food 

applications means it will be replaced with 

multiple additives without a one-for-one 

replacement and no guarantee to have exact same 

functionality. Carrageenan affects the 

sustainable work throughout the supply chain, and 

is a key to moving forward with the plant-based 

food industry and its mission to create sustainable 

plant-based foods for consumers around the world. 

Carrageenan's properties, used in a variety of 

food applications, and its positive influence 

throughout the supply chain are some of the many 

reasons to be cautious of the claims to de-list 

carrageenan. Thank you.
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MR. ELA: Thank you so much. Are there 

questions? I am not seeing any, so thank you so 

much for your comments. We appreciate it.

MS. KNUTZON: Thank you for your time.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on now 

to the waitlist and I need to apologize to our sign 

language interpreters. We know we went long on 

Tuesday, which you didn't expect, and we're going 

long today. So we hope we don't wear you out. 

Thank you again for what you do. We're going to 

go onto Jennifer Taylor, followed by Sandy Mays, 

and then John Hendrickson. So, Jennifer, please 

go ahead.

MS. TAYLOR: Good afternoon. Thank 

you. I'm Jennifer Taylor, IFOAM, North America. 

And I'm here today as a past National Organic 

Standards Board member. And speaking today also 

in my role as Co-President of IFOAM North America. 

IFOAM North America is a regional body of the IFOAM 

Organics International. IFOAM has members and 

over 100 countries and territories. Our work 

builds capacity to facilitate the transition of 
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farmers to organic agriculture, and advocates for 

a policy environment conducive to agro Ecological 

Farm Practices, organic farming systems, and 

sustainable development while addressing the 

broader mission of Organic 3.0.

The goal of Organic 3.0 is to enable 

a widespread uptake of truly sustainable farming 

systems and markets based on organic principles 

that facilitate a culture of innovation, of 

progressive improvement towards best practices, 

diverse ways to ensure transparent integrity of 

holistic systems, inclusive collaborations, and 

of true value pricings.

A number of North American 

organizations are working towards similar goals, 

and is helpful as it is, the National Organic 

Program only touches on a few of these indicators 

or principles in scope in its work. Change slides, 

please.

We in North America are experiencing 

an opportunity to build back better. Now let us 

work together to promote: social justice, 
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inclusion, participatory community engagement, 

participatory capacity building. Let us work 

together to support black and indigenous farmers; 

and farmers of color and their communities; and 

under-served small farm populations and their 

communities, in their active and equal 

participation in building back better with 

inclusive networks of organic farming systems and 

organic agro-ecology, farm strategies, 

participatory education, participatory hands-on 

trainings, and technical assistance that supports 

resilient, healthy, organic food systems. Local, 

black, and indigenous community foodways access 

to land, access to viable alternative markets and 

safe working conditions.

Let us work together to proactively 

support organic farmers and under-served small 

farm populations and their communities; and the 

principles and benefits of organic agriculture, 

building healthy soils, healthy environments, 

healthy foods, and healthy communities. And 

enabling thriving, organic, livelihoods and 
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well-being for all. Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Jennifer. Are 

there questions? I am not seeing any, so Jennifer, 

thank you so much for your comments.

MS. TAYLOR: Thank you for what you are 

doing.

MR. ELA: We're going to go on to Sandy 

Mays, then John Hendrickson. John, we're not 

seeing you; if you were out there, please let 

Michelle know. And then Lee Frankel and Bryce 

Lundberg. So, Sandy, please go ahead.

MS. MAYS: Thank you. Good afternoon, 

everyone. I'm Sandy Mays, Partner and 

Certification Specialist, Wolf and Associates. 

For the past 14 or 15 years or longer, I've observed 

the inspection of farms and processing facilities 

by independent and certification staff inspectors. 

I'm sure you're aware there's a vast difference 

in the quality of inspectors from inadequate to 

highly trained and professional. Believe me, if 

you could be a fly on the wall and experience some 

of the inspections that I've attended, it would 
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make you wonder.

Those that have had a history in 

professional training and other types of 

inspections like SQF know how to conduct themselves 

and they can explain the process and reason for 

the inspection. They're prepared for the type of 

operation to be inspected, treat the operators with 

respect and empathy, and have the ability to answer 

questions that are within the scope under the NOP 

rule. It's past the time for a unified strategy 

and a plan to address this critical issue. The 

assurance that the organic seal and the organic 

certificate provide to purchasers of organic 

products anywhere in the supply chain, depends on 

the quality and integrity of the inspection and 

is dependent on qualified, trained, and 

professional inspectors that are adequately 

compensated.

Certification agencies are considering 

or have already hired staff inspectors, and this 

may address both the training and the compensation 

obstacles to achieving a pool of professional 
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inspectors; however, this approach will not be 

unified, consistent, or impartial.

Staff inspectors may be a competitive 

advantage for some certifiers, but maybe not 

clearly for others and will more than likely 

increase certification fees. Certification costs 

are already out of reach for many operations and 

can't continually be passed on through higher 

prices for organic certification of organic 

ingredients and products.

In addition, as we all know, certifiers 

do interpret the NOP rules and these 

interpretations will be passed onto their 

inspectors, continuing the confusion and 

inconsistency that exist today for organic 

operations.

Although it was intended to create a 

level playing field for farmers and processors 

which cannot be accomplished using this approach, 

there are trade or private organizations that train 

and credential technical specialists such as 

inspectors and certification reviewers.
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There are ANSI, ISO, IEC 17024 

standards for personnel of certification bodies, 

so we don't need to reinvent the wheel; but we do 

need to work with those who have the expertise to 

develop what's appropriate for organic inspectors 

and certification reviewers. We would suggest 

exploring the establishment of professional 

standards and training within the NOP or within 

cooperation with other USDA Agency. We're aware 

that this would be disruptive to the existing 

system; however, we do believe that the disruption 

would be for the better. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Sandy. Are there 

any questions? Kyla has a question.

MS. SMITH: Hi, Sandy, thanks for the 

comment.

MS. MAYS: Yes.

MS. SMITH: I just wanted to clarify 

that last point that you made. In regards to the 

standards for inspectors to follow, are you -- were 

you suggesting that those be overseen by the NOP?

MS. MAYS: Absolutely.
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MS. SMITH: Okay. Thanks for the 

clarification.

MR. ELA: Any other questions? Thank 

you so much, Sandy.

MS. MAYS: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We appreciate your thoughts 

and comments.

MS. MAYS: Yes, thank you.

MR. ELA: Were going to move on down. 

Michelle, you didn't see John Hendrickson, did 

you?

MS. ARSENAULT: No, I don't.

MR. ELA: Okay. We're going to move 

on to Lee Frankel, then Bryce Lundberg, and then 

Bill Wolf. Lee, please go ahead.

MR. FRANKEL: Okay. Thanks. Good 

afternoon. Thank you for your contributions to 

the organic community by serving on the NOSB. My 

name is Lee Frankel and I'm speaking today as the 

Executive Director for the Coalition for 

Sustainable Organics.

We believe that everyone deserves 
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Organics. We support the USDA policy recently 

affirmed by the US Federal Court to continue to 

certify container production systems, including 

hydroponic and aquaponic systems. The Court in its 

written opinions state that quote: USDA's ongoing 

certification of hydroponic systems, that comply 

with all eligible, all applicable regulations, is 

firmly planted, in the OFPA, unquote. In 

addition, the ruling also confirmed that USDA was 

fully within its rights to reject the petition to 

demand the Certification of Organic Operations 

that use containers incorrectly following 

procedures in its handling of the petition.

We continue to support the USDA 

definition of organic production and states the 

following: Organic production. Production system 

is managed in accordance with the Act and 

regulations and it's part to respond to 

site-specific conditions by integrating cultural, 

biological, and mechanical practices that fosters 

cycling of resources, promote ecological balance, 

and conserve biodiversity.
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We believe that the organic program 

should remain open and inclusive of a variety of 

approaches for growers to respond to their 

site-specific conditions. If there are ways to 

conserve habitat by increasing productivity, 

preserve scarce water supplies by reducing water 

use, and eliminating organic pesticides by using 

containers, we should embrace those efforts.

Growers should be pursuing continuous 

improvement in their operations to minimize the 

use of natural resources and keep organics 

affordable for consumers. I'm happy to help 

coordinate visits with growers in your area that 

do incorporate containers for protection, 

hydroponic production tools. So you can see 

firsthand what it is and what is not happening in 

those farms and operations.

Now is the time for the industry to move 

forward instead of re-litigating the legitimacy 

of containers over and over again. Industry needs 

to come together rather than continuing to 

disparage fellow organic growers. I look forward 
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to supporting the NOSB to provide information you 

need to make informed decisions and 

recommendations in the future. Feel free to reach 

out to me with any of your questions and concerns. 

Thanks.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Lee. There's a 

question from Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks, Lee, and I've 

asked this a couple of times before, but the Organic 

community has really promoted its value in terms 

of increasing biodiversity and improving soil 

health and in sequestering carbon in the soil. 

How do container and hydroponic operations achieve 

that? Or would they help with that?

MR. FRANKEL: Yes. You know, each 

operation is unique and a little bit different in 

response to its site-specific conditions, but the 

first and general one is that wetlands and 

grasslands that, you know, are not producing crops 

and that, you know, we can leave untouched, capture 

and absorb even more carbon and even the best 

organic production crop yields.
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The second portion is that, you know, 

many of these systems including the ones that use 

the larger paths that substrate is composted and 

recycled oftentimes into kind of outer crust of 

the earth production systems right there on that 

same farm site. And then in general, kind of with 

all organic systems, including those using 

containers that, you know, it's taking the carbon 

from that previous cycle of fluid production on 

the form of fish meal, compost or kind of other 

kind of clippings and crop waste and that's 

composted down or kind of a made into organic teas 

that's then applied to the new food crop. So those 

cycling of the resources prevents, kind of those 

sources of carbon, nitrogen from just wasting back 

into the atmosphere.

MR. CALDWELL: Just a quick follow-up 

here. And do you know if there are any, like, 

life-cycle analyses that look at the energy inputs 

and the environmental costs of producing a lot of 

plastic and stuff and using in these systems?

MR. FRANKEL: I guess I once -- I have 
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not seen it for an Organic -- a certified greenhouse 

production system. I have seen it for some other 

ones. So we're a little bit more theoretical, you 

know, in terms of plastic use that -- Again, I think 

it's fairly standard practice across all the 

creditors that plastics are kind of recyclable and 

recycled. And, you know, use multiple patterns 

and then kind of recycle at the end of the 

life-cycle.

The biggest one may be in terms of kind 

of energy use where there's, you know, some 

producers, you know, maybe culling their 

greenhouses or their facilities, but that's also 

kind of balanced with oftentimes these production 

facilities can be located much closer to the 

markets and reduce kind of the carbon footprint 

of transportation leg of getting product to 

consumers. But I guess the short answer is I 

haven't seen a good study, a organic hydroponic 

operation just yet.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks very much, Lee.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Lee, we appreciate 
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your thoughts and comments.

MR. FRANKEL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move onto 

Bryce Lundberg and then Bill Wolf and then DD --

DeEtta Bilek, excuse me. And we'll see where we 

get with. We're thinking we're going to go to no 

longer than 45 minutes after the hour. So I will 

see how far down the list we get. Bryce, please

go ahead.

MR. LUNDBURG: Hi, Steve. Is my mic 

working all right?

MR. ELA: It is working fine. Go 

ahead.

MR. LUNDBERG: Thank you so much. My 

name is Bryce Lundberg with Lundberg Family Farms, 

a multi-generation farm in Northern California. 

Our family started growing organic rice in 1969. 

We've worked hard to improve organic rice farming 

practices.

We seek alternatives to copper sulfate, 

but at this time, we still need it. Copper sulfate 

use is consistent with organic standards in the 
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US and internationally. When our farm was 

Certified Organic by OMIC in Japan, OMIC allowed 

the use of Bordeaux mix our rice fields. The EU 

and other countries allow copper sulfate as 

Bordeaux mix and do not prohibit it for rice. With 

this in mind, we request renewal of copper sulfate 

to control algae and invertebrate pests. We 

prefer not to use copper, using it only as needed 

to save the newly planted rice crop.

If newly seeded rice needs protection 

from algae or shrimp, copper sulfate is essential 

input. Our experience leaves us to believe copper 

sulfate is safe. I have never seen an impact to 

birds, fish, frogs, or snakes. If required, it 

is applied in small amounts and is only active for 

a short period of time. We've tried drill seeding 

and transplanting. Neither system worked as an 

alternative to planting rice in water. When we 

drill seeded, weed pressure was insurmountable. 

We spent years trying to control the weeds, but 

the remaining weeds intermingled with the rice were 

so thick, the rice could not compete. We tried 
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mechanized transplanting. The rice plants did not 

establish before weeds overtook the rice.

Most rice-growing regions that 

transplant do so in shallow water and rely on hand 

weeding or herbicides. Weeds are our biggest 

challenge. We manage grass weeds by drowning 

grass during the first three weeks. Rice can 

survive underwater for about 40 hours longer than 

grass.

If rice seed develops chlorophyll 

before shrimp hatch, the rice is safe. However, 

shrimp appear before seedling turns green, the crop 

can be destroyed. Algae does not form in windy 

or cool weather. If algae grows across the top 

of the water, young rice plants cannot push 

through, causing the rice to die.

When copper is used properly, algae and 

shrimp can be controlled without adverse 

environmental impact. Copper sulfate is allowed 

in organic around the world. The EU and other 

countries listed has allowed as a Bordeaux mix, 

and do not prohibit it for rice. The NOP allows
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copper use in row crops and orchard for disease. 

Every organic farm and region face different 

conditions and need tools that enabled them to 

carefully respond to challenges. Therefore, we 

request the NOSB approve copper sulfate as an 

algicide and to control invertebrate pests. Have 

a great day.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Bryce. Well done on 

the time. Are there questions? Bryce, I just 

want to ask: I mean, part, you know, in looking 

at the topic, you know, we didn't see that there 

were alternatives. You've pretty well addressed 

that in your comments. So basically sounds like 

you just really can't get away from copper sulfate, 

well, you know, in certain situations.

MR. LUNDBERG: Yeah. I think in 

certain situations, you're exactly right, Steve. 

We continue to work on this issue. Maybe many 

of you know my dad and uncles. They worked at drill 

seeding rice for decades, believing that they 

needed to have alternative methods, that water 

seeding would not be the only method.
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And I think nature would indicate that 

having multiple methods to work with weeds and 

pesticides are very important tool. But so far, 

drill seeding hasn't been the result or the hope 

that we've looked for. The areas that were working 

in, I think are quicking -- flooding quicker. 

Right? The quicker you can flood, the quicker you 

can get the rice seed on, the less time there is 

for shrimp and algae to develop. And I think those 

things are really important.

We have worked at subsurface irrigation 

in rice. It's expensive and I think it is, has 

potential of irrigating rice from below, but so 

far the experiments we've done with subsurface 

irrigation haven't been successful either. But 

it doesn't mean we are going to stop working or 

trying.

MR. ELA: Great. So appreciate it. 

Thank you for making the comments on this topic. 

It's one we haven't heard a lot about and you 

currently have lots of experience.

MR. LUNDBERG: Thank you so much.
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MR. ELA: We're going to move on to Bill 

Wolf, DeEtta Bilek, and then Angela Schriver. And 

I am guessing Angela might be our last speaker. 

We'll see where we come out here. So, Wolf, 

you're on.

MR. WOLF: Hey, I'm trying to turn my 

screen on. I mean, my, there it is. Oops. Here 

we go. Okay. So, I'm Bill Wolf from Wolf and 

Associate, and Second Star Farm. I work with many 

Organic Growers and companies, but I'm speaking 

for myself today. My clients are listed on our 

website at organicspecialists.com.

This is my 50th year working on 

improving organic farming methods. I was a 

presenter at the first NOSB meeting nearly two 

years ago, nearly two decades ago. And have been 

bringing earthworms to many meetings since then 

as mascots of our organic agriculture.

It's really quite amazing to see 

organic coming of age. I hope that you'll consider 

our written comments on various subjects. I'd 

like to discuss two of those today. One, the 
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importance of you, the NOSB, receiving more 

support; and my perspective on the purpose of the 

National List.

First, I want to thank you for your time 

as volunteers serving our community. You face 

more complex and more diverse issues than almost 

any advisory board. I really salute you and 

encourage the USDA to provide more support.

PARAGRAPHS: In prior comments for 

over five years, we've advocated for professional 

support for the National Organic Standards Board. 

Two important areas where professional 

specialists would expedite your work are, one, 

organizing, collating, and reporting on the 

content of oral and written public comments; and, 

two, drafting the NOSB's proposed regulatory 

language and recommendations, so they are truly 

ready for implementation.

My second topic: about the National 

List and the sunset process. It was never the goal 

to whittle down these lists, but it's rather 

important to ensure that farmers have access to 
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a complete set of materials that meet the 

evaluation criteria. Sunset reviews should focus 

on new information about materials and not act as 

a popularity contest for what materials are en 

vogue now. Materials that are not being widely 

used now may be needed again in the future. And 

organic Farmers deserve a robust toolbox to do 

their jobs effectively.

Nor should the review process rely on 

public comment for technical information necessary 

for a sound decision. That information is better 

presented in a technical report, which could be 

facilitated by additional professional support for 

the board.

The National Organic Program is one of 

the most robust and transparent organic 

standards-setting systems in the world. So I 

strongly advocate that you carefully balance all 

the variables. And as I've said in the past, 

consider thinking like an earthworm. Thank you 

for this opportunity. I'm available for 

questions.
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MR. ELA: Thanks, Bill. You kind of 

went into slow motion there at the end, but yet 

your exact time. We'll still give you credit.

MR. WOLF: Actually, I must confess, 

Steve, I dropped a whole paragraph.

MR. ELA: Okay. Fair enough. Are 

there questions for Bill? Thank you so much, Bill. 

I'm not seeing any questions. We appreciate your 

comments.

MR. WOLF: I just want to say I've got 

my earthworms ready. They're talking. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Sounds great. We are going 

to move into DeEtta Bilek. Then Angela Schriver. 

Go ahead, DeEtta. I probably mispronounce your 

name.

MS. BILEK: Could be. It's pronounced 

DeEtta and last name is Bilek. But I appreciate 

your efforts. It's a difficult name. I am DeEtta 

Bilek and I'm representing OFARM today. In early 

2019 when the Executive Director of OFARM retired, 

they brought me on as an office manager part-time. 
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And much of the activity or responsibilities that 

were covered under the Executive Director, the 

officers or executive committee are accomplishing 

those activities.

So the mission of OFARM, Organic 

Farmers Agency for Relationship Marketing, is to 

coordinate efforts of producer marketing groups 

to benefit and sustain organic producers with a 

strong emphasis on opportunities, to educate and 

engage producers in the benefit of Cooperative 

Marketing.

The activities of OFARM have focused 

on that, and one of the concerns for many years 

has been fraud in the organic green area. They 

do feel that once the SOE is in place, they believe 

that it will address much of that concern with 

fraud.

So I'm going to make this really short. 

The one thing that also is brought out is that 

they would request that any recommendation has a 

restriction on the use of highly soluble sources 

of nitrogen in Organic Agriculture. Members have 
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expressed concern about that with leeching and into 

the environment.

So I would just stress that it's 

appreciated and encouraged that the NOSB were --

continues to work hard to, you know, give strength 

to the Organic Program. That it'd be strong and 

continue. So that's as much as I would have to 

say.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much and thank 

you for your patience with my name pronunciation. 

I really apologize.

MS. BILEK: I'm used to it.

MR. ELA: Any questions? I don't see 

any questions, and I know that the name like Ela, 

I'm used to that same issue. So, thank you, and 

have a great day.

MS. BILEK: Thank you.

MR. ELA: We're going to move on to 

Angela Schriver. Actually, it looks like we might 

be able to get to Beth Dominick before we end. 

So, Angela, please go ahead.

MS. SCHRIVER: Yes. Hi, my name is 
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Angela Schriver of Schriver Organics. We're a row 

crop farm located in North Central Ohio and we are 

members of OEFFA and the OEFFA Green Growers 

Chapter. I would like to start by acknowledging 

the time and effort the NOSB members put into the 

research when developing the recommendations. I 

appreciate it wholeheartedly. Thank you for all 

that you do.

My comments center around a USDA 

organic insider e-mail I received with a subject 

of NOP update memo to the NOSB. Under the heading 

of proposed changes to the National List for 

organic crops and handling, the very first sentence 

was, continuous improvement is a priority for the 

National Organic Program. Definition of 

continuous: forming an unbroken whole without 

interruption. Improvement: action of improving. 

Priority: the fact of being regarded as more 

important.

I would like to request the NOSB to 

reflect on that and habitually take the time now 

and in the future to weigh all requests, petitions, 
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reviews, work agenda items, et cetera, and question 

if they are serving that statement of continuous 

improvement, or if it's furthering something 

stagnant, showing no activity, dull and sluggish. 

Origin of livestock and strengthening Organic 

Enforcement come to mind, or worse yet, regressive, 

becoming less advanced, such as hydroponics and 

aquaponics.

Although I cannot comment specifically 

on the materials and issues up for review, I am 

confident and adamant that providing clarity and 

consistency between certifiers concerning 

container production systems, which needs to be 

back on the work agenda; that establishing organic 

agriculture as a solution to climate change; that 

finalizing the origin of livestock and 

strengthening organic enforcement as quickly as 

possible; and that if supplements and inputs cannot 

be harvested in a sustainable manner, they cannot 

be organic.

That all of these would support the 

statement of the USDA's expectations of NOP, of 
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continuous improvement being a priority. Perhaps 

the USDA NOP would benefit from a reminder of their 

own expectations and intentions of the NOSB to be 

an independent advisory board that establishes 

their own work agenda. If we don't strive to 

continuously improve, we're doing a disservice to 

every farmer and consumer that still believes in 

the integrity of organics.

I request your continual reflection on 

continuous improvement because as a farmer, I want 

to ensure we are held to the same standards as other 

organic producers and those standards are 

continuously improving. And as a consumer, I 

don't want to be misled or felt lied to in 

purchasing organic products: I want true organic 

products. Thank you again for your time and an 

opportunity to speak.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Angela. 

Any questions from the board? I am not seeing 

any. We're going to do one last speaker here 

hopefully our ASL interpreter can hang on here. 

So let's go to Beth Dominick.
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I'm going to apologize to Meredith 

Stevenson, Colehour Bondera, and Dan Giacomini. 

We tried to get to you, but it's just a long day. 

But if you would like to submit your comments to 

Michelle, she will pass them around to us. So 

thanks for being on the waitlist. Plus, even if 

we don't get to you, we would have loved to hear 

your comments. So Beth, please finish out the day 

for us.

MS. DOMINICK: Hello. Thank you for 

allowing time for my comments. My name is Beth 

Dominick. I am the senior inspector with QAI. 

I'm also an inspector member and serve on the Board 

of Directors of IOIA, the International Organic 

Inspectors Association.

MR. ELA: Beth, we just lost your

audio.

MS. DOMINICK: I'm sorry. Can you 

hear me okay?

MR. ELA: I still don't have it. You 

were on and then it turned off.

MS. ARSENAULT: I can hear her.
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UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Steve, I can 

hear her as well.

MS. DOMINICK: Okay.

MR. GREENWOOD: No problem here 

either, Steve.

MR. ELA: Michelle, any idea what 

happened?

MS. DOMINICK: Well, other folks can 

hear me, Steve, so I'm going to keep going unless 

you tell me to stop. But I'm an inspector and serve 

on the Board of Directors with IOIA.

MR. ELA: Still not getting you, Beth.

MS. DOMINICK: Everyone else can hear 

me.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Steve, I think it's 

you.

INTERPRETER: This is the interpreter. 

I can hear her, too.

MS. DOMINICK: And I would encourage 

you to visit with the --

MR. ELA: Any guesses from the staff?

MS. DOMINICK: -- and review the 
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mission statement of IOIA. Our mission is to 

address issues and concerns relevant to Organic 

Inspectors and to provide quality inspector 

training to promote consistency and integrity in 

the organic certification process.

So I'm here to your comment on the Human 

Capital proposal. And again, really want to thank 

the board and the NOP for bringing these issues 

forward for our discussion today. Overall, I 

support the comments that you've heard from IOIA 

and the ACA. I support the developments and 

funding of one-on-one mentor program grants to fund 

our special projects, including a state of the 

industry study, a credentialing study, workshops, 

conferences, trainings, online study groups, field 

trips, job fairs, and career days.

I could speak specifically to the 

questions in capital proposal. What have I 

experienced that would contribute to a shortage 

of inspectors and reviewers. In my feeling, we 

would need to recruit more from outside of the 

industry, to plan for the continued growth of the 
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organic industry and ways to benefit from the 

knowledge of our seasoned inspectors. So again, 

as far as strategies to recruit, there's some 

excellent ideas in IOIA's comments. So just 

funding for education, and supporting in comments 

from IOIA.

There are ways the NOP can provide 

financial assistance with these projects. 

Expanding cost share. Ways to partner apprentice 

inspectors with seasoned inspectors. Grants to 

help develop tests and calibrate inspectors. 

Grants for lecture series, for IOIA to buy 

materials, provide honorariums and travel for 

speakers. Costs of printing data and software 

costs. Again, I greatly appreciate your time

today and hearing our comments.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much. Sorry my 

audio died there, so, and I didn't realize my 

headset didn't give me any warning. Thank you. 

Are there any questions? All right. Thank you 

so much. You were the last speaker of the day. 

You get to close us off.
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We really appreciate everybody's 

comments and being so patient with us. We're going 

overtime with, you know, the stakeholder input, 

but it's just truly one of the things that we so 

value and that really helps the board make so many 

important decisions. There are obviously some 

controversial topics on our agenda for this coming 

meeting.

So with that, we are going to end right 

now. We'll reconvene the meeting on Wednesday at 

noon Eastern Time. That will be for the board 

deliberations. So, at that point, we won't be 

accepting public comment or public input, but the 

board will be in a public format making discussion 

and things on the topics we've been discussing on 

these public comments. So thank you so much, 

everybody, and we will see you next Wednesday.

MS. ARSENAULT: Thanks, everybody. 

Have a great night.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 5:43 p.m.)
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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

+ + + + +

NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD

+ + + + +

SPRING 2021 MEETING

+ + + + +

WEDNESDAY

APRIL 28, 2021

+ + + + +

The Board met via Videoconference at 

12:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Steve Ela, Chair, 

presiding.

PRESENT:

STEVE ELA, Chair

NATE POWELL-PALM, Vice Chair

MINDEE JEFFERY, Secretary

SUE BAIRD

ASA BRADMAN

AMY BRUCH

BRIAN CALDWELL

JERRY D'AMORE

CAROLYN DIMITRI

RICK GREENWOOD

KIM HUSEMAN

LOGAN PETREY

KYLA SMITH

WOOD TURNER
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STAFF PRESENT:

MICHELLE ARSENAULT, Advisory Committee 

Specialist, Standards Division

JARED CLARK, National List Manager, Standards 

Division

DAVID GLASGOW, Associate Deputy Administrator, 

National Organic Program

ERIN HEALY, Acting Director, Standards Division

DEVON PATTILLO, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist, Standards Division

DR. JENNIFER TUCKER, Ph.D., Deputy 

Administrator, National Organic Program; 

Designated Federal Official

ALSO PRESENT:

MAT NGOUAJIO, National Science Liaison, 

Institute of Food Production and 

Sustainability, National Institute of Food 

and Agriculture (NIFA) 

STEVE SMITH, National Program Leader, Division 

of Animal Systems, NIFA

NEERJA TYAGI, Program Specialist, Division of 

Plant Systems Production, NIFA

MAE WU, Deputy Under Secretary for Marketing and 

Regulatory Programs, USDA
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CONTENTS

Call to Order ................................. 4

Agenda Overview .............................. 18

Introductions ................................ 19

Secretary's Report ........................... 31

Chairman's Report ............................ 32

NOSB Report .................................. 43

USDA/NOP Update .............................. 43

NIFA Update ................................. 120

Livestock Subcommittee

2023 Sunset substances reviews:

Activated charcoal .......................... 174

Calcium borogluconate ....................... 168

Calcium propionate .......................... 172

Chlorine materials (Calcium

hypochlorite, Chlorine dioxide, 

hypochlorous acid, sodium

hypochlorite) ............................... 180

Kaolin pectin ............................... 193

Mineral Oil ................................. 200

Nutritive supplements ....................... 208

Propylene glycol ............................ 210

Sodium chlorite, acidified .................. 212

Zinc sulfate ................................ 224
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

12:00 p.m.

MS. ARSENAULT: Welcome, folks, to the 

first day of the National Organic Standards Board 

meeting for the spring meeting. If you're having 

audio issues, you can dial in on the phone. You 

don't need to necessarily use your computer. The 

numbers are on the screen, and I just chatted them 

in. So if you have access to the chat, you can 

find them there.

The attendees are in listen-only mode, 

so you won't have access to your mic or your camera. 

If you -- you should have available to you chat, 

so feel free to chat to your -- to each other and 

you can chat to us as the hosts. If you're having 

any issues, the Board doesn't take questions during 

the meeting from the audience. You are in 

observation mode only.

We are recording, so just so you're 

aware of that. You should see a recording button 

in the upper left of your screen just so you know 

it's active. After the meeting is done on Friday, 
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we will have complete transcripts that will include 

the comment webinars that we had last week as well, 

and those will be posted on the NOSB website in 

a couple of weeks. I'm going to turn the meeting 

over to Jenny Tucker to get us officially started 

for the day. Welcome.

DR. TUCKER: Thanks so much, Michelle. 

Hello, everyone, and thank you so much for joining 

us today. I am Jennifer Tucker, Deputy 

Administrator of the National Organic Program, 

which is part of USDA's Agricultural Marketing 

Service or AMS. This session continues our Spring 

2021 National Organic Standards Board meeting, 

which started last week with two online public 

comment sessions.

Meeting access information for all 

meeting segments is posted on the NOSB meeting page 

on the USDA website. Transcripts for all segments 

will be posted once completed. I'm serving as 

USDA's Designated Federal Officer for this 

meeting. This meeting, like all other meetings 

of the National Organic Standards Board, will be 
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run based on the Federal Advisory Committee Act 

and the Forbes policy and procedures manual.

Steve Ela, the Board Chair, will be 

introducing Board members after we complete some 

welcoming remarks here. Before we get started, 

I want to thank all of the Board members, including 

our five new Board members, Amy Bruch, Logan 

Petrey, Dr. Carolyn Dimitri, Brian Caldwell and 

Kyla Smith. 

All of these representatives devote 

hours and hours of volunteer time to serve the 

organic community, and many have not even met each 

other yet face to face. Let's all give the full 

Board a big round of thanks and appreciation with 

a Zoom applause. Now I know your cameras aren't 

on, but I want you all to applaud and this is how 

we practice the Zoom applause. So waving two hands 

in front of the camera signifies your applause. 

So I want to thank and applaud the Board for all 

the work that you do.

Next, I'm going to introduce our new 

Deputy Undersecretary Mae Wu, and she will share 
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some words of welcome. Then I'm going to come back 

and introduce the NOP team and run through the 

meeting agenda. 

So Mae Wu was announced as Deputy 

Undersecretary of Marketing and Regulatory 

Programs in January. Prior to joining USDA, she 

served as a senior director at the Natural 

Resources Defense Council, helping to lead the 

organization's health and food work. She also 

worked for the federal government to revise the 

Total Coliform rule, and served on the 

Environmental Protection Agency's Pesticide 

Program Dialogue Committee, and its National 

Drinking Water Advisory Council.

Deputy Undersecretary Wu holds a 

bachelor's degree in Chemical Engineering from 

Rice University, a master's degree in 

Environmental Policy from the University of 

Cambridge, and a juris doctorate from Duke 

University. So Mae, welcome, and I turn the floor 

over to you.

MS. WU: Thank you for the introduction 
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Jenny, and I am really happy to be joining the 

members of the National Organic Standards Board, 

the program team, and all of you in the organic 

community to kick off the Board's spring meeting.

The volunteers who make up this Board 

and all of you who have come, all the ones that 

have come before you are really amazing. I myself, 

as you've heard, have served on several FACAs 

myself and so I know about the countless hours that 

you have to put in, aside from doing your day job.

And so the professionalism and the 

experience and all of the time that you've spent 

into reviewing public comments and petitions and 

the National List is a tremendous lift on top of 

your already very busy lives. So it makes a huge 

difference to the organic farmers and to the 

businesses around the country and around the world. 

So thank you very much for your service.

But it's a really exciting time to be 

in organic production. I think what started as 

a niche market, which was selling to farmers 

markets and specialty coops has grown into a $55 
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billion agricultural sector, more than 45,000 

certified organic farms and businesses selling 

products at nearly every grocery store and market 

across the country.

Today, the USDA organic seal is 

recognized as the gold standard around the world, 

thanks to the ongoing work of this community and 

the passionate team at USDA who are committed to 

protecting the integrity of the organic seal for 

farmers, for businesses and for consumers.

Continuous improvement is built into 

the organic standards and this Board. These 

meetings play such an important role in identifying 

opportunities and building consensus. Our 

administration is committed to finishing the 

historic strengthening organic enforcement rule 

and the origin of livestock rule. 

We are committed to tackling the 

complicated rule of inert ingredients. It's going 

to be hard but it's important, and we support the 

work of the Board and the program to keep the 

National List rules moving to meet the needs of 
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the market.

So of course the administration right 

now continues to prioritize combating the COVID 

pandemic, and USDA is doing what we can to provide 

assistance. We have some folks of our -- some 

employees of ours are deployed to help put vaccines 

in arms and to also provide other support.

But we're also looking forward to the 

end of the pandemic and our recovery from this 

crisis. So some of the things we've done is 

quickly get assistance out, and have incorporated 

the updates that were passed in the COVID-19 

stimulus package back in December. So a couple 

of weeks ago, we announced $169.9 million in the 

specialty crop block grants, and we are very close 

to announcing the request for applications for the 

local agricultural market programs grants soon. 

So those are the farmers market and 

local food promotion program, and the regional food 

system partnerships. But all told, AMS is 

shepherding almost $230 million into our existing 

grant programs. But we're also looking at some 
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new programs through some of the funding, again 

with the COVID stimulus package as well as the 

American Rescue Plan.

So one of the things we're looking at 

and trying to develop is a pandemic response and 

safety grant, something that could bring resources 

to, especially small and mid-sized entities, to 

cover the costs that they incurred say for 

purchasing PPE or expanded safety equipment, any 

costs associated with transitioning to virtual or 

online sales or retrofitting their facilities to 

improve worker safety and consumer safety.

But with the American Rescue Plan, we 

actually have a bigger moment to not just rebuild 

our old economy, but to reimagine and rebuild a 

new economy. So we have this chance to provide 

millions of households with immediate relief, but 

also rebuild our food system into one that is 

stronger. It's healthier, more sustainable and 

more resilient. 

As we all know, the pandemic really 

highlighted how brittle our food system is or was, 
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and now we have this unique chance to create a 

better one that actually can withstand the next 

crisis. The extra work that organic producers do 

is a critical component of this rebuilding. 

Organic production can contribute to new income 

sources as we build more robust local and regional 

food systems.

It can open competition and more 

equitable markets for producers of all sizes and 

backgrounds, including Black, Hispanic, 

indigenous and other farmers of color. And the 

organic community's longstanding efforts in 

environmental conservation and biodiversity are 

at the heart of solutions for climate change.

Organic production helps put American 

farmers in the lead in climate solutions, and helps 

create new streams of income while leading the 

world in sustainably produced food. It helps us 

prioritize economic development and growth in 

rural America, and put the U.S. in a leadership 

position on climate change. So this is why I am 

particularly excited about the White House's 
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nomination yesterday for the Under Secretary of 

the Marketing and Regulatory Programs.

Jenny Lester Moffitt currently serves 

as the Under Secretary of the California Department 

of Food and Agriculture, and was previously the 

deputy secretary. Before she was at CDFA, Jenny 

spent -- not this Jenny, the other Jenny, Jenny 

Moffitt, spent ten years as managing director at 

Dixon Ridge Farms, which is her family's organic 

walnut farm and processing operation in Solano 

County in California.

So of course she still needs to go 

through the whole Senate confirmation process, but 

I am just really excited about the possibility of 

her joining our work towards building a more robust 

and resilient local and regional food system that 

support new fair market opportunities for American 

producers and food companies.

And another important part of building 

fair and competitive markets is making sure the 

organic community has a diverse pool of qualified 

inspectors and certification staff. So to address 
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the current shortage in qualified organic 

professionals, AMS has launched a human capital 

initiative with input from the Board and the 

community.

Jenny Tucker, who will talk more about 

this a little bit later, and how the Department 

will be supporting projects that increase training 

and support for organic oversight personnel and 

emphasize racial equity. We are also currently 

inviting nominations to serve on this Board 

starting next January. We hope that you will all 

help spread the word to build a qualified and 

diverse candidate pool.

The Secretary has talked about his 

commitment towards advancing racial justice and 

equity, about removing barriers to access for 

underserved populations, and about building 

inclusive programs. In the Marketing Regulatory 

Programs mission area, we have that same commitment 

when it comes to all of the programs we have, 

including representation on these federal advisory 

boards and commissions.
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In addition to the staff in the National 

Organic Program, USDA has thousands of people who 

are working to support the organic community every 

day, from farm loans, crop insurance, extension 

services to crop research and promotion, market 

promotion.

So we want to make sure that AMS and 

the National Organic Program have the resources 

to help smaller farms and ranches, new and 

beginning farmers and ranchers, socially 

disadvantaged producers, veteran producers and 

underserved communities. 

I want to thank all of you who took the 

opportunity to make live comments to the Board last 

week, and also to those who have sent in written 

comments on a range of issues important to the 

success of organic producers and handlers and 

processors. And again, just a huge thank you to 

the members of this Board for your good work and 

for the invitation to join you today. I have a 

special place in my heart for organic, so I really 

do look forward to working with you as we move 
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forward together. Thank you.

DR. TUCKER: And let's give Mae a big 

round of applause. Mae, it's been a true pleasure 

and honor working with you over the past few months. 

So welcome from all of us to USDA. We're really, 

really happy that you could be with us today. So 

thank you for taking the time to join us in this 

rather unique forum.

MS. WU: Thanks so much.

DR. TUCKER: And now I would like to 

briefly introduce and thank our key National 

Organic Standards or National Organic Program team 

members. First, let's all give a huge round of 

applause to Michelle Arsenault. We would never 

make it to these meetings without Michelle. She 

very much runs the place for these meetings.

I consider Michelle to not only be an 

outstanding and devoted employee, but a very, very 

good friend. She has touched each one of us in 

any number of ways with her really helpful spirit 

and very strong command of processes. She adds 

a layer of comfort to all of us. So we're lucky 
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to have her here. Michelle, again thank you so 

much.

Next I am pleased to introduce our new 

Standards Division director, Erin Healy. Erin has 

been with us since January. Can we spotlight her, 

and if she's not I don't -- she doesn't have a pin 

next to her name. So just to make sure people can 

see Erin. Erin's been with us since January. 

Before coming to NOP, she was a division director 

in the AMS Fair Trade Practices Program leading 

the Food Disclosure and Labeling Division.

Before that, she was the director of 

the Office of Community Food Systems in USDA's Food 

and Nutrition Services between 2017 and 2019, and 

before coming to USDA she was the director of the 

Healthy Eating Initiative at the Health Trust in 

California. She holds a B.A. in Anthropology and 

a master's in Public Health. And so welcome, Erin. 

It's great to have you as part of the program.

And then next I want to introduce and 

thank Jared Clark, also one of our newer folks. 

Actually, I introduced him last meeting. We've 
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never actually met in person, but I've loved 

getting to know Jared as our new National List 

manager. We're lucky to have him.

So Devon, welcome. Devon Pattillo, 

our Agricultural Marketing Service, wears many, 

many hats in the Standards Division, including some 

top notch work on origin of livestock, which I will 

be updating you on in a bit. So thank you so much, 

Devon.

It takes a lot of hands to pull these 

meetings together, so I want to particularly 

highlight that team for their very, very focused 

work.

DR. TUCKER: Now let's take a quick 

look at the agenda. We're going to be meeting from 

12:00 to 5:00 Eastern today, tomorrow and Friday, 

with an hour break in the middle of each day. The 

Board Chair will get us started. Then we'll have 

a bit of time for an NOP Update. After a break, 

we'll hear a Research Priorities Update for NIFA, 

the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, 

and then we will move into the Subcommittee's work.
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To close, I want to give a particularly 

strong special thank you to Steve Ela, the Chair 

of the Board and of this meeting. Signal a round 

of applause in advance of a great meeting. 

And now Steve, I hand it over to you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Jenny, and 

it really was a pleasure to hear from Mae. Thank 

you for making that time slot available. Some of 

these initiatives coming out of this 

administration are very exciting for me. Not that 

I wish I would stay on the Board longer, as Rick 

often says, but it's great to see some of the 

possibilities that are before us.

With that, I would like to introduce 

the Board members. Jenny already mentioned our 

five new Board members, so welcome to them. You'll 

find that these meetings are both stimulating and 

sometimes long, but I always find them to be such 

a great process for engaging our stakeholders and 

these other great Board members that we have before 

us.

So I'm just going to go alphabetically 
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down and let each of you introduce yourselves with 

a short introduction, so our stakeholders know 

who's who. So we'll start with Sue, Sue Baird.

MS. BAIRD: Hi. Sue Baird from 

Missouri. I'm with the Missouri Organic 

Association. I was placed as on to for public 

support and so I'm here and been here for four years 

now.

MR. ELA: Let's go next to Asa Bradman.

MR. BRADMAN: I'm Asa Bradman. I'm a 

professor now at the University of California at 

Merced, and have worked for many years on issues 

around environmental health and agricultural 

communities. 

Many years ago actually, in my late 

teens I worked picking apples and grapefruits for 

export, took care of chickens in the big chicken 

sheds, and I actually had the interesting 

experience of being in the field and having a 

helicopter come over and spray pesticides on our 

team while we were picking grapefruits.

So it influenced my interest in 
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agriculture. So I look forward to the meeting 

today. Thanks.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Asa. Next one of 

our new members, Amy Bruch.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. Good 

afternoon. I'm Amy Bruch, serving in the farmer 

seat. I'm an ag engineer, also a sixth generation 

farmer and owner-operator of Cyclone Farms. It's 

a family farm in Nebraska. We grow small or row 

crops, small greens, pulses, and also oil seeds.

In addition, I have experience setting 

up sustainable farming on four different 

continents. Looking forward to the meeting today. 

Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much Amy, and 

welcome. We appreciate your volunteering to serve 

on this great Board. We'll go to another new 

member, Brian Caldwell. Brian, I think you might 

still be on mute.

MR. CALDWELL: How's this?

MR. ELA: Much better.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay. Yeah, sorry, 
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yeah. Hello everyone. I'm Brian Caldwell, new 

to the Board and very pleased to be working with 

this talented and committed group, really amazing 

people. I serve in a consumer and public interest 

spot, and I'm on the Crop, Livestock and Materials 

Committees, Subcommittees.

I'm retired from Cornell University, 

where I worked with cooperative extension, and then 

did research on organic vegetable and field crop 

systems. Now I operate a small certified organic 

farm growing apples, pears, chestnuts and 

hazelnuts in central New York.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Brian, and just 

like Amy, welcome to the Board. We look forward 

to your contributions to our thought processes. 

We'll move on to Jerry D'Amore. And Jerry, you're 

on mute as well.

MR. D'AMORE: Steve, you usually 

welcome that. Thank you. Hi, my name is Jerry 

D'Amore. At this point two years shy of having 

spent 50 years in the food business, and 15 of those 

years were living overseas, mostly in Turkey and 
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Saudi Arabia.

At my age, I could keep you for another 

ten minutes, but I would like to say I'm on the 

Handling Subcommittee in my second year. I love 

the business that we're all in and I'm both humbled 

and honored to be a part of the NOSB.

MR. ELA: Thank you very much, Jerry. 

Now we're going to move another new member, 

Carolyn Dimitri.

DR. DIMITRI: Hi. I'm Carolyn 

Dimitri. I'm a professor at New York University. 

I have been working on post-farm economic issues 

in the organic sector, from the farm all the way 

to the consumer probably for the past 20 years. 

I have like a gazillion publications in this area, 

and I serve in a consumer position. I'm cautiously 

excited about my term on the Board.

MR. ELA: Well, we're glad to have you, 

Carolyn. Your experience will be a great 

contribution to this Board. We'll move on to Rick 

Greenwood.

MR. GREENWOOD: Hi, I'm Rick 
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Greenwood. I'm in the environmental position. 

I'm a faculty member at UCLA in Public Health. 

Also a certified organic grower of avocados in 

California, so a background in both academic and 

actually boots on the ground farming. 

I might say today we're actually 

harvesting, so that's going on in the background. 

But did a three-year term earlier with AMS in the 

Hass Avocado Board, one of the specialty marketing 

groups. So a number of areas of interest in 

agriculture. 

I'm going I guess onto my fourth year 

on the Board, just following in Steve's footsteps. 

So thank you.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Rick. I'm just 

amazed you didn't mention something about apples 

and avocado comparisons. So I know you'll warm 

up to that later on.

MR. GREENWOOD: It's not worth 

mentioning, but it looks like there's fire blight 

in the trees behind you.

MR. ELA: No, those are just blossoms, 
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you know. I know avocado growers don't really know 

about that, but we're going to move on to Kim 

Huseman.

MS. HUSEMAN: With that, hello. My 

name is Kimberly Huseman. I sit in the handler's 

seat. This is my second year, coming into my 

second year on the Board. I chair the Livestock 

Committee this year. I currently head up the 

Specialty Ingredients Procurement Division for 

Pilgrim's. I've been with the organization a 

little over six years, and prior to that worked 

in the renewable energy space.

So I grew up with production and 

agriculture, both crops and livestock, and I've 

been humbled by the information I've already 

learned and obtained from the wonderful people on 

this Board and I'm excited for the next few years. 

Back to you, Steve.

MR. ELA: Thanks so much, Kim. We're 

going to move on to our current secretary, Mindee 

Jeffery. 

MS. JEFFERY: Hi. Thanks, everyone. 
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Mindee Jeffery representing retailers. Big 

shout to Good Earth Natural Foods in Northern 

California. I worked there for about 15 years, did 

a quick stint in Minnesota and the randomness of 

the pandemic has me back in California. So I'm 

super excited to be on this Board and really love 

the tenor of our relationships and how we do this 

work, and super grateful for all the amazing 

partnerships.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much. We're 

going to move on to another new member, Logan

Petrey.

MS. PETREY: Hi, I'm Logan Petrey. 

I'm in the farmer's seat. I'm a farm manager for 

Grimmway Farms. We farm over -- here in the 

Southeast, we farm over 20 different crops, food 

and vegetables, our main crop being carrots. We 

also do potatoes and onions, and we also work with 

commodity crops like corn. 

We've had five years' experience here 

in the Southeast working a piece, and it's been 

exciting to see the transformation with organics 
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and all the benefits from it. It's an honor to 

serve on the Board.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, Logan. 

We are looking forward to having your input, 

especially from a part of the country that we don't 

always have represented well. So thanks for --

thanks for joining us. We'll go next to our Vice 

Chair, Nate Powell Palm.

MR. POWELL PALM: Hi, everybody. 

Super excited for this meeting. Nate Powell Palm 

based out of Bozeman, Montana, and I'm a 

first-generation crop and livestock producer. My 

operation has been certified organic since about 

2008, and I'll give a shout out to my certifier, 

Montana Department of Ag.

I'm really, you know, really grateful 

for the opportunity to hear last week from all of 

the stakeholders. I was reflecting this weekend, 

as I was on the tractor trying to finish the last 

bit of planting that I have left to do, and just 

being like how cool is it that we just all checked 

in with each other about this industry that we all 
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derive our livelihoods from, that we are all 

consumers of, and I'm really excited for the 

continued work. So I'm in my second year and 

stoked for the coming term.

MR. ELA: Great, and thank you so much 

for serving as Vice Chair, Nate. It makes my job 

definitely easier. Okay, we'll move on to our last 

new member, Kyla Smith. Kyla, go ahead.

MS. SMITH: Hi, everybody, great to be 

here. My name's Kyla Smith. I'm serving in the 

certifier seat. I work for PCO, Pennsylvania 

Certified Organic as the certification director. 

I've worked in certification for 18 years. I've 

done inspections, power review, material review, 

policy work, just about all the parts that go into 

certifying farms and food processors.

I've been a long-time audience member 

at these meetings, and so it's really fun and I'm 

super grateful to be on this side now, being able

to participate in the organic industry in a new 

way. It's really inspiring to work with this group 

of people. So I'm looking forward to the meeting.
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MR. ELA: Great, Kyla, and we're 

looking forward to your long experience of working 

with this Board and having you on the other side 

of the table. It's always good to have people that 

know how we work. Next, we'll go to Wood Turner.

MR. TURNER: Again, save the least for 

last there, I see. 

MR. ELA: Not at all.

MR. TURNER: Great to be here. I'm 

Wood Turner. I'm in my second year on the Board. 

I became chair of the Materials Subcommittee when 

Dave Mortensen left the Board after the last 

meeting, and I really enjoy this process and this 

experience.

I've had a long career. I'm in one of 

the resource conservation seats and have a long 

career, an increasingly long career in 

environmental sustainability. I lead 

Environmental and Social Impact for an 

organization called Agriculture Capital, and we 

are a grower of organic blueberries, organic table 

grapes and several other crops as well.
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It's really just such a huge honor and 

I'm thrilled to be a part of this effort. So thanks 

so much.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Wood. So 

appreciated, and I am Steve Ela. I serve as Chair. 

I am in the farmer seat in my last year. I'm a 

fourth-generation grower here in western Colorado, 

tree fruits: apples, pears, cherries, plums, et 

cetera. We do grow some heirloom tomatoes. We 

started certifying in 1994 with the Colorado 

Department of Agriculture, and I think we became 

fully certified around 2004. 

We both have crops and we have a small 

handling operation where we make our fruits we grow 

into various artisanal fruit products. It's a 

fifth year so several of us, Sue, myself and Asa, 

get to count down the moments. I have to say I've 

thoroughly enjoyed being on the NOSB. It's been 

a huge learning process.

So with that, we are going to move on 

to the Secretary's Report. I'm going to turn it 

over to Mindee as Secretary to do, let us accept 
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the 2000 -- fall 2020 minutes. Go ahead, Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Steve. NOSB 

members, do you accept the meeting minutes from 

the October 2020 NOSB meeting as written, and are 

there any corrections?

Hearing none, the meeting -- the 

minutes are accepted.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you so much, 

Mindee. We do appreciate it, and just as I said 

with Nate, it's been great having you on the 

leadership board. Your input has been really 

useful and it's been great to serve with both of 

you.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Steve. I 

hope that you know the levels at which you are 

appreciated as well. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Thank you. We're going to 

move on to the Chairman's Report. Actually, we 

should say the chairperson to be gender neutral 

here, and it's -- I just want to, if it's all right, 

if we can start off with my report, and it's been 

a pleasure over the last several years to really 
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e encourage people to apply for the NOSB.

We have a number of new positions open. 

I'm not certain, I think four of us if I'm correct, 

and I just -- it's a lot of work, it's a lot of 

time, but I also -- it's such a fulfilling way to 

learn so much about the organic industry, both in 

terms of petitions that are applied to us, 

proposals that we get and make and work agendas.

And even though the sunsets are 

somewhat routine and often a little out of our, 

you know, I never knew about some of these 

materials, it's interesting because you actually 

do learn about some materials you never thought 

you would know about. So I really want people to 

apply and I especially want to, just as Mae noted, 

really encourage diversity, even though the Board 

itself is actually fairly representative of the 

organic community as a whole right now.

We always talk about the need to 

diversify the organic community and make it more 

available to growers of all sorts and such. So 

I look forward to the administration's push to 
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encourage diversity. Certainly we're looking 

for, you know, racial diversity. We want to see 

geographic diversity with Jesse going off the 

Board. Fortunately, Logan has come on, but the 

South and other parts of the country, it would be 

really nice to have some of that geographic 

diversity.

And I also, I don't think we've really 

talked about it, but gender diversity. We, you 

know, more and more recognition of our whole 

community in terms of gender identification. It 

would be nice to have some of that on the Board 

as well.

So please apply, and if you have any 

questions, reach out to Michelle, reach out to 

myself. There are a number of other organizations 

that can help you as well, National Organic 

Coalition, Organic Trade Association and others 

that, you know, really we're all interested in 

getting the best pool of people we have.

One of the things that often happens 

if you have applied before, please apply again. 
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It really depends kind of on the mix of people 

that apply who is selected. So the fact that you 

weren't picked last time or in some previous 

application doesn't mean that you won't be picked 

this time. So please don't let that dissuade you 

from applying. We'd love to have as many 

applicants as we can.

Next, this is our third virtual 

meeting, and it's -- it's worked really well in 

some ways. It really allows people that are at 

home to not have to travel, not have to spend the 

money to come to a Board meeting. I think the 

webinars for public comment have really allowed 

more people to comment.

But we all know too that the in person 

meetings provide a richness, they provide an 

opportunity for the Board members to meet each 

other and know each other as friends, not just 

professionals. So we're keeping our fingers 

crossed that, for our fall meeting to be in 

Sacramento. 

We certainly have a number of 
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Californians on the Board. So we'll make your 

travel short if we have it there. I would love 

to see your -- you know, meet the new Board members 

in person that we haven't had to meet, and also 

see so many friends in the stakeholder community 

again.

One of the things we're hoping to do, 

and I know Jenny Tucker is working on this along 

with Dave Glasgow is, if we do have an in-person 

meeting, to go ahead and figure out a livestream 

of it, so to make it more transparent and accessible 

to all our stakeholders. Again, those who may be 

on time constraints or not want to travel to a 

meeting but still want to see the Board 

deliberations on specific topics.

So we're hoping that that can work out 

and, you know, our goal continues to be 

transparency and accountability to our 

stakeholders. I know we've had routinely a number 

of comments about the timing of the Board meetings. 

We take those comments very seriously. There's 

a lot of issues in trying to move it. But we're 
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hoping if we do have livestreams, that that may 

allow some of those people that are in the middle 

of their season to participate in the Board with 

our current meeting schedule. So we'll continue 

to work on ways to open the Board to various things.

So with regards to nominations, I do 

want to point out that next Tuesday, we are having 

a coffee with the Board. We're going to have a 

handful of Board members available for people that 

are interested in applying to the Board, to talk 

with Board members, to ask questions, for us to 

talk a little bit about our experience, and just 

very informal. 

But anybody that's interested in the 

Board or how it works, please chime into that. 

I think it's come out in the Organic Insider. If 

you don't see it on the website, please feel free 

to again contact Michelle and she can get you the 

log-in information for that. So we'll look 

forward to talking with future nominees, and please 

use that if you really want to know more about what 

you might be getting into and some of the time 
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commitments as well, some of the pleasures of 

applying to the Board.

I do want to point out that we, we always 

get comments from our stakeholders about the work 

agenda items and the tension between the Board 

selecting our own work agenda items and the program 

kind of allowing us only to work on certain agenda 

items.

You know, I think there are arguments, 

great arguments on both sides of that in terms of 

the time commitment and not having the Board spend 

a lot of time on things that may not be actionable, 

but also of giving the Board some free will to work 

on some things that may not be on the top priority 

right now but are of concern to the organic 

community.

I'm not really sure how to solve that, 

but you know I guess at some point maybe it would 

be good to explore a little bit of a mix, where 

there is, continues to be NOP oversight, that the 

Board might be able to select a couple of key agenda 

items that they would like to work on in terms of 
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kind of the bigger picture or organics.

I don't know if that's possible, but 

it might be kind of a compromise on both sides. 

We do want to make the time on the Board manageable 

and not increase it. We already spend too much 

time and it is hard to, hard to look at the big 

picture items even with our current work agenda.

But we, you know, I do very clearly hear 

from our stakeholders that part of our job on the 

NOSB is to really look at the big picture, and 

sometimes take on the hard topics that are in our 

world and provide some insight from this Board on 

some of these work agenda items.

The next thing, I am so excited to hear 

the issues of climate change coming down from this 

administration. We know that this affects all of 

us. We in Colorado here with fruit, we are in an 

area where you really shouldn't be able to grow 

fruit, yet these little microclimates allow us to 

kind of cheat Mother Nature.

But on the other hand we know that when 

we farm on the margins, that climate change will 
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very much affect us, whether it's temperature 

variability or water availability or some of these 

things. So I think it's critical for agriculture 

to really look at this, and as we all say organic 

agriculture is so well-suited to dealing with this 

issue, both through sustainability, reliability, 

ability to, you know, persevere through difficult 

events whether they're large, large rainstorms 

where we have the ability to let water soak in 

instead of run off and, you know, in terms of 

resilience.

And also just, you know, we are a 

volunteer group. We sign into it, and when we see 

USDA's comments come out of how can we voluntarily 

support some of these climate change initiatives, 

we already exist as volunteers and we have opted 

into an organization and a way of growing food that 

really addresses some of those climate-change 

issues.

So it's, as an environmentalist and as 

a person that's concerned with sustainability, 

hearing this language and seeing this focus, not 
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just as a nod, just it does make me really excited. 

I am in some ways jealous of the Board members 

that are going to continue on and work in the 

environment where some of these things will be 

recognized and we'll hopefully be able to move 

forward.

Finally I, you know, in my fifth year 

here, and I came onto the Board not really having

gone to NOSB meetings. I had submitted comments 

in the past, but not being completely familiar with 

the process, and certainly coming from western 

Colorado, we're not in the main flow of 

information.

But it is such a neat process and I so 

respect the wisdom of our stakeholders in giving 

this input. I've talked to so many stakeholders, 

you know, Kyla would be one of them, that have 

participated in the Board deliberations for far 

more years than the Board has. You talk to people 

with, you know, 15-20 years of experience in giving 

input to the Board.

I guess with new members, you know, I 
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really want to stress how important that is. You 

have a five-minute that's -- or a five-year 

snapshot of this, and I can certainly say for myself 

I am not intimately familiar with past decisions 

or past deliberations of the Board except through 

minutes and other people telling us.

So I just, you know, want to shout out 

to our stakeholder community about how valuable 

you are and reminding the Board of precedents and 

past decisions and things that have been decided 

or guidance that has been created. This is such 

a cool process of having a 15-person board making 

decisions, but being so informed by so many people 

that are so knowledgeable.

So the longer I'm on the Board, the more 

I realize how important this has been and, you know, 

as people, the zein or ion exchange or hydroponics 

or any of these things where people point out what 

has happened in 2010 or 2012 or 2002. So thank 

you to our stakeholders. I really look forward 

to this meeting. 

We don't have lots of votes, but the 
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discussion items will certainly govern the 

proposals we put out in the fall. The public 

comments were outstanding, as always, and they 

always make me pause and think about the things 

I've written as well as what other Board members 

have put out. 

So I look forward to the next few days, 

and with that I will turn it back over to Jenny 

for her report and updates from the program. So 

thank you, Jenny.

DR. TUCKER: Let's give Steve a big 

round of applause. That was terrific kind of to 

hear your thoughts there Steve. So thank you very 

much, and again you're just a delightful partner 

to work with and I genuinely appreciate it.

Okay. I'm going to go ahead and share 

my screen, and so you should be able to see 

PowerPoint on the screen. Somebody tell me yes 

or no hopefully.

MR. ELA: Yes, we can, Jenny. Yep, go 

ahead.

DR. TUCKER: Okay, okay. I just want 
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to make sure. We've got just a lot of windows going 

on here. So okay. So this is a short but I think 

important update from the National Organic 

Program. I actually only have six slides, but I'm 

going to spend some time on each slide.

But first, I do want to invite everyone 

to watch our full presentation in the Organic 

Integrity Learning Center. It's about 45 minutes, 

which is what I would do in a face to face meeting, 

to give a full update. 

When we moved to the virtual meeting, 

we decided that it was -- that this time was better 

spent having the Board being able to deliberate 

with a shortened time zone. So we took the update, 

the longer update from NOP and moved it online. 

I think that's a fun activity for our staff to 

be able to report out on what they're doing, but 

it also gives sort of a good, broad perspective 

on everything that is going on.

So I do want to encourage you to watch 

that. I am here reminding folks of the four key 

goals that we are working against. These are our 
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program's four key goal areas that we are working

on: strong organic control systems, robust 

enforcement, developing standards as far as 

continuous improvement and open transparent 

process, and engaging partners and stakeholders.

We are finding that over time, these 

projects really touch each other. We had -- last 

year in our goals we had -- strong organic control 

systems was separate from farm to market 

traceability. As we have continued to advance our 

work in systems and data and import oversight, the 

control systems really do include those 

traceability mechanisms.

A lot of work happening in enforcement. 

We do continue to focus on both import oversight 

and dairy compliance. In fact, dairy compliance 

has really broadened into our broader livestock 

work, with partnering with Animal and Plant Health 

Inspection Services and other federal partners. 

So, you know, some of that enforcement work we're 

not able to be -- we don't celebrate our successes 

publicly and a lot of those efforts are in the 
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enforcement process, but they are happening.

So I did want to mention in particular 

some of the import work. One thing that happened 

that was very significant since the last time we 

all met at the NOSB is the ending of our U.S.-India 

recognition arrangement. 

So that was an organic trade 

arrangement that had been in place since about 

2006, and as a result of doing reviews of India's 

system, what recognition means is that we had 

authorized the India government to accredit 

certifiers. Just like we accredit certifiers in 

USDA, we had authorized the India government to 

do those accreditations.

But that didn't, that made it so we 

didn't have direct insight into what was happening 

with those certifiers, and we found that India's 

organic control system was, was not adequate to 

meet the needs of that recognition arrangement. 

So in January, we sent a letter to India, laying 

out a transition plan for ending that arrangement.

So what that means is that by this 
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July, any farmer that's a certified farmer, 

processor, exporter that is certified under the 

recognition arrangement must apply for USDA 

certification by July. And then they have time 

to transition, to complete the certification 

process with the USDA certifier.

This is something that is impacting, 

we are seeing impacts in the market, and it was 

done to protect the market. So this is part of 

our import oversight, import oversight work.

We've also been seeing some depending, 

continued deepening of our relationship with 

Customs and Border Protection. We continue to 

work through the working group, the Organic Working 

Group that was established by Congress through the 

Farm bill. We meet with that group regularly, and 

it is enabling a lot of activities that we did not 

have access before.

So for example we have a staff member 

who works in CTAC, the Commercial Targeting and 

something Center, and it allows us to for example 

send very specific directions to port officials. 
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So for example if there is an operation that has 

an open investigation, we can literally put in 

business rules where if somebody sees something 

coming in on the border from that operation, they 

are to follow a certain set of instructions and 

send it back to us. That's something we did not 

have a year ago. So we are, we are moving forward. 

We have, together with certifiers, the 

process for being able to access ports to do ship 

level testing. It's become more clear. We have 

now sort of the playbook on how to do targeted 

sampling and testing at ports when there is an 

investigation that signals the need to do so.

So there is a lot going on in 

Enforcement, and all of that continues to deepen 

the control systems, both within the National 

Organic Program and with our, with our certifiers. 

So I wanted to make sure I touched on those, 

because I think people sort of wonder well what's 

going on with imports.

There is presentations. The larger 

NOP presentation goes into some of the more 
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quantitative tools that we're continuing to use 

around the globe, so that where organic grows we 

can go in terms doing surveillance and the 

follow-up work needed with certifiers.

So I want to invite you to go look at 

that full presentation, but wanted to highlight 

some of those key areas.

Next, rulemaking is a priority, and so 

this is the Goal Area 3 of Setting Standards. 

Standards are important, and we do support 

continuous improvement. So I wanted to sort of 

not only give you an update on the rules that are 

in progress, so Mae gave sort of a sneak preview 

of that, so the rules that are in progress.

But also I thought it would be 

instructive to talk about what makes a rulemaking 

project successful. We have some good case 

studies now of what makes rulemaking successful. 

So we thought it would be good to sort of review 

what are those factors, because I think they can 

help all of us in how we frame new regulatory needs 

for an administration.
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We are a growing program, we are a 

learning program. We are a growing community and 

a learning community. So I think learning how we 

communicate about rules or learning what works in 

rulemaking makes us all better at continuous 

improvement. So I thought I would talk about the 

rules themselves, but also talk about sort of what 

makes rulemaking successful.

So the rules in progress, give you an 

update on where we are. Strengthening organic 

enforcement is a key program priority. We are 

writing the final rule now, and so there were over 

1,500 public comments that came in last fall and 

took a while to get through because there were lots 

of different feedback about a lot of different 

parts of the rule, and all of the parts of the rule 

are interrelated.

So if you touch one part of the rule, 

you have to really think about how it's going to 

impact other parts of the rule. And so we do 

anticipate that that rule entering the clearance 

process later this year. So as a reminder of what 
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clearance process is, that means that it goes to 

many, many offices within USDA and it also goes 

to Office of Management and Budget, which 

coordinates inter-agency review. So any other 

federal agencies that have interest in the topic 

can weigh in.

But we have a team that has been working 

very hard on drafting that final rule. So moving 

ahead nicely.

So here's an update on Origin of 

Livestock. This is taking a long time, and the 

rulemaking process is working. It is working. 

And so we had said publicly earlier this year that 

we did plan to move ahead with sort of a second 

notice, a second public comment period to 

supplement the 2015 proposed rule.

There is a notice that right now is at 

the Office of Management and Budget. So it has 

worked its way through the USDA clearance system. 

It is with OMB. It is a notice that will activate 

another public comment period, and it is being done 

to seek feedback on some specific parts of the rule, 
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provisions that were not part of the 2015 rule.

This is where, you know, Origin of 

Livestock, it has taken a long time and I am not 

trying to diminish the fact that it's taking a long 

time. The process takes a long time and it's 

working. But we got public comments that 

commented on the 2015 proposed rule, and there were 

things that people suggested that was great 

feedback.

But because not everybody had a chance 

to comment on it, the public needs another chance 

and that is how the system is supposed to work. 

So OMB has a new notice that they have already 

reviewed and given us feedback on and that we've 

already responded to. So not only is it with OMB, 

but OMB has done their first review of it and we 

have gotten the rule back to them.

So this will show up in the Federal 

Register as a notice. It may be posted in the 

Proposed Rule section. I think it's officially 

titled a Notice of Opening Up of a Public Comment 

Period, okay. So that's moving forward.
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And as Mae committed to, this is a high 

priority for the agency. The natural next step 

would be a final rule. Now I've said that before 

and I got some legal, we got legal feedback on this. 

Wait, you've got to take another, another step 

here. And so I'm not going to make the same mistake 

of saying yes, it's absolutely a final rule because 

we need to see what happens in public comment. 

But that is the next natural step of the process, 

would be a final rule.

Again, this is a high priority. We are 

moving quickly. The fact that this notice is in 

OMB in an administration that has been here not 

very long is -- shows that we have some, we have 

the momentum here.

National List rules. I think one of 

the changes that we've made over the past few years 

is really move along National List rules faster. 

I know that the interest tends to be most with 

the practice rules and National List rules are 

really important. They are part of what we have 

to do, and they are part of implementing your 
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recommendations as a board, and that does take time 

and resources to get through USDA, this USDA 

system.

We did take the feedback from past NOSB 

meetings over the last several months, and we do 

have a commitment to move forward with what is 

called an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking 

for Inert, so that is moving along. Mae shared 

in her presentation, she knows what inerts are. 

She gets why this is important, and 

that's enormously helpful to have somebody with 

chemistry background, where you don't even need 

to do the well, once upon a time there was an EPA 

list and let me tell you about the list. I mean 

she, she -- you can go right to the chase on this, 

which has been really helpful.

So right now, those are the key rules 

that are in progress and that are our leading 

priorities at this time.

So now let's turn sort of more broadly 

to what makes rulemaking projects most successful. 
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And you know over time, we've seen kind of four 

factors that we believe are the factors that make 

rulemaking projects successful. I'd actually 

like to give examples of both where this has worked 

well and where actually there are some challenges.

And so I know there are some folks who 

may not like some of what I'm going to say, in terms 

of here's what makes a rulemaking project not so 

successful. But I have always committed to being 

kind of up front about where the challenges are, 

because we are all learning together. 

And so rulemaking projects are most 

successful when they align with the Act, so when 

the align with the Organic Foods Production Act. 

This is one of the reasons we've been able to 

sustain momentum with strengthening organic 

enforcement, is it's very clear in the Farm bill 

what Congress would like to see happen. So they 

modified the Organic Foods Production Act to enable 

things like import certificates, to close 

loopholes on handler certifications, to establish 

the inter-agency working group.
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And so it's a great example of where 

rulemaking ties very tightly with the Organic Foods 

Production Act, which is -- that is what drives 

the regulation. So SOE is a good example of 

projects that are successful, when you can draw 

that straight line.

Second, when rules address needs with 

the most cross-community support. I'm going to 

actually point to Origin of Livestock as a success 

story here, that in around 2018 the community 

really joined together on the priority of Origin 

of Livestock in a way we hadn't seen before with 

that particular rule.

The planets aligned; there were lots 

of communication on the importance of Origin of 

Livestock and why it was important across the 

sector. And so letters came in from folks who 

weren't even part of the livestock community, but 

understood the importance of Origin of Livestock 

to the community. So for needs with the most 

cross-community support, Origin of Livestock's a 

really good example of why. It's still underway, 
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but it is still a priority and it hasn't fallen 

off since it was picked up in 2018.

Will resolve known market 

inconsistencies. When we can describe the problem 

really clearly in terms of market inconsistency 

and market impacts, that really helps. This is 

one where I would also say that Origin of Livestock 

is another good example. So I'm going to kind 

of lay out, there are a couple of reasons of why 

you want a rule.

So one may be consumer expectations and 

one may be competitive fairness for producers. 

Both are important, but some rules are going to 

sell better using one argument over another. So 

when I started hearing about Origin of Livestock 

when I first joined the program, it was sort of 

explained as a consumer expectations thing. Well, 

consumers need to trust the seal and this is really 

important for that.

I'm going to tell a little story. I 

was at a -- it was one of the National Organic 

Coalition pre-meetings, and I happened to be 
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sitting next to a consumer advocacy lead. So it 

was somebody who led a consumer advocacy group, 

and we were talking about Origin of Livestock. 

She said to me you know, she said "I get why it's 

important to them, but consumers don't really get 

this stuff."

I thought it was very telling that 

consumers, that that is a very detailed rule, and 

expecting consumers to understand it or to rally 

around that is -- and this was somebody in the 

community, in the room who didn't actually buy that 

sell. When the community started selling Origin 

of Livestock as a competitive practices problem, 

that's when it got sold. That's when the buy-in 

came.

So really think about do you have the 

data to support the fact that consumers care about 

this. If you do great, we want it, let us know. 

But that takes some pretty specific questions in 

consumer surveys to show that this is an area. 

There are some good high level questions about 

standards, some good high level questions about 
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animal care and welfare.

But Origin of Livestock's pretty 

specialized, and so think through what is the 

explanatory factor that's really going to grab the 

people who will make this a priority. And so 

Origin of Livestock's another good example that 

when the message shifted a bit to being really about 

competitive practices within the organic 

community, that's kind of when at least on the 

inside I saw it click.

Now you can argue with some of this. 

I'm telling you from the inside how that process 

has worked. My goal is to share with you sort of 

the NOP perspective on how this plays out as we've 

seen it. We're all learning, and so I am trying 

to share with you how I have seen that play out.

And then fourth, when the economic 

benefits are clear. This has been particularly 

the case for strengthening organic enforcement. 

You know, we did try something pretty different 

in the economic analysis for SOE, where we talked 

about deterred fraud and that you can estimate, 
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you know, how much food fraud there is and you can 

estimate how much food fraud would be prevented 

by the provisions and strengthening organic 

enforcement.

Jean did a good job of justifying it. 

Any time we have numbers helps. Any time we have 

numbers helps, and so different administrations 

are going to feel differently about quantitative 

and qualitative analysis and cost-benefit. The 

cost-benefit is part of the dynamic.

And so, you know, we often hear well 

organic is voluntarily and therefore sort of the 

cost-benefit thing shouldn't apply. Right now it 

does. It is part of the equations. We are part 

of the federal rubric where cost-benefit analysis, 

regulatory impact analyses, all of those features 

of the Administrative Procedures Act really 

matter. So when we can articulate what the 

benefits are, that can make a difference.

So those are examples of factors that 

contribute to success, and it also helps explain 

when things aren't quite as either successful or 
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maybe slowed down a little bit or face kind of 

hiccups. On this one, again I hesitate to bring 

up examples because -- but I think it's important, 

is I'm going to on this one use native ecosystems 

as an example.

There are parts of the -- there's been 

a number of public comments about the importance 

of pushing that along, and so I do want to pull 

it just as an example of when these four things 

are a little bit sort of more problematic. There 

were parts of that recommendation that aren't 

covered by the Organic Foods Production Act. 

They're really not authorized by the Production 

Act. 

That's automatically going to sort of 

slow things down. If Congress did not authorize 

something that's being called for, particularly 

on something that would have significant economic 

impact, that's automatically going to sort of raise 

a bunch of questions. Native ecosystems, there 

are some very strong champions for it in the 

community. 
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It's also one where there are some 

people, some groups out there that actually have 

some hesitation about it, about the barriers that 

it may create for entry. So there's some, you 

know, compelling concerns about that particular 

recommendation.

The economic benefits, that's another 

one where it is -- can be hard to articulate what 

the economic benefit of that rule would be. Where 

are the numbers? What can we learn from those 

numbers? And so as you are thinking about what 

your priorities are, thinking about what makes 

projects successful and how to frame them in those 

terms, is kind of the goal of what I was hoping 

to cover here. There is a lot of interest in moving 

forward many NOSB recommendations.

I do want to highlight how much has been 

done. There have been more than 600 

recommendations from the National Organic 

Standards Board since 1992. It's about 30 years. 

For about 15 of those 30 years, the Board was 

actually bigger than the staff, right, and so it 
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didn't have as many resources as we have today.

And the NOP has implemented more than 

85 percent of the practice standards 

recommendations. They're not always rules. 

Sometimes they'll be training. Sometimes they're 

instructions. Sometimes they're guidance, 

sometimes they're memos to the Board.

But we have implemented a great number 

of the recommendations that have come from the 

Board and the vast majority of the materials 

recommendations. Now I know there are a few that 

have not been moved forward, and we have forwarded 

a lot of those recommendations. We have acted on 

those. So I just wanted to sort of share some of 

those numbers.

So I'm going to take the next step to 

therefore what? And so if you have a rulemaking 

that you're interested in advancing -- and I think 

we've got some good ones that have been raised 

certainly through the public comment process --

how did you do that? What are some of the best 

-- what are some of the best ways of doing that?
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This is -- I didn't -- I don't think 

I had a slide on it, but I touched on this at the 

beginning of the last administration. So I was 

getting a lot of questions like I'm getting now 

of well how best to communicate our priorities to 

a new administration. How do we go about doing 

that?

Again, a learning process for you, a 

learning process for me in terms of watching the 

process of what works best and most effectively. 

So I wanted to share from my observations what 

seems to be most successful in getting things --

getting things moving along. And so things that 

I have seen that are effective ways, we're talking 

about writing here, written communication.

Organization letters that reflect 

membership consensus. And so when there is a 

membership organization, a group of certifiers, 

trade organizations, even better when you can get 

multiple organizations to agree and all sign onto 

a letter that reflect membership consensus, where 

the communication indicates that that consensus 
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has been reached.

Again, Origin of Livestock is a really 

good example of where there were a lot of letters 

that came in from literally groups of groups 

talking about this, with a fair amount of 

information about the impact and some stories. 

Sign on letters that explain impacts and provide 

concrete data are very useful. 

So sign on letters -- for folks who 

don't know what that is -- is an organization sort 

of spearheads a letter and then farmers can sign 

on, businesses can sign onto that letter saying 

yes, we agree with that, with this letter. Letters 

that really substantiate cross sector support. 

So it's not just about crops, not just about 

livestock, not just about consumers, not just about 

handlers, but everybody working across the organic 

community is willing to support it.

So we're getting letters from a variety 

of different places. We're getting it from trade, 

we're getting it from advocacy groups, we're 

getting it from consumer groups, we're getting it 
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from certifiers. When we get letters from wow, 

when you have these two groups agreeing on this, 

that's really a big deal. That's very helpful.

I would say also be clear and honest 

about what the current state is and why the to be 

is important. So be clear and honest about the 

as-is and why the to be state is important. On 

this one, because that's a little abstract, I'm 

going to give a couple of examples on this bullet 

about being honest and clear about the as-is and 

why the to be is important. 

So again, I'm going to tell a story. 

A few years ago we started to get some letters 

in on gene editing -- on gene editing. The letters 

said well, the NOSB has recommended that gene 

editing be prohibited, so you need to do that right 

away. I got a call saying whoa, gene editing's 

allowed? I would never have thought gene editing 

is allowed. Really, gene -- because I got this 

-- we have the letter that says that it's being 

recommended that it be prohibited. 

It actually took a little bit to 
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explain, nope it's already prohibited. So here's 

the language from the regulations, and so if you 

read the regulations, gene editing is prohibited. 

But that took a little bit of work to actually 

convince people that their assumption was actually 

correct. It is prohibited. Well why are they 

recommending that it be prohibited if it's already 

prohibited?

So being very clear that this is 

prohibited and this is why we're giving the 

recommendation, or this is why we're supporting 

the recommendation is that the regs say this and 

it could be misinterpreted or it actually is being 

misinterpreted, or this is important because.

But providing that as is context of what 

the current state is, because frankly that took 

a little bit of work to -- because people who didn't 

think gene editing would ever be allowed all of 

a sudden had a question about it because they were 

getting all of these letters saying well, it should 

be prohibited. Well, it already is. So be clear 

on the as is when you're describing the situation 
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and why you think something different is needed. 

What problem will that solve to do something 

different?

You know I would say this is one where 

-- and again I'm going to push all the big topics 

here. This is where containers and hydroponics 

I think it's important to openly communicate about 

the as is in a fact-based way. So I get letters 

-- we get letters about containers that do explain 

sort of the entire history about what happened with 

the Board, but they don't stop with the 2010 

recommendation. 

That they cover what happened after 

that, including the most recent lawsuit on 

hydroponics, which has now ended. By painting the 

whole picture and then talking about what's next, 

what should a to b be, then it frames the arc and 

you can still frame that in how you think it should 

go.

But when you leave out the parts of the 

story that don't necessarily support your 

position, it kind of -- it leaves, but wait, I 
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thought this stuff happened after that. Why are 

-- you know, why isn't it the full picture? It 

is better to be open and honest about what the full 

picture has been up to this point in time, and then 

talk about what you would like the to be to be and 

why and what you think the impact and the importance 

is. 

So sort of selective storytelling, it 

doesn't help decision makers form the complete 

picture. Lay out all the facts. 

And then think through what can -- who 

can act. Think through who can act. There are 

things that we get here at the program that tell 

us what Congress should do, which is fine. We do 

get technical assistance questions from Congress 

and we can communicate some of that through 

technical assistance.

But there are lots of groups who have 

connections with Congress, when going to Hill days. 

I'm talking about, you know, your fly-in outreach 

days, fly-in meaning you fly in and talk to the 

Congressperson. Lots of organic groups that do 
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that know which of the most important topics you 

want to bring to Congress, versus what are things 

that USDA and the program can do.

We have different roles, and so for 

something that doesn't have authority right now 

through the Organic Foods Production Act, or if 

you think that the current system of certification 

isn't working, that those are things that are set 

in the Act and those are things that Congress can 

control.

So again we're happy to hear it, and 

thinking through who might be the best recipient 

of that particular letter or topic can serve your 

purposes in effective communication. 

So what happens when something gets to 

the building here? So when something gets to the 

USDA proverbial building -- now we're getting those 

things virtually which is good -- if they are sent 

to the Secretary or to MRP --- so Deputy 

Undersecretary Mae Wu or when we get an 

undersecretary, an undersecretary, they are 

generally assigned through a process called 
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controlled correspondence.

And so that means they enter into an 

accountable mail system where answers, incoming 

letters, and responses are tracked, and they go 

through a whole lot of hands in the building before 

you receive the letter on the other end. 

Now sometimes when you actually get the 

letter, it may say something like we're looking 

at this or we're evaluating priorities, or here 

are some things that are happening on this. It 

may feel a little well, wait. I wanted you to tell 

me it was on the regulatory agenda tomorrow and 

you didn't quite get that response.

But there is value in the process, 

because as that letter moved its way through the 

review process within USDA, a whole lot of people 

read about what your priority is, why it's 

important to you, and our response. So how we are 

responding in this moment. That's another area 

where I think Origin of Livestock really made a 

difference, because we had a lot of letters on 

Origin of Livestock where the same people in the 
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building were seeing the responses over and over 

and over again and really wow, okay. We get it.

And sometimes it takes a lot of letter 

writing and it takes a lot of groups, and it takes 

a lot of discussion to move those things forward. 

There are a lot of projects that people would like 

us to work on, and so really figuring out which 

ones are going to be the highest priority takes 

this process. It helps get the priorities and all 

the differing perspectives on the radar. 

Now there are some times where things 

are important and are going to end up being 

constrained by the pipeline. So when I talk about 

the pipeline, I am talking about the USDA review 

process that we are competing with a whole lot of 

other USDA agencies and programs for the time of 

the lawyers, for the time of the reviewers and all 

the different parts of USDA that have to look at 

these rules.

Every organization is going to have 

constraints. So one of the constraints is not only 

what the program can do but the throughput during 
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the clearance process, and the throughput at the 

Office of Management and Budget, how many rules 

that they can take in from any particular agency 

or program.

That is going to force some 

prioritization because of the pipeline. So 

thinking through again impact, thinking through 

how to package rules and how to sell rules in order

to be prioritized is right now part of the 

framework. That is part of the process.

So I'm going to give an example of what 

I might have done differently a few years ago, 

because I've learned a whole lot over the past few 

years. I think we all have. Four rules that tend 

to come up on the list of things that we haven't 

done yet are apiculture, so bees; pet food; 

mushrooms; and aquaculture. So those are four 

rules and they're all practice standards.

So sort of an interesting collection 

of all the different rules that people have some 

interest in. Knowing what we know about the rule 

pipeline now and how to sell rules, one of the 
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things we might have considered at the time would 

be to think about all of those rules actually 

together. So they may be different producer 

groups; they may be different stakeholder groups 

involved.

But they're all oriented around market 

development, about developing new sectors of the 

organic market, of providing clarity in different 

areas. So might have been interesting at the time 

to think about how could we have sort of thought 

about those as kind of a package deal, one omnibus 

rule that covered all of these different things.

It's an interesting -- I don't know if 

we could have sold that or not and it's an 

interesting way to start thinking about rules in 

a different way. Pet food's another, within that 

collection another really good example, like I 

talked with the Origin of Livestock. Do consumers 

get it? Maybe, maybe not. It is very easy to sell 

as a competitive practices rule.

Pet food's another good one, that when 

you first take sort of pet food at face value, it 
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kind of feeds into -- I'll just again be honest 

about it -- some of that really, pet food, organic 

pet food? They didn't think we were elitist 

enough? And so -- and I've had people say that 

to me.

Whereas actually pet food is really 

actually a livestock rule, that pet food would help 

the livestock sector of the organic community. 

How do you make the maximum use of animals? I think 

that if it had been originally kind of positioned 

in that way, it might have actually been -- it would 

have just been framed and taken in differently.

So again, there's a lot of interest in 

standards development. So I wanted to really 

pause and reflect on our experience over the past 

few years through a few administrations now, in 

learning how to communicate about these things 

differently. Because I know folks are frustrated. 

I know you're frustrated about the NOSB 

recommendations that have not moved forward.

I wanted to share today some of the 

steps that may help shift that conversation in 
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different ways, as we are all kind of learning, 

learning a new team. So I am going to pause and 

breathe and take a glass of water, and then I'm 

going to close up with the last two slides here. 

So bear with me for a moment.

(Pause.)

DR. TUCKER: Okay. I want to be I 

think now the third or fourth person to remind 

everyone of the upcoming call for nominations for 

the Board. This is a really important process. 

I do want to echo what Steve said. If you don't 

succeed at first, try, try, try again. There are 

many, many people on the Board who applied more 

than once, and not just this board but, you know, 

past boards.

And so it really is about the mix at 

that time. There are so many forms of diversity 

and getting the right combination of the right 

people at the right time is -- it's really 

important. So if you, if you applied and it didn't 

work out, you know A, your name is now known in 

the building and that's never, you know, a bad 
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thing, and try again, try again. Some people have 

tried multiple times before they got on the Board, 

but they got on the Board. So please do try again 

if you didn't make it the first time.

The four categories, this was said 

before, but individual owning or operating an 

organic farming operation or an employee of that 

operation; expertise in environmental protection; 

resource conservation; an individual representing 

public interest or consumer interest groups; and 

the scientists, toxicology, ecology or 

biochemistry.

And another kind of plug for the coffee 

with the Board. Again that's on May 4th at 3:00 

p.m. Eastern. It's really the Board talking. It 

won't be NOP people talking. It's really how do 

you go talk to the Board about -- so please. We 

do hope folks will take advantage of the 

opportunity to actually talk to the folks who are 

serving.

And then finally I wanted to share for 

everybody an upcoming funding opportunity, and 
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this does relate to the human capital work, another 

really good example of work that has been happening 

across the community, where there is clear passion 

and clear commitment across multiple groups and 

it is a program priority. So a number of folks 

are contributing to the human capital 

conversation.

We will be issuing likely early next 

week a call for proposals. So at the beginning 

of May, there will be a call for proposals. It 

will be distributed through the Organic Insider. 

It will list multiple candidate projects that 

could be funded. Some of this is real time kind 

of agile project development that as the Board has 

been working on this topic, we have also been 

working on creating this funding opportunity.

So it has been a bit of a side by side, 

well-informed, integrated process. We've also 

been getting feedback from certifiers and ACA and 

IOIA, so Accredited Certifiers Association and the 

International Organic Inspectors Association, as 

well as input from industry and community groups.
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So that funding opportunity will list 

multiple candidate projects. It will be a 

multiple award thing. So it's sort of like Sound 

and Sensible that we did a few years ago, where 

we made multiple awards off of proposals that came 

in. In this instance, we're going to be use the 

tool called a cooperative agreement. It's not a 

contract, but it's not a grant. It is somewhere 

in between, and we only enter in cooperative 

agreements with a non-profit.

So a non-profit, a 501(c)(3) needs to 

lead the project team for it to be a cooperative 

agreement. We do encourage teaming with a focus 

on equity and diversity. So if you look around 

your teaming your teams, and it's looking like 

you're not quite as diverse, then we would 

encourage you to consider how you're going to 

broaden it. 

This is part of the broader equity and 

diversity conversations. How do we encourage 

forces to join that perhaps have not joined before 

to create this greater good across, across the 
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community? So appreciate all the work that NOSB 

has put into this topic, as well as ACA and IOIA 

and other organizations. So look for that the 

Organic Insider next week.

So I am going to now stop sharing, and 

I think we still have plenty of time for questions 

and answers with the Board. So Steve, turning it 

over to you for that process. I am out of water.

MR. ELA: Thanks. Thank you so much, 

Jenny. We'll in deference to, you know, livestock 

welfare, try not to dry you out too much here. 

But I guess I want to thank you so much for your 

comments. Obviously you've addressed things that 

have been on Board members' and stakeholders' 

minds. 

I appreciate your addressing those 

outstanding items that have not been run through 

the rulemaking process. Obviously, you know there 

are a number of groups that are -- that's high on 

their radar screen right now. Now I think the 

bundling of things together makes a lot of sense, 

and you know, hopefully we can advance some of those 
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on. 

But I also -- I think your point that 

so many things have been advanced already is --

it's very good to remember about the positive 

aspects as well as what the work we still have to 

do. So with that, I am going to turn it over 

to -- well, I'm not going to turn it over, but I 

am going to facilitate questions from the Board 

to Jenny. 

So if the Board members would raise 

their hand and if for some reason raising your hand 

escapes my attention, please feel free to jump in 

and I will do my best to recognize you. So are 

there are people, the Board members that want to 

ask Jenny any questions? One of the Board members 

is noting that may not be able to raise their hands. 

So go ahead. You want to make a

MR. TURNER: Yeah, I do have a question 

Steve, thanks. So thanks Jenny, great remarks. 

I just want to reiterate concerns that I 

previously made at several organic stakeholder 

meetings, and Steve made his remarks that access 
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to the organic movement or organic certification 

does not reflect our country's extraordinary 

racial and ethnic diversity.

I continue to reminded of this on our 

Board calls and our public comment webinars, and 

looking broadly across the organic landscape. 

We've got to do better on diversity and inclusion, 

not because the current administration has called 

it a priority, but because it makes our 

communities, our systems, our institutions and our 

world fundamentally better. 

So in addition to improving Board 

recruitment outreach to under-represented groups, 

I just want to flag that one concrete way for the 

NOP to elevate this issue is to ensure that all 

NOP resources are available in languages other than 

English. Currently in the NOP Document and 

Resources Available in Spanish page on the website, 

the link to the organic regulations has Spanish 

links to an English version of the regulations, 

and the link to the NOP handbook in Spanish is 

broken.
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So can you talk a little bit more about 

the program's ongoing plans to address the issue? 

You mentioned it in your human capital remarks, 

but I'd just love to hear you talk about it a little 

more broadly.

DR. TUCKER: Yeah. So let me talk 

first about the Spanish issue. We are aware of 

that and next week we are going to be issuing 

Organic Insider that points to a whole bunch of 

Spanish translation resources, including the 

regulations, an updated translation of the 

regulations and some handbooks. So we really, 

really hope to get that out before the NOSB meeting, 

because it is something we've been, you know, the 

community has asked for and we agree with the need 

for.

So I think we had invested some work 

in that a few years ago, and unfortunately I think 

content governance was a bit of a problem on that, 

as how do you kind of keep up with it. I think 

we are now with more resources in a much better 

position to keep up with that. So we need to --
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we will get that information out and we will clean 

up those old links in order to make those materials 

more accessible.

So that can help the translation of 

materials into Spanish. We do know that that is 

a particularly important language and there may 

be others. So we're going to continue to look at 

what is the distribution of needs out there. 

Spanish was a very, very important step for us to 

complete. 

I think the other -- this human capital 

area in the call for proposal is going to emphasize 

equity and diversity as part of the evaluation 

criteria. And so we will reward proposals that 

really take a stand in this issue, and have a 

concrete way of doing projects that support equity 

and diversity. So I do encourage teaming 

relationships because that's how this starts.

I had a boss once that said 

collaboration is a wonderful idea. It only 

happens when people actually have projects to work 

on together. It takes, you know, concrete things
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for people to come together and do in order to build 

that broader collaborative framework and frankly 

grow, grow the pool of folks who are in the group 

and make that group broader.

Diversity of the Board is a challenge 

because diversity in the organic community is a 

challenge. I think we will continue to do 

outreach. The human capital work will not have 

an impact in the next two months, but it might have 

an impact in the next two years. So we have to 

take short-term and long-term steps on this issue 

collectively.

I would ask everybody on the line, there 

are 176 attendees on my computer right now. If 

every single one of you pick up the phone and call 

somebody and encourage them to apply for the Board, 

I think that could really make a difference. You 

know, there are a number of folks who when I've 

reached out to them and said, hey have you 

considered applying to the Board? Well you know 

people have been encouraging me to, and I hadn't 

really thought I was ready. But you know people 
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are telling me maybe I should.

You know, there are a couple of Board 

members I'm looking at right now who said that, 

that wow, yeah. It took somebody calling me before 

I felt comfortable doing it. 

So I challenge all of you, pick up the 

phone and call somebody, and tell them that you 

think they would be a great member of the Board 

and think about what, who are some people that might 

not occur to you to pick up the phone call 

immediately. But if you thought of a broader pool, 

maybe people weren't first on your rolodex, but 

you knew well enough to give them a call because 

maybe they look and sound different from you. That 

would be a good phone call to make.

MR. TURNER: Thanks for the call to 

action, Jenny.

MR. ELA: Yeah. Thank you Wood for 

asking that question. We're going to go to Rick, 

then Kim and then Amy and then Kyla. I know some 

Board members are having trouble with the raise 

hand function. So just text me if you, if you want 
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to ask a question. So Rick, go ahead.

MS. ARSENAULT: Rick, you're on mute.

MR. ELA: Rick, you're on mute.

MS. ARSENAULT: Still.

(Pause.)

MR. GREENWOOD: How's that?

MR. ELA: There you go. That's 

better.

MR. GREENWOOD: Jenny, you missed all 

my best comments. But anyhow, no. Really 

appreciated your comments, and a couple of weeks 

ago at one of the executive meetings, I had 

mentioned the form letters that we receive from 

the group. You had talked about that a little bit 

in your comments about letter writing.

I'm wondering if you could go over that 

for the audience, because I thought it was 

instructive since we all as Board members go 

through the 2,300 pages of letters and many times 

you end up with 100 that are exactly the same. 

I just wanted basically everyone to hear your 

comments about those kinds of letters.
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DR. TUCKER: Yeah. I was, I was trying 

to focus on what are the positive good things and 

ways of doing this. So form letters have value, 

and so certainly in the public comment process both 

for the Board and -- Board comments and for 

rulemaking, form letters help communicate the 

number of people who may feel a certain way.

And any time somebody does original 

writing, that's going to make a bigger difference. 

So any time a letter can be more personalized and 

sort of tell the story of their farm or their 

business, I think we will generally sort of -- when 

we're cataloguing public comments for rules, we 

will tend to okay, all of these letters were about 

the same. There were X number of people who felt 

this way, and so that it goes side by side with 

and this organization wrote about this, this 

organization wrote about that, this collection of 

folks write about this.

And so it is as effective if not more 

effective simply for the paper management to have 

the sign on letter, where it is a single letter 
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that multiple people sign on. That has as much 

or more value than 250 of the exact same letter 

that Michelle or somebody else has to kind of upload 

by hand.

So it is, those sign on letters it's 

just -- anything, any time you can make things a 

little bit easier for civil servants or the ones 

that end up having to upload all this stuff, 

honestly it does make, it makes a difference. I 

would say the least effective ones in that light 

are the ones where people on a website kind of click 

a button and that automatically sends email into 

my email system.

And so there have been times where I 

log in in the morning, a bunch of things I need 

to do like getting Origin of Livestock over to the 

Office of General Counsel, and I can't really do 

that because, you know, in the first ten minutes 

of my day, you know, there are 100 emails all on 

the same thing that has nothing to do with my actual 

regulatory authority.

But it's an online thing that now a 
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bunch of people are clicking on that is going into 

my inbox. So that, it just -- those are the least 

effective in terms of impact, in terms of really 

moving the conversation forward. I've gotten four 

or five of those campaigns over the last couple 

of years.

I do take note of it. I certainly send 

a note to the powers that be that say okay, we've 

got a campaign on this. But those are the ones 

that tend to be the least, the least effective. 

Then my email runs really slow for three days while 

email sorts through and moves them all into another 

folder. It takes me, you know, a half an hour or 

more to get Origin of Livestock over to the Office 

of General Counsel.

I'm actually using that as a real 

example. I really needed to get something over, 

and I couldn't even find the right email because 

there were literally hundreds of these coming into 

my email box. So again, civil servants, we really 

-- we are here to serve, and so help us help you.

MR. ELA: Okay. Thank you Jenny. 
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Rick, you're still on mute. Okay, we'll move on. 

So we've got -- at the point we've got about 25 

minutes. We could go a little bit over, but if 

people ask questions, if you can be -- or make 

comments just think of the time constraints. We 

want to hear from as many people as we can.

So we've got Kim and Amy, then Kyla, 

then Asa then Carolyn. So Kim, you're up.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thanks Steve. Jenny, 

first I want to say thank you for the information 

around the strengthening of the import program, 

as well as the communication that the NOP put 

together in a separate webinar not too long ago. 

Since that time, and actually even since January 

when the information went into effect stating that 

the NOP (audio interference) no longer, you know, 

we're in the middle of a pandemic.

Across the news most recently is 

India's COVID intensified, intensity has really 

been the highlight. In addition to that, the Suez 

Canal, I'll use that as an example of freight being 

a large concern on imported products that are 
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legitimate organic products.

Is the NOP taking any stance or making 

any adjustments with the time line or with feed 

ingredients as far as being organically certified 

for producers in this time frame?

DR. TUCKER: A great, very very 

practical question, and certainly COVID is still 

very, very much with us around the world. So I 

think the key term that you brought up is legitimate 

trade, is how do we facilitate legitimate trade? 

I think the time line that we laid out for India 

was purposeful in facilitating legitimate trade 

while giving people time for this transition.

So the deadlines are by January, by 

July, we said this in January but July, anyone who 

wants to continue to ship to the United States or 

has ingredients coming to the United States, they 

should apply for certification. They don't have 

to have completed certification, but they need to 

have applied for certification.

So that gives us more oversight so we 

know who's out there, and what certifiers are out 
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there so we can look at their control systems to 

make sure that they are managing those applications 

appropriately. You know, there have been other 

situations where countries have imposed new 

requirements and have said well, you have to have 

certification done by this date and they don't give 

a whole lot of time.

We actually believe the approach with 

India is a good model for how to do it, and that 

allows for operations to -- we get more visibility 

on what's happening in the markets, while also 

giving people time to complete the process so that 

legitimate traders can continue to trade.

We're going to keep an eye on the 

deadlines. We're not quite ready, we're not ready 

to shift any deadlines at this point based on 

monitoring progress. There are a number of 

factors happening with India. There is a 

complaint that was submitted to the International 

Trade Commission on that. COVID is a variable.

India has made some changes in their 

oversight system which we welcome, but that has 
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also changed some of the supplies coming out of 

India. So our number one priority has to be 

protecting the markets, and creating a fair and 

competitive playing field. 

So that feeds to your second question 

about any kind of provisions for sort of 

non-organic ingredients or fraud. So I do want 

to make it, you know, very clear. Our first 

priority has to be protecting the integrity of the 

seal and a fair and competitive marketplace.

So we are starting to hear about some 

businesses that might be interested in sort of 

requests for exception exemption to be able to use 

non-organic feeds because there are supply 

constraints now for a variety of reasons. Those 

are generally handled through a process called the 

temporary variance process, where they come to NOP 

from certifiers.

I do want to be really clear both with 

the Board and the public here, it is long-standing 

published policy and practice that temporary 

variances may not be granted for feeding 
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non-organic feed to organic livestock, period. 

So that is long-standing policy and practice. 

Temporary variances are not granted for feeding 

non-organic feed to organic livestock.

This is in our handbook on NOP 2606 on 

temporary variances. That's been out on the 

website for years. That type of formal and 

informal request has been received in the past, 

and has been rejected each time. And so I, we are 

seeing supply constraints. That is part of the 

market. We believe the approach we're taking with 

India is the right one. We will monitor those 

states. 

But I'd like to not right now commit 

to adjusting them given the progress we're seeing. 

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Great. We are going to go 

to Amy, then Kyla, Asa, Carolyn, Nate and I have 

a question as well. So --

DR. TUCKER: I'll try and keep my 

answers shorter, sorry. 
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MR. ELA: No worries. 

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you Steve and 

thank you Jenny so much for your information and 

your continued commitment to robust enforcement 

and import oversight in the SOE. We really 

appreciate that. In addition to what Kim said, 

can you comment maybe on what, what you anticipate 

on seeing with the changes being made in India and 

some of the maybe countries that are seemingly 

rising in their increase of exports, and these 

countries seem to have substantially different or 

even no country standards. Can you just make a 

general comment on that please?

DR. TUCKER: Sure. General comment on 

that is we are much better able now to see where 

the growth is as it's happening. So this is one 

of the big initiative for the import certificates. 

We are starting to see data flow. There are some 

importers that have voluntarily started to fill 

in import certificates, and we've been investing 

in data visualization so that we can really now 

start to see where our supply is coming.
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And so that's going to help us because 

it allows us to get ahead of the curve, in checking 

to see what the control systems are. Now even if 

a country doesn't have their own organic standards, 

organic businesses there can be certified to our 

standard. So business in for example the Ukraine 

can be certified to the USDA standards by a USDA 

certifier.

We oversee those certifiers. As soon 

as we see a count of certified operations start 

to increase some place, that gives us an early 

detection system so we can find out how those 

certifiers are doing in overseeing that market. 

I have heard anecdotally it's hard to find a 

certifier in some parts of the world right now.

But in high risk markets, certifiers 

don't want to compromise their accreditation, and 

they have now seen enough certifiers lose it or 

lose a satellite office or have to constrain their 

services. They don't want to be one of those 

certifiers. Many of them are voluntarily saying 

we do not have the administrative capacity to 
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certify responsibly in this part of the world.

Again, we'll see some -- we do see some 

supply constraints. Because of that, protecting 

integrity has to be the first priority. 

MR. ELA: Thanks Jenny. We'll go to 

Kyla next.

MS. SMITH: Steve, can you hear me 

okay? I had to change my headset, so we're good?

MR. ELA: It's better, yes.

MS. SMITH: Okay, thank you. Jenny, 

thanks so much. Mine's more just of a comment, 

so I'll be brief. I just wanted to thank you for 

the candidness of where things are in the 

rulemaking process, and I would just encourage the 

program to continue to do that, so that 

stakeholders are all on the same page on where these 

rules sort of end up. Sometimes they end up just 

sort of in the ether.

So I really appreciated the update and 

hearing what makes a successful rule get through 

that narrow pipeline. So I just want to encourage 

the program to continue to give such candid updates 
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of things. 

MR. ELA: Thanks Kyla, and thank you 

Jenny for that candidness. I appreciate that as 

well. We're going to next go to Asa, then Carolyn, 

Nate and then myself. Asa, go ahead.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you. I just have 

kind of a question and comment, and you did address 

some of my concerns and Mae as well, about the need 

to move ahead on List 4 and List 3 inerts. I think 

that's a real high priority. It's been around for 

a long time, and also reflects not just an 

obligation to the community but also an obligation 

to the Board.

You know as you know the Board is 

extremely busy. It's volunteer, and I think it's 

just respectful to the Board process to make sure 

that we don't spend time on subjects that don't 

really need it. There was, I think, a lot of drama 

and a lot of hours spent in the previous year around 

inerts that really shouldn't have happened. So 

it's great to hear that that's moving forward.

Similarly with the Origin of Livestock. 
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I'm glad to hear that there's going to be such 

an emphasis on that, and that's a really important 

outstanding issue that needs to move forward as 

quickly as possible. 

One last comment too about native 

ecosystems and the needs of OFPA. One, there needs 

to be a cost-benefit analysis, and I think there 

we get into some hard issues with organic. One 

of course amid ecosystems there's ecosystem 

services that can be quantified, although I think 

it's dangerous to try to put a monetary value on 

the environment, but sometimes it's necessary, and 

then also it reflects values.

A lot of the organic industry and 

systems are based on values, not just on dollars. 

So to the extent that we can incorporate those 

values into setting priorities for rulemaking, 

especially for something like native ecosystems, 

I think that's something as a community and as an 

agency we need to consider. Thank you.

DR. TUCKER: Yeah, I would say we need 

both, right. We need both the values and we need 
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the stuff that are in the Administrative Procedures 

Act. So yes, it is a balance. I really appreciate 

the comment, Asa. We do take the Board's time and 

care seriously. 

This is one because somebody's going 

to ask me about containers. So I might as well 

use this as an opportunity to sort of say that. 

I think right now it's a good question as to what. 

I'm sensitive about the Board's time. I know 

there are a lot of folks who would like you to work 

on and many of you would like to work on containers. 

How do we do that in a way that will 

end up yielding a product that can be moved forward 

with? So I don't want you working on containers 

for two or three years and then say oh well thanks 

for your work, see ya. You know, I think we need, 

we would need to really talk through do we have 

a commitment to move forward with rulemaking if 

we work on that agenda item.

That's going to take some buy-in and 

sort of looking what is the long-term arc of this? 
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How would we get from containers discussion in 

the Board through a rulemaking process? What does 

that look like? I think that -- and what is the 

Board willing to work on, and what does that --

what does that look like?

So that I think comes naturally out of 

that conversation out of mutual respect. I don't 

want you working on things I can't do anything about 

either. So it is a tension, Steve brought it up 

earlier, well sometimes we just want to be able 

to work on things to advance them. 

Well I'm fine with that and then, but 

if I get beat up about it, you know, two years down 

the road, why haven't you done anything about it? 

Well, we said we weren't going to do anything with

it right away. Well then that just becomes a 

source of tension and push-pull.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you, and I 

appreciate that. To extend the comment, one last 

thing sorry Steve, is about time and diversity on 

the Board. You know, I was recently nominated for 

a SAP position with a FIFRA advisory panel. EPA 
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pays $50 an hour for people's time. You know, I 

think it's important but the volunteer nature of 

our Board is very valuable.

But if we really want to diversify the 

Board, we have to make it accessible to people who 

don't have resources and time to devote to this, 

because it may have costs elsewhere in their --

in their lives. I think that's really important.

MR. ELA: All right. We're going to 

go to Carolyn, then Nate and then myself. So 

Carolyn, go ahead.

DR. DIMITRI: Great, thank you. 

Jenny, thank you so much for your transparent and 

direct introduction. I really appreciated that 

clarity. I wanted to talk a little bit about the 

competitive practices concept for putting forth 

a new rule, and as you know, it's always challenging 

to talk about competitive practices in cases where 

you don't have really strong and solid data.

Having looked through many of the 

comments in the federal -- comments to the Federal 

Register notices, I often can see the one-sidedness 
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of like the stakeholders' comments, which I can 

understand because that stakeholder is putting 

forth their position.

And I've also kind of read some of 

Federal Register notices of the NOP, which look 

like maybe it could be a little bit strengthened. 

So I wonder, is there any efforts to work with 

like NASS or ERS or other agencies to help get 

better data to look at these really important 

competitive issues, particularly when you're 

looking at like cost differentials across farm size 

for example?

DR. TUCKER: What a great question. 

Yeah, I do think the Organic Data Initiative was 

brought out of a different part of the AMS is 

important. Certainly at NASS, NASS continues to 

do it, organic surveys. Very, very important. 

As far as strengthening organic enforcement, more 

reporting will be required into the Organic 

Integrity Database on acreage. That should be a 

big help.

So I think there are -- we are now better 
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able to look across our systems at trends in the 

data for enforcement purposes. For rule writing, 

the data is hard and so that is a challenge, and 

I do believe that that NASS data is helpful, as 

are other sort of surveys. Public surveys are 

always more defensible in rulemaking than private 

surveys, and that's just sort of part of the --

part of the game there.

Acreage reporting will help a lot in 

understanding what the market impacts are. But 

you know, letters from in the case of Origin of 

Livestock livestock producers, talking about, you 

know, how much cows cost and what are the price 

differentials out there. It does help, helps in 

informing that rule writing process. Data is 

always going to be -- you always want more of it. 

So I appreciate the comments.

DR. DIMITRI: Can I just follow up with 

one more comment? So I think in particular the 

ARMS survey, which actually collects cost of 

production data, they used to really actively 

over-sample organic farms by commodity. I noticed 
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that that's been diminishing over time. I don't 

-- and I'm just throwing that out there for you 

to mull over.

DR. TUCKER: That's really useful 

feedback, and I have learned a bit about ARMS data 

in the work on Origin of Livestock, so not something 

I knew as much about. So I'm learning more about

it, and I know we have several members of the team 

listening in here. So thank you Carolyn.

DR. DIMITRI: Great. Thanks very 

much, Jenny.

MR. ELA: Thank you Carolyn, and 

certainly your data background is going to be a 

huge help to the Board in understanding where some 

of these figures come from. So we have Nate next.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Awesome. Thank you 

so much Jenny. This entire morning's presentation 

has been really clarifying. I feel like I'm lucky 

to have heard a preview of it. 

One thing I was thinking about while 

you were talking this morning though was as a --

for the last ten years or so, I've been privileged 
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to be an organic inspector. When I travel around 

any with new farmers, oftentimes they say oh well 

like the standards in Montana for organic are 

different than the standards in Pennsylvania. 

I'm like no, that's the greatest thing 

about organics. It's the same standard across the 

board for the whole deal. And so and I know as 

part of, you know, one of the three purposes of 

OFPA, consistency of the standard is really one 

of -- I think one of the greatest values of the 

law.

So I look at the backlog of those 20 

recommendations that haven't been acted on, and 

I worry that that consistency is compromised by 

that backlog, because ultimately the community in 

an attempt to clarify the rules and get consistency 

made those recommendations. We've been kind of 

stagnating. 

We are left, especially in the 

certification community, without the ability to 

be consistent, to have certifiers ultimately 

having to be on their own making inconsistent 
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decisions. 

So the question I just wanted to have 

you philosophize on for just a moment is do you 

believe that OFPA made the USDA ultimately the 

decider of what the organics should look like, or 

the community? I realize that is a loaded 

question, and I will ask for the most pithy answer 

because I think we're talking about this a lot this 

meeting. But I would just question just kind of 

your ideas behind that.

DR. TUCKER: So that is what a unique 

framework we have in organic, of the public-private 

partnership of completely public, open, 

transparent standards. Anybody can go and see 

what the organic standards are, and then this group 

of more than 200 people are coming together to talk 

about what those standards should be, and that is 

working within a framework of a federal government, 

that has a whole lot of rules and regulations 

related to rulemaking.

In order to, to protect the process, 

protect the democratic process. And so yeah, 
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there are a lot of gates to rulemaking and I'm kind 

of glad there are, you know, as a citizen. That 

the governing process is hard. It's complicated 

and there are lots of different perspectives.

So the community owns the standards and 

the Act owns the standards. Part of our job as 

a community is how to make that both/and, because 

I think too often it is framed as a conflict where 

it's actually a sign of diversity and richness. 

We've been talking about a diversity a good amount 

and, you know, there's a lot of research that will 

tell you that more diverse teams have more 

conflict. 

I actually think that, you know, 

applies here too, that you have a diversity in 

regulatory frameworks in the public-private 

partnerships. You've got acts, you've got 

communities, you've got values, you've got 

dollars. That's pretty darn diverse when it comes 

to regulatory framework. It's why I come to work 

every day.

And so I think my answer is yes, let's 
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let that diversity and tension and conflict and 

public process and different perspectives, let's 

celebrate that because that's who we are, and 

ultimately that's what will join more people into 

the spirit of organic.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you so much.

MR. ELA: Thanks Jenny. That's a 

great answer, and I always -- personally I know 

sometimes the government process can be sort of 

frustrating because it's so slow, and then on other 

topics I'm so glad it's so slow so that things don't 

yo-yo between this and that. I know it's always 

a tension.

But so my question, Jenny you kind of 

referred to aspects of it I guess is, you know, 

and Nate just talked about lack of consistency. 

I guess I'm personally, you know, as a grower 

worried about that lack of consistency in the 

three-year transition requirement, you know.

I know it is an issue that you mentioned 

at apiculture and aquiculture, that it, you know, 

cuts across greenhouses, containers and mushrooms. 
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And we keep hearing from stakeholders that they 

really are concerned about that lack of consistency 

between some allowing three-year periods and some 

not. 

We've heard generally from National 

Organic Coalition and Organic Farmers Association 

and I think, you know, in some ways even more 

importantly the Associated Treasurers, 

association now. You've mentioned that, you know 

public, government is coming out of your office 

or Carolyn's office or somewhere, that those 

surveys are more poignant than maybe private 

surveys, but the surveys that NOP presented to us 

I think a year ago that really did highlight some 

of those inconsistencies. I mean for me, you know, 

kind of brought up this real question.

I know again that, you know, since the 

ACAs have really put some time in an effort to try 

and come to consensus on this consistency, and they 

haven't completely been able to do so. They're 

asking us for, to address this through formal 

rulemaking in greenhouse and container standards.
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You mentioned cross-community support 

in resolving known inconsistencies, and this 

certainly is a known inconsistency. So I know 

we've asked this question a number of times, but 

do you think this lack of consistency is a problem, 

and how do we move forward on this given that it 

is, I know it's not just a simple fix that, you 

know. How do we take care of this inconsistency?

DR. TUCKER: Yeah, and I think it's a 

great question because I think the other tension 

I didn't mention when Nate was talking is also this 

tension between this overarching framework of the 

Organic Food Production Act and the nuance of 

site-specific conditions and site-specific 

decision-making that every certifier has to do.

The certifiers have a really hard job, 

and I think sometimes I'm a little worried that 

the three-year transition period is framed as a

waiting period. Well actually it has to do with 

the application of prohibited substances. It has 

to do with whether crops are -- have been, are they 

organic?
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So I think agreeing on what the problem 

is and what is going to be the scope of the work 

ahead. So there have been very focused 

conversations now about hydroponics, that the 

lawsuit for that was resolved. I think that that 

now does, it does frame the issue and it provides 

more data for that issue.

So what do we want to work on here? 

Are we working? So I think that's the first 

question, is what problem are we going to address 

here and how we view the three-year transition, 

what the three-year transition means. We need 

to -- I think we all need to go back to what that 

actually means, because a decision may differ 

between different certifiers not because --

because it's not a three-year waiting period. It 

has to do with three years since the application 

prohibited substances.

I think there are some -- some of the, 

and I've said this before, and so there are some 

certifiers that I believe are, you know, they have 

made the choice not to certify certain systems. 
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There are other certifiers that have acknowledged 

to me that they are, that they are taking a more 

conservative interpretation than even they think 

that the regulations support. But they're getting 

so much pushback from their community that they 

feel they need to do that. 

That's again where I think this tension 

between a community and regulatory framework 

occurs. So I do think this conversation needs to 

continue. I think determining what the scope of 

what the Board would work on and what we're moving 

to, what does that look like?

I don't know, see. So I don't 

have -- well, this is the next -- these are the

next 12 steps that we shall engage in. I think 

we are engaging in the conversation and that has 

value.

MR. ELA: Yeah, agreed. So I'm not 

surprised that you don't have an exact schedule 

on that. But you know, I just wanted to keep it 

on the radar screen, because I know some of my 

stakeholders are quite concerned about equitable 
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playing fields. 

Are there other questions? We're 

running just a little bit over time, but I -- this 

is such a valuable time to be able to talk publicly 

with Jenny, and for the full board to participate. 

I would entertain another question if there's 

something that somebody really wants to ask.

I am not seeing any. So Jenny, we know 

these questions and answers really put you on the 

spot, and it's hard to answer some of them because 

of your position. So thank you for being as candid 

as you can, and we really appreciate that. So 

we're going to take a -- let me get my agenda. 

We're going to take a 55 minute lunch 

break. We're going to come back at -- oh, I have 

to get this right, time conversions. Help me out 

Michelle.

MS. ARSENAULT: Three o'clock Eastern, 

noon Pacific.

MR. ELA: Thank you. Yeah, thank you. 

This is the Mountain to Eastern Time Zone that 

just screws me up sometimes. I usually do great. 
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So three o'clock Eastern, and at three o'clock 

Eastern we are going to have a presentation from 

the National Institute of Food and Agriculture 

known as NIFA. 

It really ties into the research 

priorities that we have put out there from the 

Materials Subcommittee over a number of years. 

We've seen those number of questions expand. So 

I think it will be great to hear from the NIFA 

people. We thought we would be in Crystal City, 

where they would be next door and be able to talk 

to us in person, but we're still going to do it 

virtually.

So we'll come back at three o'clock 

Eastern, and enjoy your lunch.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 2:05 p.m. and resumed at 

3:00 p.m.)

MR. ELA: So we will go ahead and get 

started again. Michelle, are you there? Maybe.

MS. ARSENAULT: I am here Steve. I 

just couldn't get to my mute button.
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MR. ELA: Okay, sounds good. We're 

just trying to, you know, keep you nimble. But 

all right. Well, I'm excited about this section 

of the program. We are going to move into a 

presentation by the National Institute of Food and 

Agriculture otherwise known as NIFA.

As everyone knows, we every year put 

forth a list of research priorities from the NOSB. 

We put those out and talk to our stakeholders for 

questions, revisions, thoughts, and then we vote 

on them in the fall. But there's been numerous 

questions from the Board as to where those go or 

if it's an academic exercise.

So we thought it would be great to kind 

of, since we were supposed to be meeting in Crystal 

City and these folks were next door, for them to 

give us an update on NIFA and possibly how our 

research priorities could tie into actually moving 

the state of the science forward. So with that, 

I will turn it over. I'd like to have Mat from 

NIFA. He's the National Science Liaison. He is 

going to introduce himself and the other two people 
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on the panel.

My understanding is he will give a short 

presentation and then we'll open it up for 

questions and comments from the Board, and have 

some give and take from these folks. So Mat 

welcome. We're so glad you made some time for us, 

and I'm really looking forward to your 

presentation. So I'll let you go ahead and 

introduce yourself and the other two members, and 

move on with your presentation.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Thank you Steve, and 

thank you for inviting us to come and share with 

you some of the work that we are doing at NIFA. 

My name is Mat Ngouajio. I have been 

at NIFA for about eight years now. I'm a National 

Science Liaison and before coming to NIFA I was 

a professor at Michigan State University, where 

I spent about 13 years, and I work on the organic 

programs at NIFA. I will ask my colleague Steve 

to introduce himself. Steve.

MR. SMITH: Good afternoon. I'm Steve 
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Smith. I'm National Program Leader for Animal 

Production Systems within NIFA. I've been with 

NIFA oh, between 12 and 13 years now, and I have 

been associated with both of the organic programs 

for the majority of those years. I think probably 

11 of the 12-1/2 years I've been associated with 

these programs and found them very rewarding. 

They've really evolved into quite 

effective programs, and a lot of that is 

attributable to you folks. So thank you for your 

inputs and your help in identifying priorities, 

and again I look forward to visiting with you 

further.

DR. NGOUAJIO: And we have one new 

person on our team, Neerja Tyagi. Neerja, are you 

there?

MS. TYAGI: Yes Mat, I'm here. I'm 

Neerja Tyagi. I'm a program specialist who works 

on the organic programs both of them, OREI and ORG. 

I joined NIFA last year in June. I'm really 

excited to be working with this program.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Okay, thank you. The 
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way we will do this, I will give a short 

presentation and then my colleagues Steve and 

Neerja will join me to answer any question that 

you may have. I will just start by saying again 

thank you for giving us this opportunity.

NIFA is the extramural funding agency 

within USDA. We are a relatively small agency. 

When we are fully staffed, we are about 300 to 

350 people within the agency. But we have a 

significant budget of $1.8 billion, which is 

usually spent on research, education and 

extension, most of that with land grant 

institutions.

So I'll -- organic agriculture is part 

of that portfolio. And that's what we will be 

focusing on today. So next, Michelle.

And we are very, you know, happy too, 

like you all, to see that the organic industry 

continues to grow. And the last survey showed a 

31 percent increase in sales.

The number of farms also increased. 

And the total certified land increased. So, we 
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are very excited at NIFA to look at those numbers 

and hope that we continue to increase. Next one.

But, this is not just here in the U.S. 

that we are observing that increase in the organic 

sector. The same thing is true, similar trends 

are being observed in Europe.

And one thing that is specifically 

interesting in Europe is that we are seeing a growth 

both in production and in processing of organic 

produce. So, that is pretty exciting. Next one.

I will try to go pretty quick here, 

because again, these slides, Michelle told me, that 

they will be available.

And one of the things that we have 

noticed however, which is really not that exciting 

is that the growth in the organic sector has not 

been compounded by a significant or a corresponding 

group in the amount of research and development 

invested by the economies.

This graph shows you some of the major 

world economies, and how much money they are 

spending in research and development. You can see 
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two things.

For the U.S. here, showed with the 

yellow arrow, it is pretty low compared to other 

major economies. So, we are not spending enough 

in research and development.

And second, from 2018 to 2019, that 

investment was pretty flat. So, not enough, but 

with not even increasing over time. Next one.

And we all recognize that we need that 

strong investment in research and innovation, to 

be able to sustain the growth in organic 

agriculture.

But, we are pretty lucky at NIFA that 

we have two programs that have helped us fill that 

gap in research and education and extension in that 

area.

One of the programs is the Organic 

Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative, 

OREI. And the second is the Organic Transitions.

I will be focusing on those two programs 

today. But, I just wanted you to know that those 

are not the only programs that support organic 
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agriculture at NIFA.

We have many, many other programs, 

including our AFRI, which is our flagship program. 

Including the SARE program, including the 

Beginning Farmers Program, and we also invest 

significantly in organic agriculture through the 

Hatch program. Next, Michelle.

And even if we go outside of NIFA, I 

say that NIFA was the original founding agency. 

But, that is not the only one.

If we go outside of NIFA, you will 

notice that many other USDA agencies support 

organic agriculture, including ARS, Agriculture 

Research Service, and the Economic Research 

Service.

And I'm sure Jenny and Michelle, they 

spend a lot of money at the Agricultural Marketing 

Service on organic agriculture. We've got NRCS, 

and many, many other agencies within the USDA. 

Next.

So, what are the challenges that the 

organic agriculture is facing right now? And I 
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will just say that, you know, the issues that we 

are trying to solve in organic agriculture are --

span the entire supply chain.

From the field, the time we put the seed 

in the ground, up to the time when we eat the food, 

we face a lot of challenges. And we need a true 

partnership to be able to solve those challenges.

And I have a graph there showing some 

of our partners that we work with. And you can 

see there that NOSB is very prominent on that graph.

And it tells you how important you are 

to us and to the organic industry. And we use your 

input and also we use input from the Farm Bill, 

from national surveys, from listening sessions, 

meetings, to be able to identify those needs that 

need to be addressed by the organic industry. 

Next.

And those challenges, next slide. 

It's not moving here with me. Okay. We got it 

next one.

So, we really need that option by the 

industry both for issue identification, to set 
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priorities to tell us what issues need to be 

addressed first. And you can clearly see how NOSB 

has been helping with that.

We need those partners to work with USDA 

and to work with Congress with a goal of making 

sure that we have enough funding to support 

research, education, and extension in the area of 

organic agriculture. Next Michelle.

So, Congress has been pretty responsive 

to the call. If you look here, I'm just showing 

a graph for one of our programs, OREI, how much 

funding we have received from Congress through 

time.

Starting back in 2004, the funding was 

just around $4 million. And that increased to $20 

in 2009.

Yeah, you see a big dip there in 2013. 

We all remember that year with sequestration. 

And a lot of programs were not funded.

But, it came back in 2014. And we have 

continued with those for $20 million until 2020.

And this year, 2021, Congress increased 
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our budget to $25 million. Next year it will be 

$30 million.

And 2023, we will have the opportunity 

to have in our hands, $50 million to support organic 

agricultural research. So, Congress has really 

responded to our call. Next.

Okay. Now, within NIFA, we saw that 

the industry has done its job. Congress has done 

its job. So, what have we done at NIFA with that 

funding that we've received?

Within NIFA, we took all the industry 

priorities, whether they came from the White House, 

from the Farm Bill, from NOSB, from all 

stakeholders. We take all that input and 

translate it into what we call the request for 

applications.

That is the call, or some people call 

it the call for proposals. Then we use a very 

strict panel review process to screen those 

applications.

Based only on scientific merits, 

because we thought if we want to stimulate 
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research, cutting edge research in this area, we 

have to base most of our criteria on scientific 

merit.

And then we also used a post-award of 

management. Very close management to make sure 

that the researchers are doing what they promised 

to do. Next.

Now, you will be wondering what -- how 

about the input that will receive, -- no, back one. 

Back one, Michelle. Yes, there you go.

The input that we receive from NOSB. 

How about your priorities that you give to us every 

year?

I will just start by saying, your 

priorities become our priorities. They are 

included in our RFAs, in our two parts for Organic 

Agricultural Research and Extension Initiative, 

and the Organic Transmission. 

However, for most input, sometimes we 

can boil it down to one sentence. Or sometimes 

even just one statement or one word.

But, because your priorities are so 
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important, the best way for us to integrate that 

in the RFA was to come to directly link that in 

the RFA, so that all our applicants can have access 

to them.

And part of the way we use them is, some 

of the applicants use NOSB priorities as a way to 

establish relevance. You know, for us to fund 

research in organic agriculture, it has to be 

organic research.

And a priority from NOSB, when someone 

is addressing that priority, there is no more 

question whether the topic is relevant or not. 

Automatically, they will establish that relevance. 

Next.

And here, I shall go quickly for the 

remainder of my time. So, I'm just showing here 

some of the statistics on the program.

And this graph is showing you the number 

of proposals that we have received over time. The 

yellow bar will be the ones that we have -- were 

declined.

And the green shows you the ones that 
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were funded. So, clearly you can see that a large 

proportion of those programs or those projects, 

are declined.

And over time, they have been 

increasing. They're up and down. Last year we 

received close to 100 projects. Next.

Now, you will ask us also, you know, 

yes, this shows you the same figures. So, a total 

of about 17 thousand projects have been submitted 

to this program. Out of which 356 were funded, 

throughout the lifetime of these two programs. 

Next.

Now, you will ask me, what is the 

success rate of those projects? Other than 2001, 

which was kind of an outlier with 75 percent success 

rate, we have an average of about 24 percent success 

rate for projects submitted to our programs.

It goes up and down, you know, from year 

to year. Some years it's really low, like 18 

percent. Some other years we can go close to 30. 

But, on average, we have 24 percent success rate. 

Next.
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And I'm sure you will be asking us, 

where are those projects coming from?

This is a graph showing the map of the 

country, and where most of the projects on organic 

agriculture come from. You see here the west 

coast, Washington, Oregon, California, big deal.

Texas in the south, Florida. And then 

the remainder, most of the projects will come from 

the north central and northeast region.

So, that is basically where the action 

is in terms of the total number of projects 

submitted.

And you will be asking, so, how about 

the ones that were funded? That is the next graph 

here. And it shows pretty much the same picture.

These are the projects that were 

funded. And we've got Washington state, Oregon, 

Minnesota, New York. Those are the leaders.

But then we follow by California, 

Texas, Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and a 

couple of other parts. So, basically follow the 

same picture there. Next.
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Okay. Some of the good news. When we 

started, I came to NIFA, Steve was already there. 

We have some difficulty funding research projects 

and animal systems.

But, over the last couple of years, we 

have seen some significant increase there. The 

same thing was true with small and minority serving 

institutions.

We have moved the meter a little bit 

also, and we are funding more projects in the 

southern region. That wasn't the case.

We are also seeing an increase in 

success rate for our breeding projects. And in 

fact, breading projects are the most successful 

as you see there on this graph, than the rest of 

the projects submitted to this program. Next.

Okay. So again, I talk about the 

increase in our budget, which was a big win. That 

will give us an opportunity to stimulate research 

and innovation, and to really tackle big challenges 

in the couple of years to follow. Next one.

And we will focus here on the three legs 
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of our stool, which is, continue to promote 

research and innovation, build on extension 

opportunities, and continue to train the next 

generation of organic farmers and leaders.

So, those are still going to be the 

major buckets where most of our funding will go. 

Next.

And then someone will be asking, what 

are the different topics that you are going to be 

covering?

Yes, we will continue to look at things 

like smart tools for use by farmers and processors. 

Things like seed, things like natural substances 

to replace those that are being phased out, or even 

just new products for farmers.

We are very interested in developing 

a tool, a smart tool for enforcement of, you know, 

to be used by agents to support the organic 

integrity. An example would be something that you 

can use to tell if the product is organic or not.

So, those are some of the things that 

we are really excited about. And we also want to 
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better understand the human dimension of organic 

agriculture.

And finally, we want to make sure that 

the research or the knowledge is accessible and 

available to farmers. Next.

On that, and this is the last slide, 

just to show you our contact information. At NIFA, 

myself, Steve, and Neerja.

And the two division directors that 

oversee the programs. One is in Plant Systems, 

and that is John. And Deb is in Animal Systems.

So, on that, I will stop and take any 

question that you may have.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much for that 

presentation. It's so much appreciated how much 

you integrate the NOSB's research priorities.

I did not realize that it was quite that 

strong. So, let me open it up to questions from 

the Board.

It looks like Brian has one. I just 

want to say, Brian is from New York. Just to give 

you a little bit of context of where the Board 
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Members are.

Yes, Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Thank you very much.

DR. NGOUAJIO: And New York receives 

a lot of our funding.

MR. CALDWELL: Well, in fact I worked 

on several projects that were funded by OREI. So, 

we really appreciate it.

I did research at Cornell University, 

so, we -- it's very important to the group at 

Cornell.

But, what I want to ask you about, two 

questions. The first one is, I'm wondering what 

-- exactly what smart tools mean? I'm not sure 

what it means in this context.

But the second one, I guess, is more 

of a comment. And that is that one of the projects 

that I worked on, funded very early on through OREI, 

was a long term systems project.

And I think those are really important 

for understanding that kind of the deeper soil and 

management and economic issues with organic 
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farming.

And that the only point that I want to 

make is that we were funded twice through OREI. 

But then the third round, we were not funded.

And in fact, one of our projects, it 

was a vegetable and a grain experiment, we had to 

drop the vegetable one after a few years due to 

lack of funding. And the grain one did continue.

But, it's such a difficult adolescent 

period for these long term trials. I mean, 

assuming they have validity and they're doing good 

work, so many of them really struggle in, you know, 

in the 10th to the 20th year. And yet that is 

when a lot of the data really starts to become 

meaningful.

But, I'm just wondering how you see, 

I guess, that is a question. I'm wondering how 

you see OREI, you know, sort of working within, 

you know, on that issue.

And then the other one is about the 

smart tools. So, thank you very much.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Okay. Steve, can you 
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take a first crack?

DR. SMITH: Sure. Whether it's from 

the animal side or the plant side, and you know, 

the many facets of this, yeah, we definitely 

recognize your point about the long term investment 

in these longer projects.

The challenge we face is that through 

Congress, appropriations, you know, almost 

exclusively, at least as they come to us, only offer 

a five year funding authority.

So, the longest project that we are 

legally permitted to support is five years. And 

certainly you've been the beneficiary of having 

repeated, you know, awards.

But, just like all the rest of them, 

they are then competing one more time with, you 

know, all the other projects that are submitted. 

And you know, we are not, Mat and Neerja, and I 

are not in a position to where we can influence 

the rankings of the panels.

So, that's the jeopardy you have. And 

I'm not, I honestly am not sure what the best right 
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answer is there. It's a very valid point. 

Particularly when you start talking about soils 

on the crop side, and well even on the animal side 

as it relates to soil issues.

But, I'm certainly open to any thoughts 

or suggestions to how we might get around the 

Congressional guidelines we have.

So, with -- I'll pop it back to Mat and 

let him fill in any facts that I may have missed.

DR. NGOUAJIO: No Steve, I think you 

covered it very well. And we, initially we used 

to fund projects only for three years.

We got this type of comment, and we 

increased the duration of our funding to four years 

and even five years, which is the maximum authority 

for our program.

But now, when it comes to long term 

projects, it will become again, very complicated 

if we, let's say we take five projects, we give 

them 70 percent of our funding, and we maintain 

those five projects for 15 years.

You can clearly understand that the 
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rest of the community is going to come quickly and 

complain why we selected those projects to fund 

on a long term basis.

However, what we do is, we can fund --

we have projects that we have been funding for the 

third round. However, they still need to compete.

And usually when they compete, they are 

at a great advantage, because they can show 

outcomes from previous years. And that puts them 

at a great advantage.

But again, we are still struggling with 

that long term versus every two or three years, 

or four years.

Now, in terms of smart tools, maybe we 

-- we mean a smart tool is everything that is going 

to be used by farmers or by enforcement agents.

That can be as simple as let's say a 

product, a natural product for weed control. It 

could be a cultivator. It could be something that 

is solving a unique issue to organic farmers.

So, we really do not want to restrict 

that to a budget or something completely, very 
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complicated. With anything that we can get to 

resolve specific issues that organic farmers see 

as a barrier. We call that a smart tool.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks very much.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Carolyn has a question for 

you.

DR. DIMITRI: I don't have a question. 

I just wanted to say hi Mat. Hi Steve, it's great 

to see you too.

DR. SMITH: Hey Carolyn, it's great to 

see you as well.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Yeah. I'm thankful for 

the great job you do for the program.

DR. DIMITRI: Yeah. Oh great, you do 

great work also. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Okay. Amy has a question 

next.

MS. BRUCH: Hi. Thank you guys for 

your time today. This was a really interesting 

presentation.

But, I just had a question. There are 
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so many facets to organic farming. Is there any 

shared learnings with some of the countries that 

we have equivalency with?

Organic equivalency that I see, you 

know, invest in organics and agriculture that we 

could kind of maybe speed up the learning process 

with some collaboration?

DR. NGOUAJIO: Steve, you want to? Go 

ahead.

DR. SMITH: Sure. I can start. 

Within NIFA, and you'll find it in our RFAs, we 

strongly encourage international collaborations 

to the extent that they benefit the U.S.

So, what we won't do, or don't do is, 

if you have a unique crop, and we have had some 

examples of this, where we've had someone submit 

in support -- to do research in support of a crop 

that is not even -- does not exist in the U.S. 

It was strictly in that case, it was a crop that 

was grown in Africa.

We're not very interested in that, 

because there's not a benefit to the U.S. I mean, 
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we're interested cognitively, but we are not 

interested in funding those.

But, we do, if you look in the RFAs, 

we do encourage and support international 

collaborations. The primary investigator has to 

be a U.S. entity.

So it, you know, again, stressing and 

in particularly the cosmetics to Congress and to 

the public, you know, it needs to be really clear 

that we are investing in U.S. agriculture.

But, to the extent that we can benefit 

from what's already learned, as you pointed out 

in your question, we want to capture that. I mean, 

there's no reason to reinvent the wheel if we can 

collaborate and both sides win.

So, we -- a few of our programs actually 

have incentive funds to support that. The 

legislation that created OREI doesn't really allow 

us to offer an incentive to, you know, extra money 

to collaborate internationally.

But, there's absolutely nothing to 

prevent it. So, it's just limited only by the 
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creativity and the connections, the network of the 

individual research groups that are trying to 

present a compelling project for funding.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you.

DR. SMITH: Oh, you're very welcome.

MR. ELA: We have Rick and then Kyla.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Rick, you are muted.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah. I just unmuted. 

Thanks very much. My question is, you had a graph 

that showed success of the research.

And I was curious, how do you measure 

success base? Some of it has to do with the 

researchers expected outcome.

So, let's say they do something like 

we're going to increase crop productivity 10 

percent. If they come out at 5 percent, is that 

still a success?

Or do you consider that a failure? 

I'm just curious how you do your metrics, because 

on the graph it looks very rigid. But, I don't 

think research is like that.

So, I used to be the Assistant Vice 
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Chancellor for research at UCLA, so I know -- I 

know it's tough.

DR. SMITH: Right. And thank you for 

that question, because clearly that slide is a 

little misleading.

The success in that slide is success 

rate of the applicant. So, we -- if you get 100 

applications and you fund 20 of them, that's a 20 

percent success rate.

I'd love to have some measure like 

you're talking about, of the actual success of the 

project. But, a lot of times, that's very elusive.

Some of the ones that I would look back 

in my career, or you know, just overall of 

agricultural research, some of the ones that have 

been in hindsight most successful were probably 

initially underappreciated.

One I can think of on the reproduction 

side that would be for, just it was basic follicular 

function that they were studying. Nobody had an 

idea what they were going to do with it.

In fact, the panel pushed back on it 
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thinking that, why would we do this? What is it 

-- where is it ever going to go with the industry?

But then ultimately it became the basis 

for, for estrous synchronization in breeding in 

beef cattle and dairy cattle, you know, across the 

nation.

Okay. Looking back, that was a huge 

success. But, we didn't know it for, you know, 

several years after the project started. 

So, that is all but impossible to 

measure other than with some of the data that we 

get back from NASS and ERS, where they'll come back 

and talk about return on investment in agriculture 

and some of the benefits there.

And they can take a little longer look 

than we do. And it's not project by project. It's 

just oh, we have these innovations into the market, 

and here's what it's done.

So, they take a stab at that. But, we 

don't really have the ability to drill it down to 

the individual project.

So, it's a great question. And if you 
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have a suggestion on how we might capture that, 

I'd love to have it, because I could carry it back 

to Congress. You know, I couldn't because I can't 

lobby.

But, you know, we could put it up 

through the chain to Congress and say, look what 

you've got. And we're already doing a lot of that.

You know, we've already got a lot of 

success stories. But, it presents a success story 

rather than a numerical score of all the successes 

we have.

So I am open to idea.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yeah. Well actually, 

I was hoping you'd kind of give me some ideas.

But some of the big research 

universities measure success in Nobel prizes. And 

so, it's a -- it's a tough body.

I was just curious. I appreciate your 

answer and some of your pain.

DR. SMITH: Yeah. 

DR. NGOUAJIO: And Rick, what we do is 

we do actually take a significant amount of risk 
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in those programs. Meaning that you know, it's 

not like high risk/high reward like our 

foundational programs.

But, we do have some level of risk. 

Because if you're only looking for projects that 

will be successful, you will likely miss some areas 

of investigation that needed the investment. So 

--

(Simultaneous speaking.)

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, absolutely. And 

that -- that's the criticism that research gets 

all the time, is when it hits the public and they 

have an article, well, they're doing this silly 

research on something, and it's meaningless.

You never know how it's going to turn 

out. So no, I -- I get that.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Thanks.

MR. ELA: We have a question from Kyla. 

And then one from Wood. So go ahead Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Hi. Thank you both for 

being with us today. I appreciated your 

presentation.
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This is an area that I don't know a whole 

lot about. So, it's fun to dig in a little bit. 

So, this might be an obvious answer. But, I'm 

going to ask it anyway.

For the projects that are declined, is 

that all funding based? There's just not enough 

money to fund them?

Or is that based on something else such 

as, I don't know, other reasons? Like they didn't 

fit the bill of criteria. Not enough information, 

whatever.

DR. SMITH: That's a yes and answer. 

Because we do have some that are -- that the panel 

ranks in what we call low priority.

That is not considered a fundable 

category. So, if it's -- if they don't -- they 

don't -- we use, you know, just as a tool.

This is just a ranking tool by the panel 

to help them in the sort. And we have a grid on 

the wall, you know, think of it as that.

And they place them in outstanding, 

high priority, medium priority, low priority, and 
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do not fund. Medium priority is the -- is the 

lowest it can go and still be considered a fundable 

category.

So, if you had the budget of the 

Department of Defense, you could fund everything 

into the bottom of medium priority. Okay, the 

others, even if you had -- even if you had money 

to burn, you can't fund those.

But, usually we're running out of money 

sometimes before we even get through the 

outstanding projects. But more, you know, more 

commonly, we will get into some of what are 

considered the high priority projects.

We just run out of money. Even with 

the increases we've gotten, you know, going up to 

$20 million, we still had, you know, a lot of 

fundable projects we couldn't fund.

And then, you know, we've gone to $25 

million. We've still got quite a few fundable 

projects we can't find.

When we get to $50 million, it might 

be easier, we can go further. But, what we're 
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seeing is, and this is, we can call it good news 

or bad news, but, I think it's extraordinarily good 

news.

What we're seeing is, more people, more 

researchers, and educators and extension people, 

coming in with applications, anticipating this 

growth in the program.

And we're getting -- we're getting more 

players. Which we've wanted all along, because 

it makes it a whole lot easier to conduct a broad 

array of research projects if we're not limited 

too just a few institutions that have gone through 

the certification process.

Which OREI by the way, does require. 

The field work has to be done on certified land. 

Well, you know, how many players in 2001 did we 

have that could even do organic research?

Okay, you fast forward to today, you 

know, just this last round, we've got a -- we've 

had applications from folks we've never heard from 

before.

But now, they've gone through the step 
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of getting access to certified lands. It's really 

exciting to watch.

But, whether that will change in our 

success rate, I don't know. The only way it 

wouldn't, is if we get just that many more 

applications competing.

So, if we -- if we jump from almost 100 

applications to almost 200 applications, well 

that's great news for us, because we then have more 

projects we can pick between and among based on 

their scientific merit.

But, then our success rate won't change 

very much. So, it's all a matter of who applies. 

But, we're seeing more and more coming in response 

to this increased funding.

DR. NGOUAJIO: And again, one other 

thing is again, if the research is not focusing 

on organic agriculture, if someone is just trying 

to get money to do research, and that is not going 

to have organic farmers, no matter how good you 

put together that proposal, it will be declined 

by the program.
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DR. SMITH: We have a list. We even 

will challenge them. Say okay, if you were looking 

at this proposal, if you were to take the word 

organic out of the proposal, would it change?

And if their answer is no, then it's 

pretty clear, you know, it's a conventional system 

that they're wanting to look at, and just putting 

the organic label on it so they can in -- because 

our success rates are a little higher than some 

of the other programs.

And they're just wanting to dip their 

feet in the pond and perhaps share in the increased 

funding. And the panel is probably more vigilant 

than I am as far as catching those that really 

aren't organic projects.

So, the integrity of the program is 

safeguarded by a lot of people.

MR. ELA: And I want to point out that 

Kyla sits in our certifier seat. So, she is on 

the other end of the spectrum of trying to enforce 

all of those rules.

And it's something I don't envy. But, 
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--

MS. SMITH: Right. And I live in state 

college. So, Penn State and so I'm sure that they 

have submitted many a proposal over the years.

And I certify some of their lands.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Yes. And they're 

successful also.

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Well, we're going to move 

onto Wood. But, I just want to say, thank you so 

much for requiring certified organic grounds.

You know, we see over and over people 

give us data where it's like well, it's off 

conventional ground. And it's just the same.

And it's not. And we know that. So, 

thank you for holding that -- that bar very high.

Wood, go ahead.

MR. TURNER: Thanks Steve. Thanks Mat 

for the presentation. It was great. I'm the 

chair of the Materials Subcommittee, which is 

responsible first for pulling together all the 

research areas from different subcommittees at 
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NOSB.

And I'm learning this process and 

trying to get my feet wet here. And so, it's really 

helpful for me to sort of understand a little bit 

more of how what we're trying to do at NOSB that 

sort of coalesce a number of research priorities 

for the community, for our stakeholders, into 

something that you can use.

How that works. And I'm still -- I 

still have a lot of learning to do. But, it was 

very helpful.

I understand that the timing of our 

research priority approval process, whereas, you 

know, we'll present a discussion document at this 

meeting, and then vote on our research priorities 

in the fall, isn't in sync. Is not at all in sync 

with the RFA process.

And I'm just curious, if there's any 

solution to that problem from your perspective?

Is there -- because it seems to me that 

for this to work best for the community, it's worth 

it for us to maybe lean into that question a little 
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bit, and one, and figure if there's a way to make 

that more of an optimal process.

So, I just -- I don't know that there 

is. But, I just wanted to ask you that question 

and see if you had any thoughts on it.

I'm not sure that -- again, I'm jumping 

in here and learning this process myself. So, I 

don't know what's possible, but I'd love to hear 

you speak to it a little bit.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Yes, Wood. I mean, our 

biggest problem at the beginning was really to have 

a point person that we could even work with. And 

know that we can, you know, contact.

Now, when we share, we know who to 

contact. And she knows us. And when things are 

available, she will send them to us.

But, the key thing is, really for 

timing, we can always make a change to our RFA, 

make an amendment to our RFA when the research 

priorities are posted.

And again, I have also noted that it 

doesn't change that much from year to year. Right?
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The same thing is true for our own RFAs. 

Our own priorities are -- the community wants it 

to be a little bit more stable so it is predictable.

And so that if you submit a project and 

it's not funded, you can still go back and resubmit 

it again.

So, the key thing would just be to be 

in touch with us, and let us know once you have 

your research priority ready, even if our RFA is 

published, we can always amend it to put the new 

version.

DR. SMITH: And the beauty is, of you 

know, what we've done with the RFA where we're 

linked to your priorities, then if they follow that 

link, it's somewhat depended on the Board, how they 

have that presented.

But, if you have each one as you like, 

if you post a new one, if there's a link from the 

old one to the new one, something as simple as that. 

If they pop onto that screen through our link and 

it says, or if it's a cover sheet that says, here's 

our priorities.
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Here's 2020, here's 2021, here's 2022, 

as you're adding them. And then they can choose 

to go to the most current one, then there's never 

a point where we're out of sync.

Yeah. We'll link to your website and 

your priorities if we can get it set up in a way 

where, you know, it's clear that you're going to 

NOSB priorities. And here's the most recent one, 

whatever it is.

And even if you allow them to look at 

the ones historically, I think that's useful and 

it's valuable.

But, if you want them to see the most 

current one, that's probably the easiest way, 

because then that requires nothing on -- on -- then 

no changes in the RFA, because it's automatic.

You've put them where they can find 

them. We're directing them to it. And then that 

way the synergy between us is obvious to everybody. 

The mutual support becomes even more ironclad.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Yeah. And we always 

link the last two years. It's not just the most 
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recent one.

We put the most recent one, and then 

the one, the year before that. So, we always put 

two years of NOSB priorities in the RFA.

So, that applicants can see the 

evolution of those priorities also.

MR. ELA: Great. And then that just 

gives such a concrete link for us that those 

priorities aren't just esoteric.

That that direct link, it kind of gives 

me shivers a little bit. That these really do 

have meaning to the community.

We are essentially out of time. But 

I have one more question for you that really deals 

with -- that we've wrestled with.

Our list of research priorities has 

increased quite a bit since I've been on the Board. 

I'm in my fifth year.

It used to be fairly succinct and 

rudimentary. And now, we keep adding things, 

because obviously there are a lot of research 

priorities out there.
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From your perspective, should we --

with our current list, should we try and prioritize 

them so there are fewer?

Is it about right? Should we expand 

it? Do you have any feedback to us on how we, you 

know, what the right length is or prioritizations 

are?

DR. NGOUAJIO: Steve, go ahead.

DR. SMITH: And I'll jump in, because 

he hit -- he hit sort of a hot button for me. And 

that is, you've really got two audiences.

And if you're talking to us, I want your 

full list. And if you want to prioritize them, 

that makes it even better for me.

But, you know, if it's a big long list 

that's great, because I can share that with a whole 

host of stakeholders that, you know, might offer 

research support.

And, you never know who's out there who 

really has this really brilliant breakthrough idea 

for, you know, one of those priorities and can jump 

on it and send us an unexpectedly compelling 
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application to address it.

Okay. So, you know, I like a big broad 

call for research. And then just them -- you know, 

let them, I'll say duke it out, if you want to use 

that term, with their brilliant ideas, and float 

to the top, and you know, that's exciting.

Okay. But, your second audience is a 

little different. And -- at least as I see it. 

And what I would consider your second audience, 

which is one I can't touch, are legislators, folks 

that might provide funding.

Okay. You give them a big long list, 

and they're -- I want to say this politely, but 

by design, the nature of their job is they have 

to be -- have a short attention span.

You know, they're jumping from meeting 

to meeting to meeting to meeting and to one request 

after another, after another. And you give them 

a big long list, they're probably already tuned 

out before they get two-thirds of the way down the 

list.

However, if you go to them and say, 
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we've got a long list. You can look at it if you 

like, but here are your, pick any number, five, 

ten, whatever reasonable number appears to be. 

And say okay, but this is what I want you to focus 

on today.

I think that's a much more effective 

strategy. So, what I would like, and what I would 

find beneficial from a research standpoint, is 

really what this conversation is about.

And so, please take my first answer. 

But, don't under appreciate the power of focus 

if you're, you know, if you've got a different 

audience that are not scientists looking for this 

remarkable breakthrough idea. 

DR. NGOUAJIO: Yeah. And, Steve, also 

you will notice that in our RFA, we try not to number 

our priorities, because when you start putting them 

one, two, three, four, five, people think that 

number one means that it's the most important 

thing.

And we don't want to go there. They 

are equally important to us. And like Steve was 
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saying, you never know where you will get the 

brightest idea to solve an issue that you have.

So, we like that long list. It will 

only increase the pool of applications that you 

will get.

So, -- so, our RFA that's what we need. 

That long list. But don't prioritize them. 

Don't say this is the top one or the bottom one. 

They are all important.

MR. ELA: Well you can rest assured, 

we have thought we should prioritize them and run 

into the same problem that we really couldn't. 

But they are all important and there is really no 

one priority. And you know, especially if you get 

between crops and handling and livestock. 

So I'm glad to hear that feedback that 

we shouldn't try and go down that road, because 

we haven't been able to. But I guess, you know, 

we could -- we could work on, quote unquote, making 

the Cliff Note version for legislators with maybe 

higher, higher-level research priorities that 

maybe aren't quite so specific, and then give you 
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all the longer list.

I am pleased to hear that we haven't 

-- haven't overwhelmed you with the length of the 

list yet, but you probably shouldn't give us too 

much rope, so.

Well we're going to move on, but thank 

you so much for taking the time to come present 

to us. It really does give us perspective. And 

like I said, it makes me feel like that work is 

so much more valuable, that that direct link is 

very much appreciated, so.

And we, you know, we appreciate our 

stakeholders giving us comment. We have a 

discussion document this meeting and they say add 

this, take away this. And you know, so we feel 

like we're not just representing the Board but 

actually, you know, a good part of the organic 

community. So thank you for supporting us. And 

like I said, thank you for taking the time.

DR. SMITH: Thank you for the 

opportunity to be here, appreciate it.

DR. NGOUAJIO: Thank you. And thanks 
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to Jenny and Michelle for keeping us in the loop.

MR. ELA: We hope to continue the 

partnership.

MS. ARSENAULT: Thank you to the three 

of --

MR. ELA: Yup.

MS. ARSENAULT: She was off-camera, so 

I just didn't want to leave her out.

MR. ELA: Yeah. Well with that we're 

going to move on to the first subcommittee report. 

Livestock I guess either drew the long straw or 

the short straw to go first, up to your 

interpretation. And as always I try, you know, 

especially on virtual meetings, I try and dress 

the part. I don't have a livestock shirt, we'll 

see if the ah, come on chicken. I'll turn off my 

virtual video here a sec so we get a good -- there. 

Okay, so I'll have the chicken for the 

livestock meeting here. So Kim, would you like 

to ahead and take over Livestock and share?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes, sure, Steve. If I 

would have known or considered, I would have tried 
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to one-up you. But I don't think I could have 

underneath time pressures.

So thank you all, please bear with me, 

this is the first time that I am chairing a 

subcommittee. So I will -- we'll go ahead and 

we'll get started. We have a few of our sunset 

review items. I think to begin we have calcium 

borogluconate first up, is that --

MR. ELA: Kim, can I --

MS. HUSEMAN: Oh, I'm sorry.

MR. ELA: Can I just jump in?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: And I neglected, to our 

stakeholders, we are going to slightly change the 

order on these. We're going to start with calcium 

borogluconate and then go to calcium propionate, 

and then back to activated charcoal. 

One of our new members is the lead on 

activated charcoal, and rather than throwing Brian 

into the lion's den to be the first presenter of 

the whole meeting as a new member, we thought we'd 

at least give him two sunset -- two sunsets as 
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examples before we throw him into it.

So we will come back to activated 

charcoal right after calcium propionate. So Kim, 

go ahead.

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes, thank you, Steve. 

So first, switching it from third over to first, 

we will start with calcium borogluconate, which 

is item 205.603, synthetic substances allowed for 

use in organic livestock production as a 

disinfectant, sanitizer, and medical treatments 

as applicable. And that would be Mindee Jeffery.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you. Calcium 

borogluconate is a really interesting substance 

in its history as it progressed through 

consideration on the National List. So it was fun 

doing some sleuthing there, and one of our 

questions was seeking clarity from the FDA on its 

classification of calcium borogluconate. 

And I am so grateful that we have Jared, 

our National List manager. Jared, do you have some 

information for us on that regard?

MR. CLARK: I do. Let me just get on 
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video here. So pull this up. 

So digging back into the final rule when 

it was added, I think this paragraph from the 

preamble covers it pretty well. And if you want 

to look at this yourself, you can go to 

federalregister.gov and type in that ID up there, 

83 FR 66559, that's the volume and page number in 

the Federal Register for this rule.

But the -- when this was added, they 

acknowledged that there was some -- that the 

discrepancy between the FDA and the USDA National 

Organic Program was brought up, and it was 

addressed at that time when it was added to the 

National List.

MS. JEFFERY: Great, thank you for that 

clarity, Jared.

MR. CLARK: You are welcome.

MS. JEFFERY: So some other great 

feedback from stakeholders on our questions. That 

prevention is our best tool, and avoiding 

circumstances that require the use of the substance 

are practiced by many stakeholders. And seems as 
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though the requirement for use is prevented often.

Organic dairies -- one stakeholder 

reflected that organic dairies can face this issue 

more frequently because they tend to keep cows 

longer, which I thought was really cool. The --

a couple of certifiers reflected that the listing 

is redundant, but they also -- because it is listed 

under electrolytes, and there's a lot of 

information in the electrolyte TR about this 

substance too, the 2015 electrolyte TR.

And the certifiers reflected that the 

listing could be viewed as redundant, but it 

doesn't cause different decision-making. One 

producer reflected that continuing to list it on 

the National List may eliminate confusion or varied 

interpretations. 

It is -- one producer reflected that 

it's common and inexpensive and remains the 

traditional treatment for milk fever in ruminants. 

Another producer group reflected that it's really 

-- it's necessary to have a variety of treatments 

for this because they perform differently. And 
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two vets commented that this substance is extremely 

essential in livestock treatment.

That's what I have, Kim, if there are 

any questions.

MR. ELA: That's great. Thanks, 

Mindee, and I'll take over. Questions, are there 

any questions from the Board? I do not see any, 

and so unless somebody wants to note that I didn't 

see them, we will move on to the next one.

So thanks, Mindee, back to you, Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you, Steve. So 

the next sunset review item that we have is going 

to be calcium propionate. And so let's see here. 

Calcium propionate, which is 205.603, for 

treatment of milk fever only. And Sue Baird is 

up on that. 

MS. BAIRD: Hi, yes, calcium 

propionate is produced by reacting propionic acid 

with an aqueous solution of calcium hydroxide. 

It also is used for treatment of milk fever, which 

is the result of metabolic stress occurring on or 

near giving birth.
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And so when lactation starts, they 

could treat milk fever by intravenous 

administrations of electrolytes. We have the same 

types of questions. Do we think that there's a 

listing for calcium propionate necessary because 

of the electrolytes, as listed in 205.603 (a)(11), 

electrolytes without antibiotics?

The comments that were heard was that 

farmers absolutely really do need calcium 

propionate and other electrolytes. When a cow 

goes down with milk fever, it's past time for giving 

boluses or paste or anything else. If a cow is 

down with milk fever, they absolutely need to give 

an intravenous injection of calcium propionate or 

calcium borogluconate.

So that's basically what we heard, was 

that it's important. Internationally calcium 

propionate is either listed directly, mainly 

normally it's listed as a -- as part of the --

normally it's listed as a method to prevent 

suffering of an animal. Not listed directly.

Either as a medical when there's no 
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alternative permitted substances, treatments, or 

just in general as let's don't let that cow suffer. 

So internationally it's an accepted product. 

Nationally comments seems like it's something 

that's absolutely necessary.

MR. ELA: All right, thanks, Sue. Are 

there questions from the Board? I am not seeing 

any, so back to you, Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: Great, thank you, Steve. 

So we didn't give Brian a whole lot of time, 

however, we're going to quick back up to the top 

of our list and talk about activated charcoal. 

Activated charcoal, number 205.603, must be from 

vegetative sources.

Brian, this is your material.

MR. CALDWELL: All right, well thanks, 

Kim. Yeah, I'm glad you gave me a few before I 

got thrown to the lions, I appreciate that.

Basically activated charcoal is 

charcoal, but it's considered a synthetic because 

of the activation process. And it's also, I didn't 

see much about it, but it must be purified in some 
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way and pulverized and everything to be used. But 

it is considered synthetic, even though it's based 

on a very -- charcoal, which is a natural, natural 

thing.

In terms of the written comments on 

activated charcoal, there were 10 written comments 

in favor of it, none opposed. And then a few more 

that described it and its use that didn't seem to 

endorse it one way or another.

But the one thing that was a little bit 

confusing to me was that several of the certifiers 

noted that a really small percentage of their 

producers actually listed it on their farm plans, 

organic farm plans. 

And I don't know exactly how this is 

handled with livestock, organic livestock, but it 

seems like if it was actually being used for 

emergency situations, that it would be listed. 

But I don't really understand that, so maybe other 

people will have comments on that.

But I didn't find any activated 

charcoal products on the OMRI list, which is 
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something that a crop producer like myself would 

look at. Even if we got in a jam and for some reason 

needed a new material that's on the list, we would 

be pretty sure that our certifier would approve 

it.

But anyways so the question in my mind 

is how critical is -- how necessary is activated 

charcoal for livestock production? And the 

comments that were in favor of it all seemed to 

indicate that it was quite necessary. And Hugh 

Karreman, who I know is a vet, maybe I shouldn't 

mention his name specifically, but a vet 

specifically did say this is a really important 

tool.

So that's -- that's pretty much it. 

In terms of alternatives, several alternatives 

were mentioned, but nothing was -- nothing came 

out as a strong alternative. They were all sort 

of offhand. So I guess that's it.

Oh, maybe I should point out too that 

the emergency situation that requires activated 

charcoal is basically if an animal gets poisoned 
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and -- or eats like moldy feed or something like 

that, and you want to take toxins out of its system. 

The, you know, feeding a lot of 

activated charcoal will absorb those toxins out 

and prevent the animal from getting, you know, sick 

or dying. So that's basically the story.

MR. ELA: Brian, congratulations on 

your first sunset drill. We -- Kyla has a question 

for you. Or discussion. These don't have to all 

be questions, they can also be just thoughts, 

perspectives, a chance -- it's the Board's chance 

to discuss thoughts on this, on all these sunsets. 

So go ahead, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yeah, mine's not a 

question, it's just a comment to maybe hopefully 

answer Brian. So just be careful when you're 

reading the public comments. I know that PCO in 

their written comment -- or for certifiers I would 

say when we're quantifying numbers, PCO doesn't 

have a way currently in our current database to 

tell the number of clients that are using this.
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So when we list seven, that's the number 

of products that we've reviewed that has this 

ingredient in it. And so it could be that hundreds 

of certified operations are using those seven 

products. So there -- look for words like seven 

inputs or you know, sometimes it will be clarified 

as like we've reviewed X number of products that 

so many producers are using.

But I will say that depending on 

certifiers' databases, sometimes it's really hard 

to pull out the number of operations that are 

actually using a particular product.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks, Kyla. 

The ones that I was thinking of actually did 

mention, you know, that it was that number of 

operations within that they were certifying, 

mentioned that on their organic farm plan. So you 

know, I guess the rest of them don't, you know, 

don't have it on their plan.

So yeah, that's a great, great point. 

And it's good for me to know that there are 

probably seven, at least seven products that exist 
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that are approved for this that have gone through 

some kind of a review process that, again, I 

couldn't find them on OMRI, so.

MR. ELA: Are there other questions or 

comments I should say? And Brian, I would also 

just chime in. It's a perpetual problem we all 

face on the Board is on these sunsets, you know, 

we often end up with the problem of people not 

commenting on them. 

And then it's very difficult to tell 

if they're not being used and should be delisted 

for that reason, or if people just didn't send in 

comments. And we sometimes, you know, if we know 

that they're being used or you know, have good 

reason to think they're being used, we may use our 

discretion as Board members to say we have common 

knowledge of this.

And on some of the materials we, you 

know, we'll say if there were no positive comments, 

you know, when we go back to subcommittee and do 

our write-ups taking into account these comments, 

you know, there may be a split subcommittee vote 
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for -- some saying, you know, we should delist this, 

some saying we shouldn't. 

And that's always a good signal that 

stakeholders as well that maybe it would be a good 

time to chime in that this is a useful product. 

But it's a difficult one when we don't get a lot 

of comments on use and why we should keep it listed, 

so. So we always struggle with that.

All right, if there are no ---

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks, just last 

quick thing that I probably should have added, and 

that is that yeah, there were no negative comments 

about it, against it and 10 specifically in favor. 

And a few did mention concerns like that it 

shouldn't be fed routinely, but I don't think the 

NOP guidelines allow for that, so. Yeah, great, 

thank you.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Brian, good job. 

Kim, back to you.

MS. HUSEMAN: Great, thank you, Brian. 

Well done on your first sunset.

We'll be moving on to chlorine 
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materials, listed as 205.603(a)(10). Chlorine 

materials disinfecting and sanitizing facilities 

and equipment, residual chlorine levels in the 

water shall not exceed the maximum residual 

disinfectant limit under the Safe Drinking Water 

Act.

This includes calcium hypochlorite, 

chlorine dioxide, sodium hypochlorite. Think I 

got all of those -- oh, and hypochlorous acid.

Nate Powell-Palm, this is your 

assistance.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, thank you. So 

it's a -- chlorine materials have been on the mind 

of the NOSB for many years as an integral 

disinfectant and sanitizer. There were quite a 

few comments, mostly I would say more oriented 

towards crop and handling than livestock. 

But of the livestock commenters, there 

were some really great and I thought really 

well-considered comments about the role that 

chlorine materials have, especially on dairies. 
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And so the more dairy-oriented 

commenters highlighted that there are several 

materials that can be used to sanitize dairy 

equipment and milk contact surfaces, but keeping 

the microbes guessing, food-borne pathogens 

guessing. 

And so making sure that we have several 

different materials, including chlorine, that can 

make it so that we have a robust and rotating set 

of sanitizers to avoid resistance buildup. I 

thought that was a really well-considered comment.

There were other comments that it's one 

of the more economical of the sanitizers out there, 

and a lot of systems have built to ultimately be 

well-designed for chlorine use. 

Of course, some of the questions were 

informed by -- some of the questions I had and the 

Committee came up with were looking at our 

sanitizer panel that we had last fall and trying 

to think of, when we think about this ecosystem 

and sanitizers, are there things that we should 

be looking at and other ways we should be 
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considering the integration of these tools towards 

trying to make a system that requires less toxic, 

less acute sanitizers and build in more, a more 

holistic system that ultimately leads to the 

suppression of food-borne pathogens.

But overall, the comments were 

resoundingly united that this is a really important 

and effective tool for livestock producers. Any 

questions? Asa. Or I'm sorry, Steve's supposed 

to do this part. I will --

MR. ELA: No, that's fine, go ahead, 

you've got it.

MR. BRADMAN: Just a comment. I mean, 

I think this issue comes up with all of the listings 

for chlorine materials that are coming up next 

fall. I've had a number of discussions with safety 

people and, you know, I kind of, the feeling is 

-- my sense if the feeling is people don't want 

to use them, they would rather use something less 

toxic. But that they're essential given the mix 

of materials available. 

And you know, the notion also of kind 
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of encouraging a microbial ecology that, you know, 

fosters less pathogenic organisms versus more 

pathogenic is extremely difficult to monitor and 

actually implement. And so there's -- they didn't 

see a practical way to implement anything like 

that. 

But again, you know, the notion of 

having a rotation and trying to use chlorine as 

a last resort seems to be the goal. But the 

combination of materials doesn't seem out there 

to accomplish that.

MR. POWELL-PALM: And that I think was 

well-reflected in several of the more 

dairy-oriented comments, what you just said. 

That there's the goal, but there's also 

the very practical nature of some pretty extreme, 

you know, food-borne pathogens that would be 

present on dairy, and to try to figure out how we 

don't become an industry that's known with food 

safety problems, how we keep ourselves at the top 

of our game with food safety.

Thank you for that.
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MR. ELA: Looks like Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. Nate, 

I just had a quick question. That was a comment, 

actually, by OMRI and just, you know, clarifying, 

you know, some of the sanitizers that are used for 

milking equipment. 

It looks like, you know, sometimes 

they're reviewing those under more of a 

handling-type mentality. Can you just provide a 

little bit of clarification with the crossover on 

some of these materials and when we see them in 

other subcommittees?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yeah, so in every 

dairy there is a very small but very important 

amount of handling that goes on because you're 

ultimately moving to a -- from a, you know, 

collecting milk from the cows to a bulk tank. 

And so those food contact surfaces 

which would be bulk tanks, milkers, those surfaces 

that actually come in contact with the milk, those 

are going to be on farm, so they fall under 

livestock. 
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Dairies aren't needing -- they don't 

need to be certified as handlers. But you know, 

if we go, say if you've gone to a creamery, a lot 

of the same food contact surfaces exist. You know, 

we saw tankers, we saw trucks going from dairies 

to creameries. But those are -- those are formal 

handlers.

And so that's why there's that 

crossover if there's a little bit of handling on 

the dairy as far as getting it into a storage 

capacity so it can be shipped out. But mostly dairy 

falls under that livestock probably. Does that 

answer your question?

MS. BRUCH: Yeah, thank you, Nate.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Okay, yeah.

MR. ELA: Well, Wood is next.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Nate, it's more 

of a comment than it is a question, but I'd love 

to hear your thoughts on it. I just want to pivot 

off of what Asa was saying, because obviously we're 

looking at chlorine materials in three different 

committees right now, your committee, well this 
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committee, handling and crops. 

And you know, it's -- it is clear that 

we're coming --we keep cycling on this idea that, 

you know, there's not a lot of options and there's 

a lot of, you know, there's a need to have rotations 

for sanitizers and coming off of the sanitizer 

panel and figuring out what to do next.

And it occurs to me that a little bit 

coming off the NEPA presentation that we need to 

be a little more forceful in some ways in the 

research priorities about sort of what we're really 

looking for here on chlorine materials and 

sanitizers in general. 

And I know -- I know this is just 

lingering issue that's sitting out there because 

we have that panel in the fall and what we do next 

with it. But I just would say, you know, right 

now in the discussion document on research 

priorities, we're really -- it's really addressing 

this issue from a handling perspective. 

And I'm just arguing to myself a little 

bit, Nate, that we should also include a livestock 
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and crops perspective on this as well. Because 

I think this is a -- I think this is a higher 

priority than I think we're realizing in some ways, 

to try to figure out what these other toolkit 

options might be. 

And you know, I get a little nervous 

whenever we say it's the cheapest option so we go 

to have it in the toolkit. I know you didn't say 

-- those weren't exactly your words, but that's 

a bit of a concern. And so I just want to flag 

that issue.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yeah, no thank you. 

I don't know if I'd have much to answer to your 

clear articulation of that issue. I realize that 

it's something that is -- it's going to take a whole 

community lift because it is such a really 

important control point for producers, especially 

farms and livestock to make sure that they have 

safe products that they're sending from their 

farms.

And it's also, you know, for a dairy, 

it's kind of one of many processes and procedures 
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that they're doing to get that milk from ultimately 

the grass through a cow to a bulk tank. So I think 

that -- I mean as a livestock person myself and 

an inspector of a lot of livestock people, I 

completely hear you. 

And I think that a path forward -- I 

don't think that in the comments I read anything 

that was not eager to, you know, identify every 

tool we can, while making sure we don't do anything 

hastily enough that it compromises food safety.

MR. ELA: Kyla has a question/comment.

MS. SMITH: More of a comment. And 

sort of building off of what Wood was saying, I 

don't know, sometimes within the National List 

items or certification in general, I feel like we 

try to be consistent, right. And I think that this 

is an area where there's a lot of nuances to how 

these materials are used, especially within 

livestock with having to incorporate other 

regulatory requirements. 

So I just don't want us to like lose 

sight of that when we're trying make things 
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consistent, that there's like other factors at 

play.

MR. POWELL-PALM: For sure, yeah. I 

think that was also reflected in the comments by 

how many comments there were for handling and 

crops. I would say there's a lot less specifically 

aimed at livestock. So I think that nuance kind 

of shines there.

MR. ELA: Yeah, I'll just jump in with 

a comment. I'll probably say the same thing for 

crops and handling, but you know, our community 

continues to ask us for more prioritization and 

decisionmaking on this, and yet this is one of those 

topics where OFRA collides head-on with FSMA, and 

it's kind of an ugly fight.

But I, you know, when Joelle came on 

the Board with my group and then unfortunately had 

to resign, but her, gosh, her comment on the --

that there was -- you know, every specific use has 

a specific use for those various sanitizers. And 

I'd kind of hoped that there would be a more 

overarching view that, you know, you could take 
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some of these off or you could add some of these 

for emergency use. 

And you know, her main profession was 

food safety, and I just took to heart so much her 

comment that everything is nuanced and you can't 

really make an overarching construct that says, 

you know, here's the priority list and here's, you 

know, what should and shouldn't be used. 

It's just so variable and so 

ever-changing. So I think Asa has always said it 

kind of drives us nuts that we have all these things 

that normally I think we wouldn't approve, but yet 

we are really compelled to approve just based on 

what you said, Nate, we have to apply with -- comply 

with FSMA, we have to comply with these food safety 

things. 

And the last thing we want is a food 

safety issue from organic food. So I think it's 

a real tension and a real dilemma, but it's -- I 

don't know that there's going to be a way to solve 

it, but except just to continue the conversation.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, thank you for 
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that.

MR. ELA: And I do want to stress to 

the Board I probably have misspoken a little bit. 

This is a -- I shouldn't say questions, comments. 

It really is a Board discussion time, so don't 

hold back if you don't have a question or something. 

This is our brainstorming session, 

especially because taking these comments or 

stakeholder comments, the Board perspectives is 

what the lead is going to take back to write the 

subcommittee discussion on the sunsets that we will 

then vote on in the fall. So I just want to make 

it clear it's a little different than some of our 

other sessions.

I don't see any other questions, so Kim, 

we'll jump it back to you for the next sunset.

MS. HUSEMAN: Okay, thank you. Make 

sure I -- okay, thanks, Michelle, I wanted to make 

sure that I had lumped hypochlorous acid into the 

chlorine materials, and our books did have it 

listed separately. So I'm glad I put that all 
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together as combined.

So then that means we move to kaolin 

pectin. And kaolin pectin is listed under 60 --

I'm sorry, 205.603(a)(17), use -- for use as an 

adsorbent antidiarrheal and gut protectant. And 

that is actually one of my materials.

So I think in the livestock industry, 

having -- this is going to maybe be an overused 

term, but the tools in the toolbox in order to 

correct different livestock ailments. Kaolin 

pectin is definitely one that is used in those 

particular situations. It's not used as a 

preventative or all the time, but just in moments 

when you need to be able to prevent -- or to correct 

scours and have an alternative to activated 

charcoal.

There's a little over a dozen comments 

regarding kaolin pectin. Overall, the sentiment 

from stakeholders in the public comments was to 

re-list kaolin pectin. A few components to the 

review or to the comments.

Pectin itself can be synthetic or 
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non-synthetic. And if only the non-synthetic were 

to be allowed, then it would not need to be on the 

National List. However, in saying such -- being 

the way that it is written and then it is on the 

National List.

Furthermore, just the comparison of the 

contrasting between activated charcoal and pectin, 

kaolin pectin, you know, activated charcoal is an 

absorbent organic carbon that can draw the toxins 

out, kind of whisk them away from the digestive 

tract. Whereas kaolin pectin just more or less 

coats the stomach and gut lining to help dry up 

that excessive fluid.

So being able to have I think both 

options is very important from the livestock 

industry. Additionally, not all producers may be 

familiar with charcoal. Or also, depending on 

where you live may not have the availability of 

one versus the other.

Other comments, again, they were 

supportive of re-listing, but there were a few 

comments around having synthetic versus 
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non-synthetic pectin. 

That pretty much sums up the both 

written and then a couple of the oral comments. 

Are there questions, comments?

MR. ELA: You're getting off the hook, 

Kim. I'm not seeing anything, so -- oh, wait, Amy 

jumps in here at the end. Go ahead, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Yeah, thank you, Steve. 

Kim, just a quick question for you. You mentioned 

that there are synthetic and also non-synthetic 

varieties of this kaolin pectin. Is there a 

limitation with availability on the non -- or on 

the synthetic or the non-synthetic route --

MS. HUSEMAN: I'm glad you brought that 

up. I'm hoping we have stakeholders that are 

listening to this component to help to draw more 

conversation. That's not something I really had 

even looked too intently at until I started 

researching some of our comments that were given. 

So I really don't have the answer to that one 

today.

Kyla, do you --- I mean not to put you 
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on the spot, but anything from your perspective 

that you know of?

MS. SMITH: No, but I am not recalling 

really seeing that when I was reading through the 

comments myself, so --

MS. HUSEMAN: It was more, I would say 

not really boilerplate, but a few entities listed 

the exact same language. So I can, you know, we 

can look at that as we proceed forward too. 

I do not see where there was any kind 

of limit or the, I don't know if it's 

brand-recognized as far as which is synthetic and 

non-synthetic and how -- how that's even delineated 

from a allowable perspective. But very good 

question, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: All right, thanks, Kim.

MR. ELA: Brian also has a question for 

you, Kim.

MR. CALDWELL: Yeah, thanks, Steve. 

Kim, I'm just trying to sort of differentiate 

between the activated charcoal and the kaolin 

pectin. 
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And what I would sort of gather is that 

the activated charcoal is for really acute cases 

of poisoning, whereas the kaolin pectin would be 

for scours and maybe you know, just kind of mild 

upsets. It's probably a gentler product. Is that 

a fair way to differentiate between those two?

MS. HUSEMAN: Not a veterinarian, and 

I know enough about animal nutrition to be not even 

close, slightly dangerous. I think having 

multiple tools in the toolbox to assess the 

situation and having the allowance to utilize one 

versus the other given the symptoms is very 

important to the livestock industry.

MR. CALDWELL: Great, that makes 

sense. Yeah, I don't want to act like I'm a vet 

either, because I certainly am not, I'm not even 

close, so.

MS. HUSEMAN: It was clear in the 

comments that activated charcoal did have more to 

do with toxicity from moldy feeding perspectives. 

Sue, you might have some comment here too. 

Whereas I mean, antidiarrheal could be a slew of 
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different aspects that created the onset.

MR. CALDWELL: Great, thanks.

MR. ELA: Looks like we've got Kyla 

then Nate.

MS. SMITH: Yes, so Kim, I don't know 

-- I don't know if the comment that you were sort 

of thinking about in regards to the non-synthetic 

was the one that was talking about kaolin pectin 

containing amidated forms of pectin versus 

non-amidated and the use of non-organic crops used 

to produce the pectin. 

So that was -- I'm not sure if that was 

the comment that you were sort of referring to. 

That's the only one that I really saw that was 

like digging into that.

MS. HUSEMAN: So -- and that was -- so 

Beyond Pesticide --

MS. SMITH: Yeah.

MS. HUSEMAN: I think uses that 

verbiage, and then NOC had verbiage as well around 

pectin can be synthetic or non-synthetic and would 

not need to be on the National List if only the 
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non-synthetic were allowed. So I think that's the 

origin of the pectin.

MS. SMITH: And then to answer, or to 

maybe answer Brian's question, again in Dr. 

Karreman's comments, he was talking about some of 

the uses, and he was saying that not all producers 

may be familiar with charcoal in place of kaolin 

pectin. And also I think Kim covered this, 

availability may play a role. So anyway, just 

wanted to comment on that as well.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Kyla. Nate has a 

question or a comment.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yeah, it was just 

sort of a, yeah, a bit of a comment. Just coming 

from a cultural practice, Kim, I know that ranchers 

in my community have always sort of kept activated 

charcoal around for sort of acute grain toxicity 

poisoning.

So if we got into, you know, the 

vomitoxin or something in some grain hay, versus 

kaolin pectin being more oriented towards sort of 

routine, mild microbial infections like in calves. 
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So I think -- I think it was Brian who said, you 

know, that difference between acute, you know, 

poisoning events versus more general just fighting 

off microbial infections.

MS. HUSEMAN: Yeah, I agree. I think 

that the underlying sentiment is having the tools 

in the toolbox to be able to assess the situation 

and determine the origin of, you know, the cause 

and then be able to treat accordingly. 

All right, Steve, I think it's back to 

you, and you are on mute.

MR. ELA: Thanks. I just -- I'm taking 

lessons from Sue lately. But thanks, Sue, for 

being a mentor.

Kim, great discussion, and we will just 

-- actually back to you, so --

MS. HUSEMAN: Okay. Well speaking of 

Sue, up next we have mineral oil. And mineral oil 

is listed as 205.603(a)(20), for treatment of 

intestinal compaction. Prohibited for use as a 

dust suppressant.

Sue, I'm going to turn it over to you.
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MS. BAIRD: Thanks, and thanks, Steve, 

I do need accolades for some things.

Mineral oil is used for impactions 

normally in the ruminant's third stomach. This 

happens many times in pregnant cows during cold 

winter months when the cattle consumes less water 

and is fed lower quality roughage. Mineral oil 

is applied as an oral drench at a rate of one to 

two gallons of -- every 12 hours until the mineral 

oil action lubricates that impaction and it passes 

on through.

We asked the question -- oh, and by the 

way, we did ask for a limited TR and we received 

that in March of this year. So that gave us a lot 

of insight.

We asked a question of our audience, 

our public, and asked what their differences of 

interpretation amongst certifying agents on when 

and how mineral oil could be used. And we did get 

several comments on that particular question.

The certifying agents material working 

group discussed their differences and said there 
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was confusion as to whether this material is 

permitted orally or rectally. NOC also said that 

they received feedback that producers and 

veterinarians may not even know that they're 

allowed to use it. And others have been using it 

for a long time without it ever being put on the 

National List.

Overall -- oh, the TR listed several 

different methods for that could be used in place 

of the mineral oil, and yet the conclusion was that 

mineral oil still seems to be the best method for 

this kind of emergency situation.

I always appreciate comments from 

public, and especially the veterinarians who have 

a lot of scientific knowledge of why and when 

materials should be used, and we did get several 

of those. 

And of course not missing our favorite 

vet who used to be on NOSB, but everyone knows who 

he is. But he said that it was indispensable to 

him as a practitioner to quickly reverse digestive 

upsets.
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All the comments that we received on 

whether it should be allowed were positive. There 

were no negative comments on whether it should be 

removed. We did get a comment from another group, 

Beyond Pesticides, that said there was 

difficulties of course in -- on some interpretation 

or mis-correlation between FDA and the NOSB, and 

that we should get clarification maybe by adding 

a specific pass number to the mineral oil that would 

be used for this purpose. And yet we know and they 

know that we can't address annotations at this 

point.

Allowed by our international family on 

all -- on all the countries. Again, not 

specifically addressed, but by we're interpreting 

their annotations that we can't allow animal 

suffering. And this would be certainly one way 

that would cause animal suffering. When this 

stomach gets impacted, it causes intense pain for 

that cow.

Any questions?

MR. ELA: All right, are there 
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questions? Questions, comments, discussion? 

All right, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Sorry, yeah, I did notice 

that even within the comments there were some 

inconsistencies among certifiers about whether or 

not there was inconsistencies. So you know.

MS. BAIRD: I would agree. I've seen 

it as an inspector, yeah. 

MS. SMITH: Yeah. So I did try to seek 

clarification on that, and from my understanding 

from certifiers that were on the ACA, the CARES

working group, that most -- I'll say most because 

I don't want to include anybody that shouldn't be 

in there -- are allowing both orally and rectally. 

However, I do believe that it was stated 

within that working group that it would be more 

clear if that was clearly annotated in some way 

or explicitly noted some way in the listing. But 

my understanding is that in the actual review 

process, that certifiers are pretty aligned.

MS. BAIRD: I think -- I think most 
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certifiers and most of the public would want us 

to err, when we have a cow that's down and in intense 

suffering, we want to be able to alleviate that 

suffering.

MR. ELA: Nate has a question. Nate, 

are you on mute?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Sorry, can you hear 

me, Steve?

MR. ELA: Yeah, now we can.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Okay, apologize 

about that. I was just going to throw a quick 

comment to Sue that I couldn't agree more with your 

last statement. I think that my foray and journey 

into organics was as a young cattleman. 

And so when I was nine and my 4-H steer 

had a compaction issue and mineral oil was 

deployed, I don't know if I'd be here and farming 

today if that animal had died and I had been scarred 

that early on, so.

MS. BAIRD: Right.

MR. POWELL-PALM: I think that is a

good point, so I thank you for that.
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MS. BAIRD: There were some comments 

or suggestions that perhaps we could use other 

types of oil. And it was clarified both in the 

TR and then I think Hugh made that comment as well 

is that other types of oil actually break down and 

does not alleviate the obstruction like mineral 

oil, which does not break down in the gut. 

So I think that's important point for 

us to remember, other oils are not effective. 

Mineral oil is effective.

MR. ELA: Anything else from anybody? 

Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: I just want to highlight 

that the other place where we have mineral oils 

being used for horticultural oils used in crops. 

And just, you know, two places where we have 

petroleum products used in organic directly, going 

into the environment and going into soils. 

And this is one of the challenges here. 

In both cases I think these materials are 

important, but perhaps just one of the challenges 

to think about when we think about other 
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petroleum-derived materials.

MS. BAIRD: And to make that even more 

unclear, we have it listed twice for livestock, 

the one that we're reviewing today, which is 

603.820. But it's also approved in 603(b)(7). 

So you know.

MR. ELA: Yeah, continuous 

improvement, right?

MS. BAIRD: Exactly.

MR. ELA: And Sue, I want to say we give 

you accolades for many things, so.

MS. BAIRD: I know, I just had to say 

that, Steve, thank you. Because you're right, I 

always forget to unmute.

MR. ELA: Well I have the same problem, 

so nothing intended on this side.

But Kim, we'll send it back to you.

MS. HUSEMAN: I think it just helps to 

keep all of us on our toes, who could be first tell 

somebody else that you're on mute. Maybe that 

should be, Michelle, next time we should have 

t-shirts made.
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Okay, going forward our next material 

is nutritive supplements. Nutritive supplements 

is 205.603(a)(21), injectable supplements of trace 

minerals per paragraph (d)(2) of this section, 

vitamins per paragraph (d)(3), and electrolytes 

per paragraph (a)(11), with excipients per 

paragraph (f), in accordance with FDA and 

restricted to use by or on the order of the a 

licensed veterinarian.

And that is Nate Powell-Palm.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, it is. And the 

themes continue as we talk about tools for farmers. 

And you know, dovetailing right into Sue, what 

do we do to help acutely sick animals? I think 

that, you know, activated charcoal, mineral oil, 

nutritive supplements. 

It means that we have, you know, more 

tools in the toolbox to actually be able to provide

aid to animals in critical, acute periods of 

illness.

I think one of the great comments that 

we received, there was a lot of really impactful 
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comments. I, as an inspector, have observed the, 

ultimately the power of injectable electrolytes, 

other injectable nutritive supplements. 

And the comment said the whole reason 

for the injectable electrolyte is for sick animals 

to be treated and rehydrated and boosted to fortify 

their immune system in the face of an infection 

or other malady. If this category were removed, 

we'd go back to the Dark Ages.

And I think the balance that organic 

livestock folks have to keep -- to keep such complex 

beings as livestock, especially cows, healthy, 

alive, and well is a challenge. And it's a, it's, 

you know, when you see a healthy herd of cows, it 

is a real representation of incredible husbandry. 

Cows don't stay healthy easily or 

without a lot of consideration and due diligence. 

And so this -- the comments were resoundingly 

consistent that nutritive supplements are widely 

used and very necessary.

And just to kind of close up the toolbox 
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example, that they're something that would be 

sorely missed and really put farmers in a difficult 

position to keep those animals healthy and 

ultimately keep the welfare of animals at the 

forefront in organics.

Any questions?

MR. ELA: I don't see any, Nate, so 

thank you. And I just really want to say thank 

you to the ASL interpreters. We get into this kind 

of jargon and I enjoy watching you as you struggle 

with some of these things. So thank you for 

bearing with us on this, I'm very impressed.

But Kim, we'll turn it back to you.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you, Steve. Next 

we have propylene glycol under 205.603(a)(27), 

propylene glycol only for treatment of ketosis in 

ruminants. And that is going to be Mindee please. 

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Kim. An 

updated TR has arrived and is posted for everyone's 

perusal between now and the fall meeting. 

One group noted that the derivation 

from petrochemical feedstocks in propylene glycol 
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is also part of an exception we're making with this 

substance. Experts, the same stakeholder 

referred to experts saying that prevention with 

high-energy diets contributes to the not needing 

to treat ketosis because it doesn't arise.

There weren't a lot of comments on this 

subject, but one of note. Before this, farmers 

were administering bottles of dextrose 

intravenous, which is not only a subpar treatment 

for the disease, it's also dangerous for both the 

farmer and the cow. 

Intravenous dextrose causes blood 

sugar spikes, preventing the cow from regulating 

her own blood sugar levels, and it also causes 

abscesses under the skin when administered 

improperly.

Cows can be aggressive when ketotic, 

making IV administration difficult and dangerous. 

Propylene glycol is the easiest route to 

successfully rehabilitating ruminants who suffer 

from ketosis. That's all a quote from a 

stakeholder.
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Another producer mentioned oral apple 

cider vinegar and molasses as extremely effective 

treatments. They also commented that this 

substance is available in farm stores and 

veterinarian clinics and is considered very 

effective. 

Dairy producers reflected that they 

support the continued listing of propylene glycol. 

And a large animal vet commented that propylene 

glycol is the gold standard for treatment of 

ketosis.

MR. ELA: All right, thanks, Mindee, 

are there questions, comments, discussion? I am 

not seeing any, so we'll send it back to you, Kim. 

Thanks, Mindee.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thanks, let's see here. 

Okay, so next we have two left. The next one is 

sodium chloride, acidified, reference 

205.603(a)(28). Sodium chloride, acidified, 

allowed for use on organic livestock as a teat dip 

treatment only. And 205.603(b)(9), reiterating 

the same, allowed for use on organic livestock as 
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a teat dip treatment only.

I would say that there were few comments 

written and none that were presented orally. 

There are -- there are certified -- there are 

organizations that do list this in their OSP.

I think from a, you know, all of that 

that did list, that's less than five, said that 

they did support the re-listing to use sodium 

chloride, acidified, as a teat dip. Do you feel 

that it is very important in the dairy industry? 

I think from a house cleaning 

perspective, it seems that it was listed in both 

(a) and (b) as a overscope, or just to put it all 

underneath one umbrella, cover all the bases. But 

I think as a work agenda item, we could look at 

cleaning this up and just having it listed once 

versus twice.

And we did ask stakeholders for any 

alternatives, and you know, if there are changes 

in the availability of iodine, would that reduce 

the need? Those questions were not answered in 

the public comment that I saw.
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So with that being said, that's 

hopefully we'll get -- we'll generate some more 

comments before the fall. And that's really all 

I have for this item. Any questions?

MR. ELA: Kyla has a question for you, 

Kim, or a comment.

MS. SMITH: Just a comment. I didn't 

take note so I'll have to do a quick search here, 

but I did make a note that there was one comment 

that said that iodine availability will not reduce 

the need for ACS, but I don't remember what comment 

that was. So I'll try to find it.

MS. HUSEMAN: I might have missed that. 

If you did, can help to reference for me?

MS. SMITH: You bet.

MS. HUSEMAN: I wonder, I might have 

-- maybe the way that I was searching for those 

two, but I did not grab that. So yes, thank you 

for making that comment.

MR. ELA: Asa has a comment also.

MR. BRADMAN: I just have a question 

in the review. You know, Beyond Pesticides 
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submitted very thoughtful comments on chlorine 

compounds and also ASC, and I was going to talk 

about some of this tomorrow when we get to handling 

chlorine materials versus livestock today.

But I'm curious what your response to 

those comments are? And, you know, maybe what 

discussion in the Subcommittee going forward about 

chlorine alternatives. And, you know, I also see 

of course in the comments that there's a number 

of folks that are very supportive of this material, 

and think it's essential. But I'm just curious 

what your response to those comments are?

MS. HUSEMAN: To be honest with you 

Asa, I'm not exactly sure how to answer you.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay, which is okay. I 

mean this is, these are complex issues and there's, 

you know, as we kind of said earlier, among the 

food safety people I've talked to, you know, again 

chlorine materials seem essential. But, you know, 

how do we look for alternatives?

And maybe this is one where there's not, 

or, you know, it's hard to think about, but -- I 
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don't know if anyone else wants to chime on. Or 

maybe these are things we can also discuss as we 

lead up to the Sunset voting on the law.

MS. HUSEMAN: I, yes, I honestly hadn't 

looked at the application here in consideration 

with some of the other chlorine materials. I 

looked at them very very independently, but I see 

the link that we're making. I just looked at this 

more narrow scoped.

MR. BRADMAN: Sure, yes, yes, and I 

could have brought this up moments ago, and I 

certainly will bring it up tomorrow when we talk 

about chlorine materials in the context of 

handling.

MS. HUSEMAN: More valid, okay.

MR. ELA: Do any other Board Members 

want to chime in on that question? It doesn't just 

have to be Kim commenting on this. We don't need 

to put the leads completely --

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I didn't mean to 

say, you, individually and single you out, but 

rather, how many you all --
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(Simultaneous speaking.)

MS. HUSEMAN: I think I used the --

MR. POWELL-PALM: Could you repeat the 

question one more time, Asa?

MS. HUSEMAN: -- for sure.

MR. BRADMAN: Well, just that, you 

know, I think there's some really thoughtful 

comments about chlorine materials in the written 

public comments. And, you know, we talk about 

foreign materials is the challenge.

And again, I'll bring this up tomorrow 

with handling, but ASC is kind of a special case. 

It's not a handling issue. So I'm -- it'll be 

discussed tomorrow and there's, you know, are there 

alternatives?

And, you know, perhaps this a very 

specific type of need, and not, you know, doesn't 

have the broad environmental, occupational 

implications of other chlorine materials. But 

this is a kind of special case foreign material 

that we only discussed today.

And I'm just curious about, you know, 
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your response to those comments and how do we think 

about it going forward?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, I think, one 

thing I think about in the application of 

livestock, especially teat dips, say for mostly 

dairy cattle, is that we -- dairies are so 

different. Each, you know, you could have a small 

dairy that's just from a, you know, sort of 

microbiome context, is wickedly different. But 

they're all ultimately needing to make a safe food 

product.

So, I think the issue you run into with 

livestock is you have a really, really, you know, 

acute threat of food safety problems with milk. 

And how do you have, you know, as big of a toolbox 

as possible to make it so that you can have this 

same federal rule apply to all dairies equally?

I think that's just sort of in the 

livestock context, I couldn't speak to handling. 

And it's more nuance in handling, I think. I 

think that is one issue when we're looking at 

addressing how do we find alternatives? It's how 
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do you find alternatives, but also alternatives 

that work for this really crazy broad spectrum, 

with every state having some amount of dairy in 

it.

And I know that doesn't answer your 

question. I just wanted to sort of throw that out 

there.

MR. BRADMAN: Right and I just think 

that the same chloride is kind of special case 

material specific to livestock with teat dips. 

And I'm, you know, my sense from the review and 

the people actually using the materials is they 

see it's a necessary, in the toolkit.

And I guess I'm just asking you, is 

that, you know, is the committee reflect and agree 

with that? Or is there a place for discussion 

about other alternatives that, you know, don't rely 

on this material, which may be more toxic than other 

teat dips?

MR. ELA: Sue, and then Kyla have 

comments.

MS. BAIRD: Fine, there are very few 
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teat dips that are performed -- a sanitary issue. 

We have teat dips that are used maybe as a medicine 

when the teat is, opting glycerin, when the teat 

is cracked and those type things.

But if you have a milk product with 

high, a cow that has high somatic counts, which 

is high bacteria in the milk, your milk is going 

to be dumped, which it should be. We don't want 

those kinds of things. Or it goes into the cheese 

processing arm of distribution.

There's so little chance of 

environmental issues, because it's applied 

directly through some method. Whether very small, 

as Nate alluded to, with a small farm that's got 

10 cows. And he just takes a rag, and he dips, 

you know, washes down the bag.

Other methods may be in larger 

operations, but it's just, you can't allow those 

bacteria from when the cow lays in the manures or 

whatever, or muddy fields that they're walking 

through in spring time. You can't allow that 

bacteria to impact that milk. That's just my take 
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on the thing, and.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, of course, 

definitely.

MR. ELA: Kyla, one last comment.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I found the comment. 

It was, so OTA does produce our surveys. And it 

does look like in the producer survey that they 

submitted to the question -- the producer who was 

responding to the survey said -- responded to the 

question of have there been any changes in the 

availability of iodine that would reduce the need 

for sodium chloride? And the answer was, no. So, 

they didn't like, you know, go into detail about 

that.

And then the last comment, I would just 

say is that, that same respondent to the survey, 

did say, certainly iodine is the preferred method. 

But the, but ASC seems a necessary option in a 

rotation of pre and post, to provide against 

pathogens.

And then many certifier comments noted 

small number of products reviewed and approved, 
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or even operators using them. And one even, one 

certifier even said that they had several but it 

wasn't commonly used. But it does seem to be, you 

know, good to have in the back pocket should the 

need arise where you really do need something, you 

know, stronger or more effective, or in a rotation.

MR. ELA: Great. Amy, very quickly.

MS. BRUCH: Yes, sorry. Kyla, just to 

note in that response or that comment that you were 

referencing, it looks like there was only one 

response to that question on, is iodine, you know, 

available?

MS. SMITH: Correct.

MS. BRUCH: So, just kind of very 

limited reactions --

MS. SMITH: Yes, yes.

MS. BRUCH: Okay.

MS. SMITH: And going back through too, 

I realized a lot of the comments did not include 

acidified, which narrowed some of my scope. So, 

going back, sorry Steve, I just jumped in, I 

apologize.
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MR. ELA: No, that's, you're fine.

MS. SMITH: Going back through the 

message that I heard by widening the scope was very 

similar though.

MR. ELA: Well, one more Sunset. We 

were scheduled to finish at 4:30 but we usually 

set aside until 5:00. We could have cut the NIFA 

people short, but I really wanted to get the full 

discussion from them.

So I apologize to our ASL people and 

anybody out there that needs to be done by 5:00. 

But I felt like that was, while we had them on 

the line, we wanted to make use of them.

So, we have one more Sunset, and then 

one more thing the Board wanted to bring up.

So, go ahead Kim, with Zinc sulfate.

MS. HUSEMAN: Okay. So the last item 

under the Livestock Committee is zinc sulfate. 

Reference 205603 (d)(11) for use in hoof and foot 

treatments only, and Brian, you are up.

MR. CALDWELL: All right. Thanks, 

zinc sulfate basically for use, used in foot baths 
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for hoof rot and other foot issues. I think 

there's legitimate concerns about zinc sulfate's 

manufacture and disposal. You know, mining and 

processing of zinc is pretty toxic all the way 

around business.

And, but it doesn't have the same kind 

of buildup in the soil potentially as copper 

sulfate, which is the main alternative. And 

another issue with zinc sulfate, compared to copper 

sulfate is that sheep are really sensitive to 

copper toxicity.

And so, I don't think you can just run 

sheep through a copper sulfate foot bath. I'm not 

sure about that. We used to have sheep and we 

didn't do that. But anyways I think there's 

definitely issues with toxicity in sheep.

So, zinc sulfate would be the kind of 

the preferred alternative there. That said, in 

terms of the written comments there were 10 in favor 

of keeping it. Two with annotation, basically 

because of the environmental drawbacks. And our 

question was, has zinc sulfate reduced the use of 
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copper sulfate in treating foot disease?

And it really seems like it probably 

hasn't. One of the certifiers said that they have 

zero zinc sulfate use on their organic farm plans, 

and almost 100 copper sulfate uses. So, it doesn't 

seem like a popular alternative.

So, I guess -- and the other answers, 

again, were that only small numbers from the 

certifiers, only small numbers of farm plans 

included zinc sulfate. So, I think there's a 

question about whether it's necessary.

There are alternatives but again, a 

couple that were mentioned, peracetic acid and H2O2 

had variable, said they had variable results. 

Amazingly to me, vaccines evidently have some 

efficacy against some of these foot organisms, but 

again it sounded like it was more experimental.

I didn't get a real clear signal that 

any of these alternatives was really great. 

Formalin is I think, was the old fashioned 

approach. But formalin is quite toxic and so both 

either zinc sulfate or copper sulfate were 
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preferred over that, and copper sulfate is the main 

alternative and is mostly used.

So, I guess, my feeling is on this, is 

I guess we aren't going to do any annotations now, 

but that might be an avenue that we'd want to pursue 

in the future.

MR. ELA: Are there any comments? 

Kyla, go ahead.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I have a couple. So, 

zinc sulfate is relatively new, right? So, it was 

only allowed, I think the final rule came out in 

January 2019. So, I do recall seeing some comments 

from certifiers, or one, saying that they had 

difficulty getting info from manufacturers.

I'm not sure if that's our experience. 

I'm trying to reach out to staff on that. One 

producer group indicated that product development 

is slow. So, again I don't know because, I don't 

know, anyway, just making -- whatever.

And then the other thing too, is that 

there's no restriction on the use of copper 

sulfate, or like annotation. Like saying that one 
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has to use zinc sulfate before they use it, so 

anyway just all things to think about, but --

MR. ELA: Great, thanks Kyla. 

Anything else to discuss on the Board on this? 

All right, that will conclude our Sunsets for 

Livestock.

Michelle, if you want to go to the next 

slide. All right. Nate, would you, do you want 

to introduce this?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, I do. I'm just 

going to pull mine up real quick to get a little 

bit bigger, so I can read it a little easier.

So, we as a community, and I'm excited 

to sort of speak for the whole community because 

in 2017, April 21st, 2017, so almost nearly exactly 

four years ago, the National Organic Standards 

Board unanimously voted to pass a resolution 

requesting for the implementation of the Organic 

Livestock and Poultry Practices Rule, OLPP.

And I'm going to refer to as OLPP, so 

you'll know what I'm saying, but Organic Livestock 

and Poultry Practices Rule, which I think probably 
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everyone on this call is familiar with it. But 

we wanted to just reiterate that the community is 

as unified today as we were four years ago.

So, the National Organic Standards 

Board recognizes that consumers trust our organic 

label and industry growth depends on the strength 

and consist application of the organic 

regulations.

NOSB has an integral role in advising 

USDA in its promulgation of these voluntary 

standards, and strives to seek consensus among 

organic stakeholder in its recommendations to USDA 

and the Secretary.

The Organic Livestock and Poultry 

Practices Rule finalized in 2017, subsequently 

withdrawn in 2018 was based on a unanimous NOSB 

recommendation to the USDA in 2011. The NOSB 

recommendation was the product of a decade of 

public NOSB meetings, lengthy discussions, public 

comment periods, and consultation from organic 

producers, processors, consumers, and the 

veterinary scientific community.
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Both the NOSB recommendation and the 

final rule issued by Secretary Vilsack in 2017 

defined appropriate requirements for space, 

density and outdoor access in organic poultry 

production. Support for this rule has been 

expressed through public comment by major and 

growing organic brands.

The rule is supported by organic 

producers, consumers, the industry, and the NOSB. 

The policy received over 120,000 supportive 

comments in the federal register, representing 

over 99 percent of commenters. The NOSB stands 

by its 2011 recommendation to USDA on the Organic 

Livestock and Poultry Practices Policy question.

So, therefore, we have a resolution. 

Be it resolved by unanimous vote today, the 

National Organic Standards Board as USDA's federal 

advisory board on organic issues, and representing 

organic farmers, ranchers, processors, retailers, 

and consumers urges Secretary Vilsack to reissue 

as final, the Organic Livestock and Poultry 

Practices Rule with policy considerations related 
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to outdoor access and space requirements as 

established in 2017, without further delay.

Though it's been four years, since it 

passed in 2017, the Board, and I say the community 

as a whole remain unified in our call for the 

implementation of OLPP.

Today, we vote again, as a unified Board 

and ask for the immediate implementation of the 

Organic Livestock and Poultry Practices Rule.

MR. ELA: All right, thank you, Nate. 

Is there any discussion on this?

Okay, hearing none. Nate, made the 

motion. Would somebody like to second that?

MR. GREENWOOD: I can second it, Rick.

MR. ELA: Okay, Rick, seconded. We 

will move to a vote. Sue, we're going to start 

with you and go ahead with your vote.

MS. BAIRD: Yes, love it, thank you.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, thank you.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes, yes, yes.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan? Are you there, 

Logan?

We may have lost Logan, but Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: See here, Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Emphatic yes.

MR. ELA: The Chair votes yes, so we 

have one absent, so it would be 13 to zero.
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All right, thank you so much for 

presenting that. And I know Jenny talked about 

this earlier today as well with some of the issues. 

But I think it's really great to reemphasize that 

with all the new Board Members, we still stand 

united and wanting to see this implemented. And 

it truly was something that all our stakeholders 

came together on well, and are really asking us 

for.

So, with that, we are done for the day. 

I really apologize for running ten minutes over 

time to all our stakeholders, but we are going to 

recess until tomorrow at noon Eastern Time.

And tomorrow we will be going to the 

Materials Subcommittee, Compliance Accreditation 

Certification Subcommittee and Handling 

Subcommittee. So, we'll have a full day of it. 

So, thank you everybody. We will see you tomorrow 

at noon.

DR. TUCKER: Thank you to the Board and 

the staff for a terrific day. I appreciate it. 

Give a round of applause to all of you.
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MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you, Jenny.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 5:11 p.m.)
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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

+ + + + +

NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD

+ + + + +

SPRING 2021 MEETING

+ + + + +

THURSDAY

APRIL 29, 2021

+ + + + +

The Board met via Videoconference at 

12:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Steve Ela, Chair, 

presiding.

PRESENT

STEVE ELA, Chair

NATE POWELL-PALM, Vice Chair

MINDEE JEFFERY, Secretary

SUE BAIRD

ASA BRADMAN

AMY BRUCH

BRIAN CALDWELL

JERRY D'AMORE

CAROLYN DIMITRI

RICK GREENWOOD

KIM HUSEMAN

LOGAN PETREY

KYLA SMITH

WOOD TURNER
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STAFF PRESENT

MICHELLE ARSENAULT, Advisory Committee 

Specialist, Standards Division

JARED CLARK, National List Manager, Standards 

Division

DAVID GLASGOW, Associate Deputy Administrator, 

National Organic Program

ERIN HEALY, Acting Director, Standards Division

DEVON PATTILLO, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist, Standards Division

DR. JENNIFER TUCKER, Ph.D., Deputy 

Administrator, National Organic Program; 

Designated Federal Official
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CONTENTS

Call to Order and Opening Remarks ............. 5

Materials Subcommittee (MS) ................... 7

 Discussion Document: Research

 Priorities 2021 ............................. 7

 Discussion Document: Excluded Methods

 Spring 2020 ................................ 22

Compliance, Accreditation, and

Certification Subcommittee (CACS) Update ..... 47

 Proposal: Human Capital: Strategy for

 Recruitment and Talent Management -

 Organic Inspectors and Reviewers ........... 50

 Discussion Document: Human Capital

 Management - Supporting the Work of

 the NOSB ................................... 71

Handling Subcommittee (HS) ................... 79

Proposal: Ion Exchange Filtration ........... 85
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2023 Sunset Substances Reviews:

Agar-agar ................................... 138

Animal Enzymes .............................. 139

Calcium Sulfate - Mined ..................... 148

Carrageenan ................................. 154

Glucono Delta-Lactone ....................... 169

Tartaric Acid ............................... 176

Cellulose ................................... 180

Chlorine Materials (Calcium Hypochlorite)

Chlorine Dioxide, Hypochlorous Acid

Sodium Hypochlorite) ........................ 182

Potassium Hydroxide ......................... 201

Potassium Lactate ........................... 203

Silicon Dioxide ............................. 205

Sodium Lactate .............................. 209

 Discussion Document: Zein - Petitioned ... 211

 Discussion Document: Fish Oil

 Annotation ................................ 218
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

12:00 p.m.

MS. ARSENAULT: Welcome, folks who 

have joined us already, to day two of the National 

Organic Standards Board meeting.

I have opened the chat feature. You 

guys should all be able to chat. It looks like 

you can't choose an individual person to chat to, 

but you can chat to all panelists, which are the 

NOSB members and staff that are on the call, or 

all panelists in the attendees, if you would like 

to chat amongst yourselves.

I've add the phone numbers. If you 

have any issues, then you need to dial into the 

meeting. The Zoom phone numbers are in the chat 

box now.

And I'm going to turn it over to Steve 

to get day two started.

MR. ELA: All right, Michelle.

Rick or Nate volunteered to lead the 

meeting today. So, I'll just turn it over to them.

(Laughter.)
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No, we'll be nice.

Welcome, everybody, to day two. I 

really thought yesterday was a great day and lots 

of discussions. Sorry we went a few minutes over, 

but that's what happens sometimes. We really want 

to take the time to make sure we maximize the use 

of our panelists and everybody in the meeting. 

So, we'll try to be a little better at staying on 

time today, but we've got some great topics that 

will make our heads scratch a little bit, but, 

hopefully, we can work through them and have some 

great discussion.

So, with that, we are going to start 

with the Materials Subcommittee. After that, 

we're going to go to Compliance, Accreditation, 

and Certification, and then, spend the afternoon 

with the Handling Subcommittee.

Well, I do want to say one other thing 

before we start. At this meeting, I think every 

Chair is a first-time Chair. Just the way the 

Board rotation is set up, we, basically, had to 

ramp people up very quickly, but they've all done 
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a great job through the lead-up to this meeting. 

But I just want to recognize them for their 

willingness to jump in with both feet into the 

water, and so far are doing a great job.

So, Wood, it is all yours as the 

Materials Subcommittee.

MR. TURNER: Well, thanks, Steve, and 

thanks to Kim for getting us initiated yesterday. 

Again, that was a fabulous opportunity to have 

somebody to follow.

And just a reminder, I'm very happy to 

be in the leadership role in this Committee, and 

yet, I still lament that we lost Dave a year early. 

So, I'm learning and getting my feet wet here a 

lot faster than I expected. So, I hope the 

community will be patient with me and bear with 

me, as I navigate this new role.

So, we have a couple of items on the 

agenda today, and I think we have about 45 minutes 

total to talk to a couple of discussion documents 

that we have. One is on our research priorities, 

and the other one is something that Mindee is going 
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to lead on excluded methods.

With that, I'll go ahead and dive right 

into the research priorities. It was really a 

learning experience for me to listen to the NIFA 

presentation yesterday and to really understand 

kind of how these priorities sort of interact with 

OREI and sort of really help to frame, I think, 

a core set of priorities which are lingering 

questions that I think so many of us in the organic 

community are trying to sort of understand. And 

we are constantly sort of in need of getting more 

data on, more content on, sort of more clarity on.

And it has been really interesting to 

me to sort of think about kind of how these 

priorities have evolved over time, how they have 

kind of started some sort of, years ago, started 

sort of a much smaller list of priorities into more 

nuanced priorities, sort of deeper, more granular 

thinking on some of these issues.

Part of our job with this Subcommittee 

is to coalesce kind of the ongoing priorities of 

the different subcommittees in just sort of one 
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common document that we can then submit on behalf 

of the Board to the program.

And it's really interesting to think 

about some of these things. I will quickly go 

through the summary part of the discussion 

document, and then, kind of, again, quickly try 

to give you a sense of some of the feedback we've 

gotten from the community so far. We're certainly 

expecting and excited to hear more from the 

community as necessary and as the opportunity 

presents itself. I think it is clear to me there 

is a lot of opportunity, frankly, to improve the 

document, given some of the feedback that we have 

seen from some of those folks in the community.

So, getting into the summary document 

that I think a lot of you have, for the Livestock 

Committee, we have several, I think four, pretty 

straightforward, or reasonably straightforward, 

priorities focusing on the efficiency of natural 

parasiticides and methodologies, more research on 

the efficiency of a variety of tools and programs 

that are available there.
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Another one is on evaluating natural 

alternatives to DL-Methionine in a system approach 

to organic poultry feed programs.

Another one is evaluating ways to 

prevent and manage parasites and livestock, 

examining breeds, geographical differences, and 

the like.

And then, researching and developing 

livestock breeding programs resulting in livestock 

that are adapted to outdoor life and living 

vegetation.

I guess, to be honest, I won't go 

through these. As I am doing this, I'm realizing 

I shouldn't just read you this summary document, 

as you all have it. And you have all had a role, 

obviously, in articulating these priorities.

So, there is a lot more focus in the 

Crops Subcommittee on crops priorities. We have 

about 12 priorities there that range from the role 

of organic in addressing carbon sequestration and 

climate solutions, conservation tilling and 

cover-cropping practices, questions about nursery 
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stock, a number of issues that I think have 

continued to persist for this Subcommittee.

I think -- and it's no surprise to 

everyone here -- that under the handling part of 

the priorities list, we have a couple that are 

focusing on chlorine materials and sanitizers. 

We've got a lot of feedback from the community on 

those, and it appears to me there's an opportunity 

to kind of distill those comments, distill those 

priorities into something a little bit more 

cohesive and clear.

Another one is focused on suitable 

alternatives to BPA. I know that's been a concern 

for a lot of us.

And then, a core set of priorities as 

well on genetic engineering and coexistence with 

genetic engineering and organic. I think some of 

what Mindee will talk about in her excluded methods 

document will kind of push that even further. I 

think that is an ongoing area of research that I 

think we're all aligned on.

And then, a couple of general 
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priorities: examination of the factors in 

influencing access to organically produced food, 

which is something very important to me personally; 

and two, production and yield barriers to 

transition into organic production to help growers 

in their transition period.

So, I just wanted to just remind folks, 

I know you've seen some of the comments, but there 

have been several suggested topics. We've heard 

from some of the community that there needs to be 

more of an opportunity to look at, to research 

things like heavy metals in baby food; a lot of 

comments, as I mentioned, on sanitizer research 

and sort of even the interplay between kind of our 

sunset process on certain sanitizers and the role 

of the sort of research priorities pathway in 

really trying to kind of clarify sort of where we 

are on the sanitizer question. So, I think there 

is a lot of feedback from a lot of different points 

in the stakeholder community on that topic, in 

particular.

And again, I'll just candidly say I 
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think there are some opportunities to refine the 

document between now and our fall meeting, given 

some of that feedback. Some were just very clear 

that -- we even heard some feedback from folks. 

I think one of the things we tried to do in some 

of our sunset documents was to begin to include 

some of the draft framework that came out of the 

Sanitizer Panel. And there was some clear 

feedback from some folks in the community that, 

using that draft framework that followed that 

Sanitizer Panel as a guidance to the sunset process 

was in some ways inappropriate and, in fact, we 

need to be asking those questions more broadly as 

a part of the research priorities workstream.

We got a lot of feedback from certain 

folks, certain parts of the community on bio-based 

mulch; issues on that ecosystem service evaluation 

on organic farms; looking for guidance, you know, 

looking at cover crops from more of a horticultural 

perspective than a crop perspective; feedback on 

plant management system research and organic 

planting stock research; some good feedback on ways 
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to think about nutritional value of organic crops, 

and ways to think about how you look at side-by-side 

material trials. So, a lot of good feedback in 

that regard.

And also, a lot of positive support for 

the research priorities as they currently exist. 

A lot of folks took the time to give us a vote 

of confidence on the research priorities, and then, 

give us some guidance on which ones of those 

priorities that we've articulated that they 

consider to be the highest priority. A lot of 

feedback in some cases that we have a long and 

growing list as organic becomes more and more 

mature and more sophisticated over the years. 

We've got a lot of different ways to look at these 

issues. And so, are we getting too diluted in 

looking at so many research priorities versus 

really narrowing that list down?

I was really heartened by some of the 

feedback on sort of the way we've articulated the 

research on organics relative to climate solution. 

We talk about the ways that organic can sequester 
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carbon and help drive solutions for climate change, 

but there's very real needs among the farming 

community and the agricultural community on how 

to adapt to climate change. And I think that's 

something that many of our stakeholders are dealing 

with and could benefit from some more research on 

that regard. And I heard that from several folks, 

that same idea.

And I think, with that, again, I think 

that's a pretty good summary of sort of some of 

the comments we received. And I want to just open 

it up to the group and see if there's any questions 

that came up for others as you were reviewing 

comments and had thoughts on how to advance this 

document. So, I'll pause for a minute to see if 

there's any questions.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Wood.

Sue has a question for you. And before 

we jump in here, I neglected to do a roll call at 

the start, and I do, just for the record, want to 

note that all 14 members of the Board are on the 

call at this point, just to get that read in.
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But go ahead, Sue.

You are muted, Sue.

MS. BAIRD: If you want to do roll call 

first, that's --

MR. ELA: No, we don't. We don't need 

to do a roll call. I just wanted to note that 

everybody is present.

MS. BAIRD: Right. Okay.

Just a comment, because we did have a 

few comments on the research saying that perhaps 

it was time to remove some of them.

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MS. BAIRD: Some of them have been 

there forever. I really, really enjoyed the 

presentation by NIFA, but I think that, if nothing 

else, they answered that question and saying, "Give 

us all these broad things; give us more. Don't 

take away."

And kind of a specific comment because, 

for the livestock, it almost appears as if one 

efficacy of natural parasiticides and 

methodologies might be redundant to No. 3, 
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"prevention and management of parasites".

MR. TURNER: Oh, yes.

MS. BAIRD: But, in terms of No. 

3 -- and we're not numbering them now in priorities, 

according to NIFA --

MR. TURNER: Right. Good point, good 

point.

MS. BAIRD: -- but the No. 3, 

"prevention and management of parasites," would 

be an overall -- especially for other types of 

livestock.

No. 1, "the efficacy of natural 

parasiticides and methodologies," was 

specifically added for our poultry industry 

because we did not approve fenbendazole as a 

parasiticide because there were comments that they 

were finding the worms in the eggs. So, we added 

that one specific for poultry, in hopes that some 

of our universities, research facilities that are 

interested in parasiticides would really pick that 

one up and run with it. We have heard from our 

poultry industry that they do have a problem. 
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We're not allowing them to use fenbendazole 

products in solutions for our poultry industry.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Sue. Those are 

great points and great clarification. And I also 

share your view that, coming off the NIFA 

presentation, more may be better at this point. 

We need to know a lot more. So, that's a good 

point to raise.

MR. ELA: Yes. We have Brian, and 

then, Rick.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, thanks, Steve, and 

thanks, Wood.

Yes, I was going to say the same thing 

as Sue about combining No. 1 and 3 under livestock. 

But, on a different sort of take on that, I'm 

amazed that we're still asking for research on 

parasiticides. I was involved when NOFA-New York 

first wrote its standards in 1985, and we were 

working on that then. And I just can't believe 

that the research either hasn't been done or isn't 

known, or whatever, about some of these topics.

I'm wondering whether we could somehow 
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ask for literature reviews on key topics. And 

that's really what our technical reports sort of 

are. And maybe there's no reason to ask for 

academic ones as well, but that might sort of 

consolidate a lot of the literature into places 

that were easy to find.

MR. ELA: Great.

MR. TURNER: Great thought.

MR. ELA: Yes. Let's go to Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: I don't want to be like 

Sue. First of all, I wanted to actually mention 

something that Brian did. When we talk about human 

capital, one of the things that would really be 

useful would be to have a current literature review 

of each of these topics, because we put them on 

the list and they stay there, but we really don't 

know what's actually happening. And so, it would 

be a good use of someone's time, rather than having 

TRs, but to go through the current literature and 

see if some of these things maybe have already been 

solved. You know, that would be very helpful.

The other thing is, I really applaud 
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everyone for bringing the NIFA people in. So, I've 

been on the Board, I'll be on for four years, and 

I don't think I ever quite understood the linkage 

between NIFA and how we presented things to them. 

So, I thought that was really a worthwhile effort. 

So, I think I really applaud everyone for bringing 

that in. And for the new people, in particular, 

you got a real head start over where I started on 

it.

MR. ELA: Yes, thanks, Rick.

Kyla is next.

MS. SMITH: Hello. I just wanted to 

sort of echo the thoughts of Rick and Brian. It 

was somewhere in the public comment, I believe, 

or I saw it somewhere anyway, but that point in 

the part that sometimes seemed to be the theme is 

getting the information to the people that actually 

need it. So, that link is like missing. And so, 

if there is a way to facilitate that in some way 

to get that information to the folks that are 

actually needing to use it, whether that be farmers 

or Extension agents that are working with farmers, 
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or consultants, whatever, just to sort of link that 

up, I think that would be helpful for everybody.

MR. ELA: Sue, you have another 

comment?

MS. BAIRD: Just a response to that, 

because I think that was a wonderful comment and 

thoughtful. And I know that we North certifiers 

can serve to provide specific information, but 

there are a lot of state organic associations -- and 

I'm thinking Missouri and Montana specifically 

because we're both MOA -- but I would assume that 

all state agencies have or all states have an 

organic association; that maybe we could help them 

to then disperse to their participants. That's 

what we do in the MOA, is anytime we get some kind 

of information like this that would help our 

members, then we disperse that out. So, I think 

that's a great point, Kyla, and I really appreciate 

that.

MS. BAIRD: All right, then, Amy. And 

then, we probably should move on to excluded 

methods.
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So, go ahead, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Sure. Thank you, Steve.

Just kind of a general comment. I know 

all these research priorities, they're relevant 

and it's a very comprehensive list, but some of 

the topics are actually in our current work agenda. 

And I know the commentary was maybe we shouldn't 

prioritize. But, to me, having some of this 

information more immediate would actually help us 

make better decisions in some of the other 

subcommittees, such as on biodegradable and 

bio-based mulch. That would be tremendous to have 

additional research on, the chlorine materials, 

et cetera. So, I can kind of see the idea of just 

providing a very comprehensive list, but I also 

think there's some immediate research we need to 

address sooner than later, too.

MR. TURNER: That's a great point, Amy.

I don't know, Steve, I mean, to that 

point, I don't know that, to be honest, the 

interaction between these near-term needs and sort 

of this research priorities cycle that we're in 
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with RAI and NIFA -- I don't know how to respond 

necessarily to Amy's feedback there, because I 

totally agree. And then, I'm agreeing with what 

Rick is saying, too, about kind of the 

near-term -- Rick and Brian are talking about sort 

of the near-term literature reviews, as to how we 

can all benefit from sort of a better flow of 

information here.

But, anyway, it's a great point, Amy, 

and I think it's worth considering it as we continue 

to refine the document and think about what goes 

where in the list of priorities.

MR. ELA: Yes, very much agree. As I 

said yesterday, I was very heartened to hear that 

this isn't an esoteric exercise, but that that 

direct link from NIFA to relevancy, I found quite 

stunning, actually. I've had no expectation that 

there was that much use of it and instantly 

declaring relevancy, based on our list, for an 

application.

Carolyn, did you have any -- I saw your 

hand up and it went down. We need to move on, but 
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if you have one quick last thought, we'll recognize 

you.

DR. DIMITRI: Just a very quick 

thought. It's just about the research priorities 

regarding handling. It is, I wonder if we could 

get information from NIFA on like where to send 

that, since I don't think that really fits very 

neatly into the OREI research priorities.

MR. ELA: Yes, good point. Make note 

of that, Wood.

MR. TURNER: Yes, yes.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Wood. Good job. Go 

ahead.

MR. TURNER: Sorry, Steve.

So, moving along to the next part on 

our panel, our Materials Subcommittee, Mindee has 

been working on that discussion document on 

excluded methods, which I know is an issue of great 

importance to a lot of the community. And I want 

to turn it over to Mindee to lead us in that 

discussion.

MS. JEFFERY: Thanks, Wood. Thanks, 
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everyone.

Just a tiny bit of context from myself. 

I spent 15 years in a retailer really committed 

to organic, the foundation of organics. And then, 

as we were confronted with the GMO issue, we were, 

as a staff, given a great degree of education about 

what a GMO is and how they were entering the 

marketplace, and a highly educated consumer base 

that we sort of viewed ourselves as being a society 

of great debate in which customers would come in 

and try to stump us on our own standards. And so, 

the ability to communicate what the organic system 

is doing, and how the incursion of GMOs as excluded 

methods was affecting the organic system, was our 

everyday dialog within and without.

And so, that's where I come from on this 

issue, and as a Board member, took it upon myself 

to try to educate myself on everything that this 

Board has said on this issue and the history of 

this issue, and it's a doozy.

So, this discussion document is meant 

as a "how can we reset ourselves as a Board on this 
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conversation?" because it's a big issue. And we 

want to make sure that we understand as much as 

we can at the current state of the union on organic 

and how excluded methods are interacting with our 

supply chains.

So, that 2016 document is the appendix. 

Thanks, everybody, for taking all the time and 

energy to read all this material. And I can't 

appreciate the stakeholders enough on the level 

at which they are educated and they pay attention 

and help us understand what to do next in this work.

So, the way I'm approaching this is 

mostly to just take the public comments and 

contextualize them, and try to just do as little 

editorializing as I can. So, I put them in 

buckets. I took what the major reflections were 

from the stakeholders and put them in five buckets, 

so that we can look at it from the major feedback 

perspectives from the stakeholders, given what we 

said and what we asked in the discussion document. 

So, those five buckets, I'm just going to go over 

those and give you a couple of quotes from 
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stakeholders to emphasize what they said back to 

us.

The first major point was the request 

to move forward on the 2016 recommendation by this 

Board for the criteria in evaluating excluded 

methods. The request for guidance and reflection 

in the Policy and Procedure Manual was pretty 

much -- it was all major stakeholders mentioned 

the importance of this course of action, emphasized 

the history of unanimous decisionmaking by the NOSB 

on excluded methods proposals. And these are some 

Steph Curry statistics. I love the unanimity of 

the reflections on how excluded methods are 

important to this community and that we're very 

united on our positions around this. So, that was 

the first major bucket, were the requests from 

stakeholders to take that 2016 criteria and the 

following documents forward through guidance and 

the Policy and Procedure Manual potential.

And the second major bucket was the seed 

community. And seed use in organic has long been 

tethered to the excluded methods conversation, and 
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stakeholders have been clear in public comment that 

the organic seed issue is also a standalone area 

of our organic system that needs the support and 

attention of this Board.

One stakeholder encouraged the NOSB and 

the NOP to continue to focus on strengthening 

organic seed availability usage and enforcement

among growers. As long as the loophole in the 

organic seed usage regulation exists, organic 

growers will continue to source conventional, 

untreated seed of varieties that may have been 

developed using excluded methods, but remain 

undisclosed.

Another stakeholder, "rather than 

attempting to police unconventional, untreated 

varieties for which a regulatory mechanism is 

infeasible," and another stakeholder suggested 

that success will come from regulating organic seed 

and to put our energy into the development of 

organic seed production and organic seed breeding.

So, the seed is where, as a Board, I 

think we have two ways of kind of looking at the 
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impact of excluded methods and, also, looking at 

helping support and bolster organic seed usage in 

our community. That's the second bucket.

The third bucket, response to that TBD 

list. So, the TBD list terms are the terms that 

we have not determined whether they fall into the 

excluded methods category.

In those questions along the TBD list 

terms in this third bucket, public comments 

established that we're doing a good job of naming 

technologies of concern to the organic system. 

There are some techniques on the horizon in 

development -- and this is me editorializing -- I 

see them as being harder and harder to maintain 

our prohibition on excluded methods when we start 

having to deal with field sprays and insects out 

in the field and out in the world in a way that 

might make it difficult for us to protect our supply 

chains from how that interacts with organic farms. 

So, that was there in public comment.

The clear and consistent request to act 

on the TBD list in the fall meeting with a lot of 
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information about how those decisions will affect 

farmers. That was the big push from a lot of 

stakeholders, that the TBD list needs to be dealt 

with in the fall of 2021.

And let's see, one quote from a seed 

producer asked the NOSB to make recommendations 

clearly and conclusively upon the TBD breeding 

approaches, and within 2021, a burgeoning young 

generation of breeders needs to know if and how 

they can serve the organic community.

And there's some great information from 

a seed group that outlined how our recommendations 

on this TBD list will impact farmers and farmers' 

toolboxes. And that's a big subject, and I look 

forward to Materials tackling the seed issue, in 

particular, and deciding how to treat it, both as 

an excluded methods issue and a standalone issue 

in organic systems that could use our support.

So, the fourth bucket is emphasis from 

stakeholder feedback was transparency, what I'm 

looking at is, transparency and protection of the 

interagency collaboration requests were 
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ubiquitous.

One group said, "We encourage the NOSB 

to continue to request information about emerging 

technology from the U.S. Department of Agriculture 

and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration."

Another stakeholder reflected that, 

"Biotech is largely unregulated by the USDA's 

Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, 

APHIS."

Updates to these regulations establish 

even less oversight by USDA over the introduction 

of new genetically engineered organisms. 

Manufacturers of new GMO products now have the 

authority to determine if their products should 

be regulated at all. USDA's voluntary, 

non-regulatory approach to evaluating and 

commercializing new GMOs is unacceptable and 

further burdens certified organic growers and 

handlers. This relates directly to the organic 

community's ability to exclude genetic 

engineering.

The NOSB has a timely opportunity to 
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use its authority as an advisory group to the USDA 

to hold Secretary Vilsack accountable to his 

commitment to coexistence as well as the agency's 

mission, which is to support the success of all 

forms of agriculture, including organic and other 

markets that rely on exclusion of GMO products. 

USDA APHIS has a responsibility to collaborate 

with the NOP to protect the organic market.

These are quotes from public comments 

from this meeting in this discussion document.

One group emphasized the notion that 

"The (audio interference) EPA requires virtually 

no assessment of the environmental (audio 

interference) they involve plant pests or are 

themselves pests."

"The FDA has no mandatory requirements 

for food safety assessment and technically has the 

authority to assess gene-edited animals, but the 

standards for doing so are unclear. Once they are 

on the market in the U.S., gene-edited products 

may not be identifiable to consumers or retailers."

(Audio interference.)
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MS. ARSENAULT: Mindee, you just 

froze.

MS. JEFFERY: -- "in food and the 

momentum in the international regulatory" --

MR. TURNER: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes?

MR. TURNER: Mindee, you froze for 

about 20 seconds.

MS. JEFFERY: Oh, that's okay. I 

think you got it. there's a lot of emphasis on 

the need for transparency and the need for 

interagency collaboration to establish clarity for 

organic producers to protect ourselves from 

emerging technology. Got that, Wood?

MR. TURNER: I did.

(Laughter.)

MS. JEFFERY: Okay, great. Making 

sure.

And then, my last bucket is kind of how 

I look at the urgency factor. So, you see comments 

from individual consumers and retailers and 

retailer association groups in the public comments 
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emphasizing that their experience on the ground 

with consumers is that, when organic shoppers are 

passionate about keeping GMOs and genetic 

engineering out of their food, and when they say, 

"No GMOs," they mean it.

And this is the space that consumers 

see as the place where they can rely on transparency 

and rely on us doing our jobs to help them make 

sure that they can eat in a way that they 

understand.

So, I think that's good. Those are the 

buckets. I can say them again, if anybody wants 

me to. It's a big subject. We have lots of time 

in Subcommittee to kind of go over all of this 

feedback together, and I'm happy to hear if I talked 

too fast.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: It's a giant piece of work, 

Mindee, and I just really want to acknowledge your 

passion and your efforts to get your head around 

the issue. It feels like we're in good hands with 

you leading this process.
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MS. JEFFERY: Thanks. I definitely 

feel like I don't know if I covered all the ground. 

So, thank you.

MR. ELA: Steve, do you want to --

MR. TURNER: I will.

Thanks so much, Mindee. I know that, 

yes, this is a huge topic, and thank you for taking 

it on.

We're going to head down the list of 

questions, comments, discussion. We'll start 

with Brian, then go to Jerry, and then, go to Kyla.

So, Brian, go ahead.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, thanks, Mindee. 

I think you did just an amazing job of condensing 

all those comments. It was way more than I could 

assimilate.

I had a couple of thoughts. I really 

appreciate that Jenny spoke at length a couple of

times to us about excluded methods. And one of 

her points was that the existing definition under 

the regs really does cover a lot of ground with 

excluded methods. And so, maybe trying to capture 
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all the new forms of genetic modification that may 

come out and gene editing, and everything like 

that, isn't as important as enforcing kind of what 

is already known; and that maybe what we need to 

work on is a mechanism for disclosure. Of course, 

I'm thinking about seed varieties mostly here, but 

I'm sure you could extend it to components, you 

know, materials used in organic products and 

processing.

But, in terms of seeds, the TBD list 

that we have, one of the question is whether cell 

fusion -- you know that's in the TBD category, and 

yet, it is actually specifically named in the 

definition of "excluded methods" that it is 

excluded. And so, I don't know the history of all 

that, but I'm really kind of surprised that it would 

sit there when it's specifically in the regs. So, 

to me, that seems like kind of a straightforward 

one, at least to make the decision on in terms of 

TBD.

And then, the question is, how to 

retrieve varieties that have been in use for a long 
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time, and that sort of thing. And that's pretty 

thorny. I think we have to sort of realize that 

we live in an imperfect world and we may not be 

able to get everything.

On the other hand, I am aware that the 

Demeter Certification Program does have -- they 

have never allowed cell fusion, and they do have 

a list of varieties that they've compiled. And 

this was from an article in 2008. So, at least 

we have the old ones that sometimes people are 

wondering about. I don't know if Demeter has kept 

up with this.

But, anyway, what I'm talking about, 

my main point here is that maybe enforcement of 

the rules that are actually in the regulations is 

a way to start on some of this. And then, sort 

of moving forward from there, rather than trying 

to specify all the methods that are coming 

along -- they should be captured already -- if we 

can ask for information, and that transparency part 

you talk about, from the seed companies. It 

evidently totally works for GMO corn and soybeans. 
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Nobody has any question that Roundup Ready 

products are not allowed in organic production, 

even though they are conventional and untreated, 

right? So, we should be able to do the same thing 

with other vegetable varieties with excluded 

methods.

So, thanks a lot.

MR. ELA: Great, Brian.

We'll move on to Jerry, and then, Kyla.

MR. D'AMORE: Hi. Jerry here.

I can't go into the detail that Brian 

just did, but I'd like to acknowledge your really 

great and thoughtful work on this. I think it's 

an enormously important subject and complicated. 

And I personally believe this is a path that we 

have to go down with vigor.

Thank you.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Jerry.

MR. ELA: All right. Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes, thanks for your work, 

Mindee. This is great.

I have one comment, and then, one 
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question, actually, that maybe is more directed 

at the program. So, I just wanted to make it known 

that the ACA Materials Working Group did develop 

together and advocated for excluded methods. It's 

mostly used for handling ingredients. I know a 

big focus of this is around seeds. But, anyway, 

that does take into account the technologies that 

have already been voted on by the NOP and lists 

them specifically on the affidavit from 

manufacturers to say whether or not they've used 

any of those. So, I just wanted to make that be 

known.

And then, my --

MS. JEFFERY: Give me one second, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MS. JEFFERY: I just wanted to say I 

do think that handling is extremely important, 

especially given the developments in synthetic 

biology. I think we have to really just stay 

vigilant about that this is so much farther past 

seed, while we press on how important the seed part 

is at the same time. So, thank you so much for 
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the affidavits are so important.

MS. SMITH: Yes, you bet.

My question that's more maybe directed 

towards the program is, Mindee, you had talked 

about in your first bucket, and that I also saw 

in the public comment, just urging the program to 

move forward with the previous recommendations. 

And based on, Jenny, your presentation around sort 

of packaging things together, I just wondered if 

that would behoove us, as a Board, to like move 

forward, so this could all get packaged together 

and get pushed forward into one whatever, 

rulemaking, guidance, whatever path, as opposed 

to be taking them sort of piecemeal.

DR. TUCKER: Yes, I think it's a really 

important conversation and really insightful 

comment of what is kind of the content governance 

on this. Because the Board has continued to work 

on this, and, okay, let's have this, and this is 

an emerging -- and this is going to continue to 

emerge. I continue to really encourage the people 

to really read the regulations. So, we can frame 
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whatever the Board recommends into the "We think 

this is already prohibited because the regulations 

say this." So, these are merely implementation 

guidance to enforce it.

So, to Brian's point, what we're doing 

is enforcing the existing regulations. So, it's 

not modifying existing regulations, which are 

really quite strong and quite broad. That's what 

I say to consumers when I get asked about GMO, "It's 

a very broad definition of what is excluded." And 

I think that's good. It's a very solid umbrella.

And so, I think, thinking through how 

are we framing this to avoid confusion as to what 

we consider allowed and not allowed -- it's not 

allowed. So, do we frame all of these examples 

in a way that doesn't say, well, somebody says, 

"Well, this isn't on the list. So, therefore, it 

must be allowed."? Well, no. No, no. It's a 

very broad definition of what's not allowed here.

So, it would help, at some point, it 

always helps to kind of have pencils down, so we 

can take an inventory of here are all the pieces 
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and think through how do these pieces fit together 

into a package that's either guidance or it is 

implementation instructions for certifiers. 

We're actually the ones that have to check all this 

on a daily basis. What do we most need in a 

practical way to uphold integrity and give 

certifiers a practical tool, while not seemingly 

open all these loopholes because something isn't 

explicitly on a long list? And then, how do we 

update it as needed, and what does that, quote, 

"calendar" look like? I know that's all very 

boring nuts and bolts, but it really matters in 

terms of framing a work process moving ahead.

MS. SMITH: May I just follow up with 

one thing? So, I'm new to process here as well, 

but I've heard previously, as an audience member, 

like maybe making it very clear on our cover sheet 

like what we want the program to do with this whole 

big package. Would that be a helpful path forward?

And I know that there hasn't been a lot 

of movement in guidance in the past couple of years, 

but I'll just reiterate that, as a certifier, we 
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like really rely on guidance and would like to see 

more things put through guidance. So, anyway, I 

just wanted to sort of put a plug in for, yay, 

guidance.

(Laughter.)

DR. TUCKER: Well, in hearing that, you 

know, this is not an esoteric discussion. These 

are decisions that certifiers have to make every 

day, and these are oversight steps that they have 

to take in enforcing the regulations. And so, yes, 

connecting that to, therefore, what do certifiers 

need to do is so, so important in this dialog 

because that's where we build consumer confidence, 

is that certifiers are out there doing the right 

thing at the right time with the right operations 

every single day.

So, it's a really important 

conversation. I want to help move this along, and 

trying to figure out, okay, what is it that we're 

actually trying to package and in what format, and 

for who? And, gosh, we have these regulations. 

So, let us remember how strong our existing 
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regulations are, our regulatory definition, and 

use that, rather than having people question it 

as, well, if we're doing all this extra work, that 

must mean the regulations aren't very strong. 

They are strong. These are prohibited. These are 

excluded. Let's always put that first.

MR. ELA: Thanks.

Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: I apologize, I've 

raised and lowered my hand like a dozen times during 

this period, mostly because so many great things 

have been said.

I want to echo everyone who noted how 

great this document is and the work that Mindee 

did over this last semester.

In sort of tacking onto Kyla's point, 

I think I just wanted to say to Jenny, it's not 

boring at all, this calendar of how we figure out 

the nuts and bolts and minutia of managing this 

practice. And I think that we're really excited 

for it.

I think the consistency is something 
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that, as both an inspector and someone close to 

the certification community, is needed. So, I 

just wanted to upvote what Kyla said about wanting 

those guidances and to move forward with past 

recommendations on seed especially for this topic.

So, thank you, Steve, for humoring me 

and the many ups and downs of trying to decide what 

to say.

MR. ELA: I was going to call on you 

regardless.

(Laughter.)

MR. POWELL-PALM: Okay.

MR. ELA: Once you went up and down 

twice, it's like you were on the cue.

I have something to say, but go ahead, 

Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Jenny. I 

appreciate that.

I think part of the pressure just comes 

from this overwhelming development from the 

biotech into the food and ag industry. And so, 

I think it's important to remember for myself how 
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good a job this community has done for how long 

in supporting this issue, and also, the great 

partnership on working on this issue; and that we 

have to remember that we're playing against a 

really big basketball team and the game is not going 

to stop. And so, that's, I think, good to just 

in my mind go, oh, yeah, like the pressure is coming 

from outside, and we're doing great working on this 

issue.

MR. ELA: Yes, good point, Mindee.

And I just wanted to say, I mean, I think 

crops are certainly one aspect of this. And you 

mentioned the other aspects that I think are 

probably moving even faster than we know that 

really concern me. And, you know, it's just like 

on biodegradable mulch the arguments over the 

definition, I guess, where we said "not derived 

from excluded methods." And a lot of people said, 

"Well, that's already in OFPA. We don't need to 

specifically say that." And I think, to Jenny's 

point, that is true, but we also know in 

fermentation products we see that very creeping 
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use of excluded methods that is much more subtle 

than in crops. We keep bringing up the question 

of, if the product doesn't include excluded 

methods, is it okay? I personally would tend to 

argue, no, it's not if it's made from an excluded 

method. But, then, how far back do we look?

So, I think you've got your work cut 

out for you, but I really applaud what you're doing. 

I think it's critical. And I think we, as has 

been said, we need to not just focus on definitions, 

but focus on larger issues, filters that we can 

run things through to say, is this or isn't this 

an excluded method, rather than just specifically 

naming them.

I think it's going to be a real tough 

go to keep the prohibition as a prohibition without 

something sneaking in, but I am so glad you are 

working on it, because if nobody works on it, I 

think we're in trouble. So, thank you.

All right. Anything else, Mindee, 

before we move on? Or, Wood?

MR. TURNER: That's all we've got, I 
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believe, Steve, for our Subcommittee.

MR. ELA: Great.

MR. TURNER: So, I would like to turn 

it back over to you.

MR. ELA: Great. Well, weighty topics 

again. Yes, thank you to both of you. Materials 

waxes and wanes, but you've got a heavy lift right 

now. So, thanks for biting that off and moving 

forward.

With that, we're going to move on to 

Compliance, Accreditation, and Certification 

Subcommittee. I'm so glad that Michelle spelled 

that out on the agenda because I always say, "CACS," 

and I can never remember all the words that go into 

it.

But we're going to turn it over to Nate, 

as Chair, and let you proceed with some of the human 

capital things.

So, go ahead, Nate.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you, Steve.

I just wanted to kick this bit off with 

a little bit of history about myself. I know I 
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sit in the farmer's seat, but, for about 10 years 

now, I have traveled around the country working 

for a lot of different organic certifiers 

conducting organic inspections. I started as an 

organic farmer, and my first inspector was Margaret 

Scoles, who is the Executive Director of IOIA. 

And I had initially decided to take an inspector 

course, the basic crop course, because I just 

wanted to get better at my own paperwork. I wanted 

my inspection to be less scary when I was trying 

to prepare for my inspection.

But after taking that course and, 

ultimately, going through the training process to 

become an inspector, I realized there's this just 

incredible, somewhat quiet, somewhat 

under-the-radar world of organic inspectors that 

really make all of the work we do on NOSB, as a 

community, possible by making sure that it's being 

done right.

And so, when Jenny came out with the 

memo on human capital, I think that the whole 

community -- I mean, it came out in a really timely 
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time when we were in a pandemic -- but the whole 

community took a deep breath and said, yes, this 

is something we really need to be addressing. This 

is something that we've gone from inspectors 

scrapping it from state to state looking at farms, 

helping make this industry a reality. And now, 

it's $60 billion, and we need a lot of people to 

do this enforcement work. And we need a lot of 

really qualified, really professional folks out 

there making sure that the integrity of the seal 

is protected.

And so, my first shoutout before we get 

into the meat and potatoes of the document is to 

Jenny for taking the time to give us this 

opportunity to recognize the important work of 

inspectors, reviewers, and the entire 

certification community, and how we go forward with 

resilience in mind and growth and 

professionalization.

But I also wanted to give a bit of a 

shoutout to the folks who have done this work, both 

training, like IOIA -- and I have to just sort of 
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wax for a moment to say how cool I find it to be 

that we have an organization that is recognized 

by the entire world as the standard bearer for 

excellence in organic inspector training, in that 

most of the folks in our greater community have 

in some way interacted with either being inspected 

by an IOIA-trained inspector or taking a training 

themselves.

And I think that when the human capital 

document memo from Jenny came out, a lot of people 

really kicked into high gear. And I wanted to, 

I think from our comments last week, also give a 

shoutout to folks like Oregon Tilth, who made a 

pretty big jump to say we want to change how things 

are done, and we're going to make a move. It's 

not necessarily the move that everyone made of 

taking on staff and inspectors, but I think folks 

who heard the deficits that were noted in the 

community and the working conditions, that's the 

sort of leadership that I really commend. I think 

I'm excited about these more novel groups, like 

the Organic Inspectors Coop and other folks working 
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on how do we make this a really great profession 

to work in.

So, with that, I wanted to hand it over 

to Sue, who's going to present the document 

proposal for human capital.

And I wanted to give a shoutout, also, 

sort of retroactively, to Scott, who was the Chair 

before me of CACS and got us kicked off with this 

work in human capital.

So, Sue, I will stop talking and hand 

it over to you.

MS. BAIRD: Thanks, Nate.

This has been a great project, and I 

also want to give a lot of thanks to Jenny and the 

staff for recognizing some of the issues for human 

capital.

I'm not going to read the document 

because, obviously, everyone who has made comments 

has read it, and hopefully, the whole organic world 

has read the document.

But I do want to just highlight a few 

things that were identified as we talked with 
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inspectors, both present inspectors, long-term 

inspectors -- I take "long term," you know, those 

of us who have been around for the beginning, new 

inspectors, and even some who have recently, or 

not so recently, left the profession.

So, we asked the questions to these 

inspectors. First of all, what compelled you to 

become an inspector? So, it was great to hear 

Nate's reasons for becoming an inspector in the 

first place, because he answered one of those 

questions originally. What perhaps compelled you 

to stay in the profession? And if you have left, 

why did you leave? And then, we also asked the 

question: what are some challenges that you have 

identified as an inspector or to become an 

inspector perhaps?

And so, common points that we heard from 

all the inspectors was the cost of travel time. 

We heard both positives and negatives on the 

ability to travel.

The second was professionalism. It 

does appear that at least some of our inspections 
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have experienced lack of recognition that they are 

professionals in their industry. What causes that 

lack of recognition? Why would that happen?

A third one was compensation for 

experience.

A fourth was, how do we continue 

education? First of all, how do we become 

inspectors? What are the challenges and the pros 

of that? And how do we continue that to build our 

professional image?

The other was, at this point, it kind 

of got down to some semantics, but the cost of our 

personal and errors omissions and travel 

insurances and how that impacts our -- and health, 

personal for ourselves and our families -- how does 

that impact our willingness to remain an inspector? 

And then, lack of consistency among certifiers 

for pay, insurances, those types of things.

So, creating a certifier shopping, not 

only for our four certified indices, but for those 

of us who are inspectors. And how do we address 

all of those things?
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It was incredibly overwhelming to me 

the responses we got from individual inspectors, 

from our certified entities, from our certifiers, 

and then, of course, obviously, from our IOIA 

agency, and the thought that they put into 

addressing the issues that we had identified in 

this paper; and the fact that they put out a survey 

to their certifier list, their inspector list, was 

amazing to me and how they quantified that into 

a survey.

I think that there was some really, I 

know that there was some really interesting 

responses to that, and how do we go about 

alleviating some of these challenges. All 

acknowledged that there is a lack of an inspector 

pool, as those of us who have been around for 110 

years, I'll say -- maybe not quite that long -- but 

as we get a little older, maybe a whole lot older 

in my case, and don't really want to do as much 

travel, as we're leaving that inspector profession 

and moving more into consulting and review, and 

those types of things, and for the younger 
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inspectors who have got small families and losing 

that family time. Those are probably the two main 

identifiers of why we're having some issues.

Travel, of course, would play into that 

same thing. If you've got a small family with 

small children, you're not so apt to want to travel 

long distances and go places that those of us who 

have children out of the home, and therefore, are 

able to go Egypt, or wherever we want to go. So, 

that was a huge issue. How do we go about providing 

insurance because insurance is a huge issue.

All of those things were identified. 

I really liked several points. First of all was 

perhaps we need to implement a risk analyses of 

those certified entities who have more of a risk 

factor and focus our more in-depth inspections for 

those entities, and then, save the lesser with 

people, certified entities, for a lesser in-depth 

inspection. That was an interesting concept, one 

that I had heard way back when, but I think I had 

kind of lost track of that. Of course, if we went 

that route, we would have to identify the 
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parameters of what causes a risk assessment, a 

high-risk assessment.

The second strategy that everyone, I 

think, bar none, identified was, how do we 

apprentice these new inspectors, so that the 

concept of professionalism is more enhanced and 

increased in our certified entities and in the 

organic (audio interference)? How do we assure 

our public, our industry, that the integrity of 

organic products is being maintained?

So, with that, I'm just going to open it up 

to discussion. Again, I am old school. I have 

26 pages, back and front printed, of all the 

comments and highlighted what I found. So, that 

is old school, but there it is, 26 pages, back and 

front. That's 52 pages of comments. So, thank 

you very much, Public.

MR. ELA: Are there questions? Kyla, 

go ahead.

MS. SMITH: Yes, Sue, thanks for your 

work on this. It's obviously something that's 

near and dear to my heart, working in certification 
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for so long.

Like some things that I saw in the 

public comment are, and as was in the 

proposal -- and I don't have an answer; I'm just 

sort of talking here -- but is the way that the 

proposal was structured is that there could be 

entities sort of taking pieces, doing pieces/parts 

of this, right, whether it be an apprenticeship 

program or training or career development, or 

whatever.

And then, some other commenters talked 

about a bit of a more like unified approach, you 

know, through some type of centralized like 

certification or credentialing program that would, 

then, take some of those elements and sort of wrap 

them together into one thing, so it's not so, you 

know, parsed out. But like this company is doing 

this one thing and this group of companies is doing 

something.

So, I don't know; I guess I'm just like 

wondering other thoughts from the Board members 

on if one is better than the other or if there's 
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an appetite from the industry to like have a more 

unified, centralized certification or 

credentialing program that would cover, I would 

think, like some qualifications and like tiering 

of, you know, entry level, mid level, expert that 

would have some pay and certain qualifications that 

would go along with it, some mentorship criteria, 

anyway, all those things, as opposed to it being 

so parsed out. So, just what's up in my head right 

now.

MR. ELA: Nate? And then, we'll go to 

Sue.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, I just wanted 

to kind of jump on your question, Kyla. I think 

I've been thinking about this a lot, as we have 

been working on this in CACS. And I know we've 

talked about it really a lot since the memo came 

out.

I think when we look at -- and this is 

Sue's point -- when we look at one of those acute 

kind of bottlenecks being this apprenticeship 

program, and how do we get that practical training 
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to inspectors, I've always admired how close to 

the community and kind of grassroots IOIA, as a 

training organization, has been able to remain. 

You know, all certifiers use IOIA-trained 

inspectors and they do training. And so, coming 

up with, basically, an entity that is closely 

related and similarly grassroots, similarly with 

the community buy-in, making that really intense.

And Angela Wartes-Kahl and Garth Kahl 

both mentioned the idea of a mentorship boot camp 

that would still be very closely aligned with IOIA. 

I think that would make it so you don't get folks 

operating in vacuums, and are able to make it so 

that we have just a really fundamentally 

acknowledged and accepted standard of training, 

but also that we can make sure that we fill that 

gap, that bottleneck.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Sue.

MS. BAIRD: Yes, I agree, Nate. I did 

hear comments -- and I'm not sure it was in these 

papers; I apologize -- but I heard comments that 

a lot of the responding would like to see us somehow 
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aligned with secondary education.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Uh-hum.

MS. BAIRD: And it very well could be 

IOIA secondary education. Some of them, some 

responding -- is that a word? -- stated that they 

would like to get Continued Education Units. If 

they're going to spend this much time studying and 

learning, then they would like to get some credits 

from a university, or whoever, that they could then 

transfer to other things. So, I thought that was 

interesting and had a lot of validity.

If you're spending $5,000 -- and I heard 

that number several times as I talked with 

them -- by the time you do the training, you do 

the travel, you do the whatever, whatever, it's 

going to cost you over $5,000 -- if you're going 

to spend $5,000 for training, it would be really 

nice to get some college credits for that. So, 

just a thought and just comments that I heard.

MR. POWELL-PALM: May I respond to that 

real quick, Steve?

MR. ELA: Sure.
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MR. POWELL-PALM: Sorry, Amy, and 

then, I will be quiet.

I think that I couldn't agree more, Sue, 

and I think if I were to paint the worlds that I 

would like to live in as far as this pipeline flows, 

I would see an entity, I would see IOIA working 

with the university to make a standardized 2- or 

3-credit course that I know as a trainer for IOIA 

I often find myself in a position where I'm like, 

oh, I mean, I could definitely fill 45 hours of 

lecture time with all of the minutiae that goes 

into being a good, observant, and impactful 

inspector.

And so, I think marrying the basic 

course with the university would be just an 

incredible step forward for incorporating, like 

you said, that more formalized education 

component.

I really love, though, how IOIA is able 

to stay very close to the active inspectors who 

are actually working and doing the inspections, 

and their trainers -- and I'm a junior member of 
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that team -- but like the trainers who are much 

higher up than me have done just thousands of 

inspections. And so, I really like how it's not

a theoretical training. You're being trained by 

folks who have done a lot of this on-the-ground 

work and they're actually working as inspectors.

I think, though, that there's even more 

potential with that university component because 

we can start to more clearly, I think in this 

question of diversity and inclusion, clearly 

target schools that just aren't necessarily in the 

normal organic folds right now. So, if we were 

working with schools that have agricultural 

programs, we would make good partners, but are not 

necessarily in the Midwest or in the West. They're 

not necessarily on the radar. I think that's a 

way we can tap into broadening this organic tent 

as well.

And so, if we had the training via both 

IOIA and the university in cooperation, moving to 

that boot camp, and then, having either some sort 

of more standardized employment practices where 
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folks could be recognized, could have a promotion 

path, a path to a career.

One thing I would tap onto that, though, 

is, personally, I thought it was a real steal to 

be able to spend $5,000 to jump into a career that 

paid me, you know, more than I probably would 

realize in any starting position for my 

undergraduate degree, which was much more than 

$5,000.

So, I think in recognizing the 

professionalism of the inspector, also recognizing 

that we're paying for the opportunity to engage 

in the career in a really big way. And I think 

it's kind of a chicken-and-egg question, but I 

think to kind of start that acknowledgment train, 

as it were, we can start by saying the education 

does really lead to something very special and very 

economically impactful.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Sure. Just a quick 

comment. Sue and the Subcommittee, thank you so 

much for working on this. I think this subject 
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matter is super important now, especially with the 

impending SOE that's going to be passed, and 

there's going to be more and more strain on 

inspectors and certifiers. So, giving them the 

support and training and education is going to be 

more critical now than ever. So, thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. Time is running 

a little bit short. The only thing I would make 

a comment on is how we've often started off the 

conversation, and again, with the new 

Administration, is that in this training, if we 

could really help make sure that we have diversity, 

whether color or sex or gender identification, or 

anything, that we not just fall into the trap of 

the "normal look," for a better way of saying it, 

of inspectors.

And I think of the black colleges and 

such. Could we reach out to them somewhat, so we 

make sure our inspectors are representative of a 

wide diversity, just to not reinforce the 

stereotypes we already have out there?

But I think this is a proposal. Is the 
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Board ready to go to a vote on this? And if so, 

I would entertain a motion.

MR. POWELL-PALM: I would make the 

motion.

MR. ELA: All right. Nate made the 

motion. Do we have a second?

MS. JEFFERY: I'll second.

MR. ELA: That was Mindee.

So, we will start down the list and we 

will --

MS. ARSENAULT: Steve, can I interrupt 

this for one second? Just for the record, could 

you state the motion, please?

MR. ELA: Yes. Go ahead.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, let me make sure 

I get this all right. But motion to vote on 

forwarding the proposal on Human Capital Strategy 

for Recruitment and Talent Management - Organic 

Inspectors and Reviewers.

MR. ELA: All right. Okay, we will 

start the vote with Asa this time.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: And the Chair votes yes.

Mindee, the vote count?

MS. JEFFERY: Unanimous, 14 to 0. The 

motion passes.

MR. ELA: All right, 14 yes, zero no, 

zero abstentions, zero absent.

All right. With that, Nate, I'll turn 

it back to you.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you, and it 

will be a quick turnaround.

Our discussion document, and then, this 

is, again, I don't mean to tell how great Jenny 

is, even though she is very great, but it's also 

a deep insight. We were talking about it 

yesterday, the impact of calling someone up to say, 

"You should run for the Board." I know that I, 

as a first generation farmer -- and I apologize 

if I froze. Can everyone still hear me?

MR. ELA: Yes.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes? Okay, great.
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Right when I get off of these meetings, 

I'll run to my field and keep planting my fellow 

peas and my durum wheats, and it is a stretch for 

time for this sort of volunteer work. And so, I 

know that's true for a lot of people and we miss 

out on a lot of really great talent who could be 

serving on this Board, but feel that the lift is 

too much to be able to pull away from their farms 

or their other work.

And so, prompted by how do we ultimately 

support the Board, how do we make it more accessible 

to more people, this discussion document, human 

capital and supporting the work of the NOSB, is 

a first stab at trying to figure that out. What 

could we do as far as providing resources to Board 

members to make it so that the lift isn't so 

insurmountable that we miss out on really 

insightful folks getting on this Board and being 

able to make their mark without having to sacrifice 

their day job?

So, Steve has very kindly offered to 

take us through this, and I will turn it back over 
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to him.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Nate.

Yes, and I really appreciate both the 

CACS and the program bringing this up. We often 

talk about the lift that it takes to be on the NOSB. 

I certainly, even though I'm a fourth generation 

grower, have not followed the NOSB closely, even 

though I have occasionally submitted comments and 

sort of kind of diving into it.

It's a new area, and like somebody said 

yesterday, I was debating whether to apply or not, 

and I thought I would probably wait because of kids 

and things. But somebody called me up and 

encouraged me, and here I am.

But I think, just to summarize quickly 

the comments -- we don't need to spend a lot of 

time on this. Just to start off with, there were 

a number of comments that we should open an online 

docket between NOSB meetings, just so there can 

be a more transparent exchange of information to 

help NOSB members in decisionmaking processes. 

I think that's a great suggestion, and I would like 
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to point out I don't know that we accomplished that 

this go-round.

But, in general, we have opened the 

online docket fairly soon after the public meeting 

just for that purpose. And I will note that that 

has been largely unused by stakeholders and, also, 

by the Board. There's no fingerpointing there. 

It's something that we have thought about using 

more. And so, that is, again, a suggestion, trying 

to move more forward with that.

I will point out that it's always so 

difficult for the Board and subcommittees because 

our turnaround time is so tight. I think, for 

fall, our work will have to be to Michelle by 

mid-August in order to get it published and public 

comments for October. So, the time for a lot of 

exchange is limited, but, yet, I think it could 

be very important, so that proposals come out much 

stronger and do reflect more stakeholder comment.

Other than that, we know that NOSB 

independence from the program has always been a 

very high priority for us and the stakeholders. 
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And so, we, honestly, were a little nervous in 

pushing this forward of how to support the NOSB 

without stakeholders and the NOSB itself feeling 

like there was undue influence from the program 

on this. But I was very heartened to see nearly 

all our stakeholders, in fact -- unless I missed 

a comment -- were in favor of this; that really 

all of you recognize the difficulties of being on 

the NOSB and really lauded that we could use 

additional technical and research support.

And I thought the comments were great, 

that worries about the program having too much 

control could be allied through clearly outlined 

policies and vetting the support individuals. And 

a number of comments said they would like the NOSB 

to be able to have some autonomy in picking these 

support individuals, such as the program giving 

each member or committee a budget that, then, could 

be determined how to be used by that individual 

or subcommittee, or having a research assistant 

or something, one per three members, that could 

help. There is a fair amount of brainstorming on 
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this.

I think another comment was, in 

addition, I think the thoughts were really of 

providing NOSB members with more technical 

support, whether it's chemistry, ecology, 

biological sciences, plant pathology, 

bioengineering, all these things where we may not 

be as technically versed on this because of our 

day jobs, but where somebody could really provide 

some help.

We already have the technical reports, 

which, hopefully, are able to provide this, but 

they have a fairly long turnaround time, are quite 

expensive. And so, somehow making something a 

little more accessible and quicker to the Board 

members would be very useful.

The other item that was brought up is 

to have some regulatory language development, so 

that our intent is captured in our recommendations. 

I know in the last few years the Board has really 

tried to be more specific to the program about what 

our intent is, so that the program doesn't have 
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to interpret in the regulatory language what we 

meant. We don't always get the regulatory 

language correct or precise, but at least it shows 

fairly clearly what our intent is. So, help with 

that could be very useful.

I think the concerns that people had 

is that they still thought -- and I agree with 

this -- that our subcommittees should author their 

own proposals and documents for stakeholder 

consideration because, one, it comes in from that 

individual member that is selected to be on the 

NOSB, and then, that member also has investment 

in those documents. So, that is part of the 

commitment to being on the NOSB.

Also, people said it would not be 

useful/appropriate to have outside people support 

or summarize, abbreviate, or translate the public 

comments. They really felt that outside people 

could sort them -- Michelle already does some of 

this for us -- but that the Board itself should 

read those public comments, just so there is not 

influence on our interpretation or the positions 
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may be nuanced in those public comments. So, 

there's strong feeling that we should still be 

responsible for those because we sometimes know 

who's commenting. We may have talked to them 

before. Over the years, we've gained experience 

in those nuances, which might be very important.

So, with that, I was very pleased by 

the amount of support encouraged for us. I know 

that does consume a lot of time and it does inhibit 

people from serving on the Board, especially maybe 

smaller growers or small businesses, and such.

So, with that, I think I'll turn it 

back. This was a discussion document. We don't 

have a lot of time. We're running behind a little 

bit at this point, but are there any thoughts from 

the Board at this point? Otherwise, it will go 

back to the CACS for probably a more formal proposal 

on this.

Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: I just have one quick 

question, not a question, one comment.

Michelle clarified for me in this part 
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of the OFPA that the participation on the Board 

is without compensation, and that came up 

yesterday, too, in terms of my experience with EPA.

But just to emphasize that that, also, 

limits the people as well, not just time, but also 

money. There's people I know I've suggested to 

participate on the Board, and they basically can't 

afford it. And when we think about diversity, of 

course, we can't contravene OFPA in that specific 

designation, but I think that's something to think 

about, how to improve diversity, and some resources 

to help people participate could make the 

difference in accomplishing that.

MR. ELA: Agreed, Asa. And, yes, we 

certainly know the loss of time. And whether it's 

an employer saying you have to do it in the evening, 

"We'll support you, but you still have to do it 

in the evening and keep up with your day job," or 

an employee saying, "Yes, we'll sponsor you" -- I 

know, just to be candid, on my own farm that I figure 

every meeting that I leave, and the extra people 

I have to hire, or the trucking I have to hire, 
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probably out of pocket costs me $1500 to $2,000. 

That doesn't count my time. It's just the 

alternatives that I have to put in place. So, it's 

not cheap and it does limit people, I think.

So, any other comments?

(No response.)

I don't see any. So, Nate, I'll turn 

it back to you to wind up before we go on to 

Handling.

MR. POWELL-PALM: All right. Well, I 

think no vote should be taken on this as of now. 

I really just wanted to, again, thank Jenny for 

getting this conversation started. And I think 

it's something that is exciting. I mean, I see 

a true path forward for seeing another iteration 

of organic certification, inspection, and moving 

forward as we grow as an industry.

Yes, Jenny?

DR. TUCKER: Yes, just a very quick 

comment, both for the Board and for the community. 

I shared yesterday that we will be issuing early 

next week a call for proposals. And it will have 
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a number of projects listed in it.

This is one of the projects. So, 

although this is a discussion document, and the 

Board will continue to work on it, I do think an 

agile approach in terms of learning through 

multiple pathways is important on this item.

And so, there is a project in the call 

for proposals on this item. We will not get ahead 

of the Board on this. And I think it's really 

important to know who's out there, because we're 

talking about what a bunch of people could do. 

We don't know that there are any organizations out 

there that are going to be willing to do this.

And so, I would really strongly 

encourage the community that, if you know of 

academic institutions that would be interested in 

doing this kind of a project, encouraging them to 

submit a proposal on how they think it would 

work -- you know, it's not only a demand problem; 

it's a supply problem. So, who's going to actually 

do this work and who could run it, and how would 

that work institutionally? There are a bunch of 
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universities out there that we really have to think 

about this, or nonprofits, and really think about 

how to structure this kind of thing.

So I do encourage us to think about that 

as a starting point, as an experiment, but I do 

want to be overt about the fact that it will be 

in the call for proposals, given the progress the 

Board has made on it and given the positive public 

comments about it. But I did want to commit we 

won't get ahead of the Board in thinking about it.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you. Thank 

you for that. And thank you for the clarity and 

the heads-up. I think a lot of folks are really 

interested and excited for this call for proposals.

I will just give a quick shoutout that 

I know IOIA is very excited to work with 

universities. And so, please contact Margaret 

Scoles as you're coming up with your proposals. 

Because I think it's exciting how we can all move 

together forward on this.

I think that's it for me, Steve. And 

I really appreciate everyone's time, and I know 
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we went over. So, thank you for letting us dive 

into this discussion.

MR. ELA: That's all right. We 

started a little bit late anyhow.

And I probably neglected to say in my 

presentation there that, yes, there were quite a 

few suggestions of using interns or research 

associates from universities, so that they would 

get their feet wet, so to speak, and really 

introduce more people to the NOSB and to the process 

of organics. So, I think that could be a really 

great idea. I know how to combine technical 

research with technical reports is probably going 

to be a challenge, but I think it will be very 

interesting to see what this day brings up in terms 

of people thinking about it.

So, Nate, you had one more thought?

MR. POWELL-PALM: One more thought. 

I just wanted to give a shoutout to Emily Oakley, 

who was part of the early drafting of this proposal, 

and she is great.

All right. Sorry. Thank you.
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MR. ELA: No, I totally agree; she 

really has her fingerprints on this in such a good 

way.

So, with that, we are going to move into 

the Handling Subcommittee, and, Jerry, I'm going 

to turn it over to you.

MS. ARSENAULT: Jerry, you're muted.

MR. D'AMORE: Oh, I am not.

(Laughter.)

Well, I'm going to start someplace that 

I had no intention of starting with. And I really 

want to acknowledge Nate and his entire team for 

a phenomenal job on a very, very important set of 

issues. I enjoyed it and was well educated. 

Thank you very much.

So, the Handling Subcommittee, we're 

going to start out with a proposal, a Subcommittee 

proposal, and that will be presented by Steve.

And I don't have more of a preamble than 

that, Steve. So, if you would be kind enough to 

go with it, I'd appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Jerry.
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I apologize for presenting so many 

things. I'm not sure how I got myself in these 

buckets of hot water.

But ion exchange, to give some 

background, was sent to us by the program to try 

and clarify from the NOSB some discrepancies 

between certifiers. And so, the program asked us 

to give our opinion or our recommendation back to 

them as to how ion exchange materials should be 

handled in terms of how they should be certified.

It seemed like a fairly straightforward 

topic. It obviously has not been. And there was 

a proposal at the fall Board meeting that was put 

forth and was voted down by the Board. So, I just 

want to put that in perspective. And so, this is 

an updated proposal that maybe is a little less 

concrete than the proposal in the fall, but also 

tries to, well, account for some of the nuances 

that are in ion exchange.

And just as a high-level reminder of 

what really is involved in this, there are really 

several different aspects or buckets, as Mindee 
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has noted with excluded methods, that ion exchange 

involves.

And the first item is really what should 

be on the National List. It's whether recharge 

materials that are used to clean these resins, so 

that they continue to be active, whether those 

should be on the National List. It's also whether 

the foods or the materials coming out of this ion 

exchange filtration, whether they have been 

chemically altered. And then, the final bucket, 

which is probably the most controversial, is 

whether the resins themselves need to be on the 

National List.

So, in public comments and such, I think 

it's been pretty clear there has been a little 

pushback, but these materials that run through 

these ion exchange filtrations have been somewhat 

chemically altered just by the ion exchange itself. 

So, if you go into the filtration with a heavy 

metal and it comes out without a heavy metal, but 

some other ion, that that probably is a chemical 

change. It may not be all that large in terms of 
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the total product, but it is there. And there is 

pretty widespread agreement on that, although I 

do want to recognize that there are some comments 

that don't totally agree with that. So, to me, 

that one is fairly clear. I'm willing to be taken 

to task on that, if somebody feels differently.

The other thing that I think there is 

pretty widespread agreement is that the recharge 

materials that are used should be on the National 

List. And again, just to explain the process very 

quickly, you have resins that are in the column. 

Those resins have some ionic points where ions 

are attached to them, and then, as you run the 

material through the column, those ions are 

exchanged. So, if you have -- and I'll be terrible 

at this -- but if you have a sodium ion on the resin 

and another ion comes through, you exchange that 

sodium for something else that you don't want in 

the food product.

After a time, those ions are, I'm just 

going to say, fully exchanged and the resin will 

no longer do its work, or the column will no longer 
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do its work. And so, you then have to recharge 

the ions that are on that, take the ions that were 

exchanged off, and recharge it with new ions, and 

then, you can proceed to use the filter again.

So, there's wide agreement that those 

materials that you run through the column to 

recharge those resins should be on the National 

List, and I don't think there's much argument on 

that. So, whether there's a chemical change in 

the final substance, or whether the recharge 

materials need to be on the list, there's pretty 

widespread agreement on that.

Where the big disagreement occurs is 

really on the resins themselves. And that, we 

definitely get a disparity of opinions on this. 

Do those resins need to be on the National List 

or not?

And so, I'm going to kind of go through 

some public comments. It gets a little bit 

technical, but I'll do my best to simplify it.

So, some of it really comes down 

to -- people disagree with me a little bit on 
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this -- but as to whether the resins are food 

contact substances, which would not need to be on 

the National List. Examples of those might be 

piping, tables, o-rings, and such, used in organic 

processing, but which are not required to be on 

the National List. Or whether these resins are 

secondary food additives and that they do 

contribute some things to the final product, and 

if they are secondary food additives, they should 

be on the National List.

So, the first thing is, even if they 

are a food contact substance, we had a couple of 

commenters note that in OFPA it does not say that 

food contact substances are exempt from review. 

So, the argument is that, yes, these resins should 

be on the National List. And they note that, for 

a manufacturer to list a food contact substance 

with the FDA, they are first listed as a secondary 

food additive. And then, that manufacturer 

applies for that substance to be a food contact 

surface, and that process of vetting the food 

contact surfaces is not necessarily thoroughly 
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reviewed or available for public comment. So, 

that that process might not really align with 

organic principles or with OFPA.

And there's also been the stakeholders 

have noted that ion exchange may introduce 

chemicals into the food, that those resins do break 

down, and that, really, they are secondary food 

additives, which would fall under the criteria that 

we should list those resins.

And OMRI submitted some comments, 

basically, where they said that they consider these 

as secondary food additives and that they would 

require a petition in order for them to be 

considered. They note that, in addition to 

filtering (audio interference) agents mentioned 

some of these secondary food additives, including 

boiling water additives, anti-foaming agents, and 

certain enzymes. So, that's the argument that 

these resins should be on the National List.

And I guess the final comment in that 

is that, if we were to decide that they are 

permitted as a food contact substance, would that 
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precedent apply to many other substances; and that 

we cannot justify allowing this loophole to one 

category and not set a precedent for all, a bunch 

of other categories.

On the other hand, there are a number 

of commenters that present evidence that these 

resins do not need to be on the National List. 

And in some ways, and as I noted in the proposal, 

some of this really gets into the legal issues that 

I don't feel like the NOSB has the experience or 

the capability to resolve. And I think if we pass 

this proposal, part of it is saying that the program 

should talk with their legal experts and decide 

this issue for us.

So, the argument on this side is that 

it really comes, in part, around the definition 

of food contact substances. FDA regulates the 

food contact substances, and those substances are 

not intended to have any technical effect in the 

final product. And it can easily be argued that 

the resins themselves are not needed for a 

technical effect. It's really just the ions that 
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are attached to them.

So, the resins are, I'm going to use 

the word "inert," but that is probably not a great 

word. But they are just a holder, not actually 

change themselves the final product.

And it was noted by one commenter, in 

response to the fact that some of these other items 

do need to be on the National List, which I just 

mentioned, that there are processing technologies 

that can chemically change a processed product that 

do not need to be on the list. For example, 

cooking, baking, heating, the use of activated 

carbon for filtration, where that carbon has to 

be filtered out at the end. So, some of these 

things, I think it can be argued either way that 

some things we allow; some things we don't.

The nuance here, and this, again, comes 

back to the legalities. It was mentioned in the 

public comments, but it comes back somewhat to the 

Harvey lawsuit. And in that lawsuit, they 

included, interpreted ingredient as including 

processing aids. And processing aids are 
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something that is added to a food, for a technical 

or functional effect, but is minorly present in 

the finished food. So, you would think that would 

tend to indicate that resins need to be on the 

National List.

However, in 2002, the program had 

issued a policy that has continued to still be used 

about what is "still present in the food" refers 

to. And so, I'll just read a little bit from that 

document.

It says, "The NOP defines `still 

present' as those ingredients regulated by the Food 

and Drug Administration as food additives 

permitted for direct addition to food for human 

consumption."

And it gives the various lists, but it 

says, "Secondary direct food additives are 

permitted in food for human consumption, except 

that substances classified by the FDA as food 

contact substances are not subject to this 

definition."

"Food additives permitted in food or 
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in contact with food on an interim basis for 

additional study, except that substances 

classified by FDA as food contact substances are 

not part of this definition."

So, this is the acting principle from 

the program, where they, as part of the definition 

of OFPA and the regulations, where the program 

could say that FDA's classification of food contact 

substances really does affect whether those 

materials need to be on the list or not.

Finally, and for the Board as we get 

into discussion on this, I'm happy to try and 

clarify this further. It does seem a little 

complicated. But, to me, it really does hinge, 

despite the comments that OFPA does not cover this 

situation, the program has said it does. There's 

been common acceptance of this. And so, a lot does 

legally hinge on food contact or secondary food 

additive.

There is, though, wide agreement, to 

finish up, that ion exchange filtration must be 

reviewed and approved in the Organic System Plan. 
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This is not something that operates in a vacuum. 

NOP policy information and the Handling 

Subcommittee's recommendation that ion exchange 

filtration is allowed, providing that the 

recharging materials are on the National List and 

approved by a certifier, and that the ion exchange 

resin may be allowed if it is FDA approved as a 

food contact substance and -- I note 

"and" -- approved in the certified operations 

Organic System Plan. So, there is disclosure of 

what this process is, and that is a very important 

thing that I think most our stakeholders agree on, 

whether they agree on the resins, the 

classification of the resins themselves.

We received a fair number of comments 

on this. Sue had her number of pages that she held 

up. This is one that I don't have a count on the 

number of pages I looked at, but it is certainly 

a topic that has been a discrepancy between 

certifiers. And that is the reason the program 

asked us to look at it. And that discrepancy is 

shown in the stakeholder comments.
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I personally -- and this is my own 

opinion -- and I guess it was the Handling 

Committee's opinion, that since we forwarded it 

to the Board unanimously, this proposal should be 

passed. It, basically, sends it back to the 

program and says get the legal opinion, and once 

you get the legal opinion as to whether this is 

a food contact surface or a secondary food 

additive, that will determine whether the resins 

need to be on the list or not. It's complicated.

I will open it up to Board discussion. 

So, Brian, go ahead.

Brian, you may be on mute.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes. Yes, thanks, 

Steve.

And since I've been on the NOSB a short 

time, I am constantly astounded at how complex 

these issues are. And you've sorted through that. 

I really appreciate you going through all that 

minutiae.

I have two questions. And one is that, 

since it sounded like you felt that the comments 
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were pretty unanimous that a substance that goes 

through an ion filtration process is chemically 

altered, what happens then? Whatever that 

material is, is that considered a non-organic 

ingredient then?

MR. ELA: That's a great question, and 

I think that's a little above my pay grade. I mean, 

the recharge materials themselves have to be on 

the list. So, what is added to the product, it's 

technically on the National List. But I guess I 

would leave that to the interpretations or the rule 

itself as to how that is interpreted. So, I guess 

I don't know that it really affects how we look 

at this proposal, but I would defer to how 

certifiers look at that.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay, yes. And my 

second one is that, speaking as I do from the 

consumer and public interest point of view, I 

understand a lot of this legal wording uses whether 

the intention is to have residues in the final 

product. But I think that, as a consumer, I'm 

really concerned about whether there are residues, 
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whether the intention was there or not, especially 

when I see that styrene, which is one of the typical 

components of these columns, is a possible 

carcinogen, I'd be really concerned about that.

So, I guess I would like to hear your 

opinion on that. And my feeling is that I'm sorry 

to say, because I know you've put so much work into 

this, that I think it should go back to the 

Committee.

MR. ELA: I respect your opinion, and 

I'm certainly not going to try to change your mind 

if that's your feeling.

I think, to me, looking at this -- and 

I respect what you say, whether the intent is there 

or not -- you know, the TR did note that, and I 

think we've received other comments, that these 

resin materials, as you noted, there is no intent 

for them to go into the product, and that I think 

it's fairly unclear how much of, know, how those 

break down. I know one of the comments referred 

to by one of our stakeholders referred to how these 

resins break down, but when I read that, it was 
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really when these resins are used under conditions 

that they're not really designed for. So, whether 

it's high temperature or inappropriate acidity or 

alkalinity, or low temperatures, for that matter, 

if they're used incorrectly, yes, they will break 

down. But used according to their specifications 

as to how they should be used, they don't break 

down.

And again, I think the hard part about 

this, I think this argument can really be made for 

so many substances. If we cut fruit up on a plastic 

cutting board, I think the argument can be made 

that some of these plastics leach as well, or the 

type of o-rings used in dairy processing, or some 

of these other materials.

I agree with your thoughts, but I also 

think it really opens a rabbit hole of these food 

contact substances of how far do we go in 

determining this. And that was certainly one of 

the big comments, that we say this, even though 

FDA defines this as a food contact substance, but 

if we're going to say it has to be on the National 
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List, where does it stop? Of other food contact 

substances, do we require everything to be on the 

National List? And that gets very bulky.

So, the intention, and I think really 

the action, of these resins is generally that they 

do not contribute. You mentioned styrene. 

Certainly, that is a big concern, but the way the 

styrene is chemically put in and how it's tied to 

things may make it behave much differently than 

as the straight styrene that is on the list for 

cancer-causing.

We'll go to other comments. So, Sue, 

and then, Kyla, and then, Carolyn.

MS. BAIRD: Steve, kudos to you for 

tackling incredibly difficult subject.

I'm wondering -- and I know all the work 

you've put into it, and I know your 

preference -- but I'm wondering if there's some 

way we can actually separate this into two 

different proposals. One being we seem to have 

consensus that all the other ingredients need to 

be listed, but we really don't know about resins, 
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whether it should be or not.

I think the point that you made that 

we need some real legal counseling on this before 

we could even make an informed decision is valid. 

So, I guess I need clarification. If we vote to 

move this and accept this proposal, exactly what 

are we voting on? Are we voting to say we're not 

going any further with the resin issue, but we would 

like to move forward on the other, or what are we 

saying? I apologize that I'm having to ask this 

question. I should know it.

MR. ELA: It's a complicated one. I 

guess we've asked for legal clarification from the 

program several times. We have not gotten it. 

So, I don't expect to get it.

I think what I've tried to do in writing 

this is ask -- you know, if we forward it to the 

program, we say, "You need the legal opinion." 

And depending on which way that legal opinion goes, 

it would be our recommendation for which way, what 

should be done. If the legal opinion is that these 

are truly food contact surfaces, then it would be 
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that, just like they say tables and these other 

things, they would not be required to on the list. 

And if it's determined that they're secondary food 

additives, they would be required.

So, even though we're not making an 

exact specification, depending on the legal 

outcome, we are making that specification. Does 

that make any sense?

We could separate them. That 

certainly would be a possibility, but I think the 

question of the resins really is the thorny one. 

If we separate them and come back, we're still 

going to have to deal with the resins. And I 

honestly don't see where we can go after this. 

If this is voted down or sent back to the 

Subcommittee, the only other way to go -- you know, 

we've said, first, that they shouldn't be listed. 

That got voted down. If we vote this one down 

or send it back to the Subcommittee because we don't 

feel comfortable voting on it, I guess the next 

step is to say the resins do have to be on the list. 

But there's going to be no unanimity in that as 
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well.

So, I guess one of the reasons I think 

we should pass it is to move it on to the program, 

because I don't see us, you know, where else we 

can go with this, quite honestly. So, I don't know 

that it is a great use of our time. I think we've 

outlined the issues, and we kick it back up to the 

program to let them deal with it. I know some 

stakeholders say we shouldn't do that, but I think 

we've outlined it pretty well in the proposal. 

And that's one reason the Subcommittee passed it.

MS. BAIRD: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Let's go to Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Thanks for your work on 

this, Steve. Yes, this is quite the doozy topic 

here.

So, I just want to say that OFPA 

requires us to review ingredients and processing 

aid, right, to put them on the National List. In 

my read of the definitions that we have to work 

with, I don't think that resins are, either. I 

don't think that they meet the definition of a 
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processing aid or a definition of an ingredient.

I do think, as a bigger topic here, that 

it would really be in the NOSB's best interest to 

have a bigger policy determination on whether food 

contact substances are like processing aids, 

because sometimes they are. Resins I don't think 

are. So, I think that we need to sort of have that 

bigger determination or criteria, so that we know 

when food contact substances are or are not. 

Otherwise, we're going to come up with some other 

substance and be sort of grappling with the same 

issues. So, I do think that it would be in our 

best interest to have that, whether that's coming 

from NOP, or whatever. That would be helpful for 

the future.

I think we should vote.

MR. ELA: Okay. Let's go to Carolyn 

next.

DR. DIMITRI: So, thank you.

I mean, I appreciate all of the work 

people have done on this. It's very complicated 

and I'm not a scientist. So, a lot of the arguments 
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kind of go over my head.

But I speak as the representative for 

the consumer interest. There is something that 

is very unsavory about saying this is a legal 

definition that we should leave in the hands of 

FDA and the National Organic Program.

And I just think that, if we can't

clearly say yes or no about resins in our minds, 

then, what does that tell our consumers in general? 

And then, how does that put us in a position of 

upholding the integrity of the organic standard?

So, mine is like a more general, 

abstract question. I don't understand resins, 

but, to my limited understanding, it sounds to me 

like they should be on the list, for what it's 

worth.

MR. ELA: Sure. And, I mean, I, again, 

respect your thoughts on that.

I mean, I guess this is where we go down 

the rabbit hole, but water, for example, is used. 

It's often softened, or whatever, by ion exchange 

filtration. We completely allow water in our 
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substances without thinking twice about it. This 

ion exchange is used in some other materials that 

we don't think twice about, I think -- God, I can 

never pronounce this -- pullalan, maybe citric 

acid. So, it's not like this is unheard of and 

it is widely accepted by consumers, even in their 

own homes.

And I guess I hear that you think it 

might be unsavory, and I do have those reactions 

myself sometimes. But I guess, also, being 

geologist, my knowledge of clay chemistry is these 

ion exchanges are quite often in soils, and 

whatever, and that's very normal.

I guess in my head it just seems to me 

that these resins are relatively inert. And I 

would say completely inert, but, obviously, that 

might be -- you know, I always hate to make 

statements that are complete.

So, to me, the equivalency is working 

with a table or an o-ring or PVC pipes that are 

used, rather than some of these other things. But 

that's my opinion and I respect yours.
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Wood? And then, Nate.

MR. TURNER: Steve, I'm really hung up 

on this, and I'm saying that as a member of the 

Subcommittee. I've been on the Subcommittee now 

for a couple of months, since the last meeting, 

and I'm struggling with it newly, just thinking 

about the comments and this discussion.

And I'm wondering -- it is a question 

for you or a question for anybody who can take 

it -- but are there other examples where the Board, 

on the issue of food contact surfaces, is 

regulating, is making rulings on food contact 

surfaces versus the implication that, if it is a 

food contact surface, then it's out of our purview? 

I just want to make sure I'm understanding that 

a little bit because I am a little confused on that, 

because we do talk a lot about other food contact 

surfaces and I'm just not -- I haven't been on the 

Board long enough to really know, have a full 

visibility on all those materials that might be 

in the category of food contact surfaces that we 

do make decisions on versus the implication that 
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we wouldn't make decisions on resins as a food 

contact surface.

So, that's just a new question for me, 

Steve, that I didn't ask prior to the meeting. 

Sorry.

MR. ELA: No need to apologize. I 

mean, this is part of the discussion, is, as things 

come up, we brainstorm.

Actually, I don't think I can answer 

that specifically. I don't know. I can be taken 

for task for this answer, and I'm willing to, but 

I think -- and coming back to that 2002 

interpretation by the program, it is that we 

don't -- you know, if it's a food contact substance, 

we have decided, as an interpretation of OFPA, to 

not touch those because it just would expand our 

work by a huge amount. I mean, anything that an 

organic product touched would then have to be on 

the list, and that would get very complicated.

So, I'm going to say no, but I'm sure 

some stakeholders out there are shaking their heads 

and going, "Oh, God, Steve, don't say that." But, 
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you know, it just comes down to how much in the 

weeds do we want to be. To me, again, my own 

opinion, are we in micro-regulation here, where 

we have bigger topics to look at, or not? So, my 

own opinion.

But, Nate, Asa, Kyla, Brian. I'm going 

to step out of the lead on this and step into the 

Chair position a little bit. I want to make sure 

we get everybody heard on this. I think it's 

really important, but we also don't have unlimited 

time. But I think it's important enough that we 

don't want to cut it off, either.

So, go ahead, Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: I just wanted to 

thank you, Steve, for sort of your take on where 

we're at, and the incredible amount of work that 

you've put into this.

I think that I just wanted to highlight, 

you know, there is sort of a goal. There's an end 

point for where the work -- where we can actionably 

move forward and keep progressing with the work. 

And if I hear you right, I think it's that there's 
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not going to be a whole lot difference between what 

we can say now and what we could say, you know, 

with another semester under our belts.

And I think we have an incredible amount 

of work and leadership that is going to be leaving, 

you, you know, after another semester, and folks 

like Asa. So, I think, also, tying up those 

resources in time, when we don't have a clear path 

of like getting a lot more done on this topic -- so, 

that's why I personally think that we should vote.

I did want to just highlight, to Wood's 

point, Kyla I think is able to answer something 

real quick. So, I don't mean to jump the queue, 

but she was raising her hand as an answer to Wood.

MS. SMITH: I was, but I can wait. I 

remember.

MR. ELA: Okay. Well, let's go to Asa, 

since he was next. But, yes, Kyla, keep that 

thought.

Go ahead, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: I just want to respond, 

actually, a little bit to you, and then, comment 
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on this.

There's some similarities here between 

concerns about BPA in canning products. I mean, 

there we have a situation where there's 

demonstrable leaching into the food and 

biomonitoring that validates that exposure. I 

know a number of organic producers have been in 

the news lately about taking phthalates out 

of -- looking at their processors and getting 

phthalates out of their product. I know that's 

come up with dairy, and then, more recently, with 

macaroni and cheese, although probably the dairy 

component.

So, in some ways, I do feel like that 

materials that can leach are within our purview. 

I know I want to work on the BPA issue. This 

particular issue has been just complex to me, and 

I agree our document kind of outlines all the 

issues. Whether we're in a position to deal with 

those legal issues, I think it is a hard question.

I appreciate the comments today from 

those representing consumers. You know, I think 
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that's an important driver. I know I'd like to 

see this, and I also did volunteer to take it over 

for the fall, if we do continue it.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Asa.

Kyla, I accidentally lowered your hand, 

but you're next.

MR. D'AMORE: Steve, may I interrupt 

as a point of order?

MR. ELA: Sure.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, I already had a note 

to myself at the appropriate break to ask you to 

take over the responsibility for keeping us on 

time, because I don't have the experience to do 

that. So, please accept that formally.

MR. ELA: Yes, I am keeping an eye on 

it.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you, sir.

MR. ELA: So, we may have a shorter 

lunch period here, just as an FYI. But I think 

we're fine.

So, Kyla? And then, Brian.

MS. SMITH: Sorry, I was competing on 
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muting things.

I was going to try to address Wood's 

comment. I know that like calcium hypochlorite, 

which is under quarry materials, is a -- I mean, 

not to get us into the whole sanitizers 

conversation, but that's a food contact substance.

And then, this just brings me to my 

earlier point of like why I think it would be in 

our best interest, because there are some food 

contact substances that are processing aids, and 

we would be required to review and put them on the 

list. But, again, I don't believe that resins fall 

into that definition of processing aids, but, 

again, it's not a one-to-one match, right? Some 

food contact substances would, and we would be 

required to review and approve them and put them 

on the list.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Kyla.

Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Well, I guess I really 

appreciate all this back-and-forth, and I'm sorry 

to prolong it. But, Steve, you outlined that, 
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essentially, the third option, which has not yet 

been a proposal, is that we could require that the 

resin component be on the list, is that right?

MR. ELA: To me, that would be the next 

step after this.

MR. CALDWELL: Right.

MR. ELA: We're kind of working down 

to the approaches. Personally -- well, I'll say 

what my opinion is -- go ahead -- after you're done.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, well, my thought 

is that that makes sense to me to do that. If these 

materials are pretty benign, then they can be on 

the list and there's no issue. And I think that 

it could be done with a sufficient read period, 

so that it didn't disrupt people's processing plans 

for the next couple of years. It wouldn't destroy 

the processed food, organic food industry.

So, I guess I would like that to be a 

possibility to be entertained. And the way I 

understand it, the only way that that could be done 

would be to send this back to the Committee. Does 

that seem right?
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MR. ELA: That is correct, yes, if it 

went back to Subcommittee. But, you know, I guess 

I would, again, very much respect your opinion, 

but I think if you look at the comments we have 

received, I am going to guess that we would receive 

pretty much the same comments and end up in the 

same quandary, that a number of people would argue 

against that they should be listed, and again, a 

number of people would argue that they should.

Part of this issue, too, and it gets 

a little complicated, is that secondary food 

additives were identified by FDA a number of years 

before food contact substances were. So, there 

was a period of time where things were listed as 

food contact substances, and, in fact, some of 

these resins fall in that category. I'm sorry, 

I said that wrong. There was a period of time where 

things were listed as secondary food additives 

because there was no listing or food contact 

substances as a definition did not exist. And so, 

once food contact substances became a definition, 

resins approved after that were put in the food 
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contact substance list, but the FDA didn't try to 

look back and say, oh, things that you find as 

secondary food additives are now moved forward to 

food contact substances.

So, because of the way the regulatory 

process worked and the timing, we do see some 

discrepancy of how they're listed, but those 

originally listed as secondary food additives 

might have been listed as food contact substances 

if that category had existed.

And I guess I'm nervous, if this kind 

of comes back to a List 4 inert discussion, where 

we had a huge pushback from the industry -- and 

I don't know how much you listened to that, but 

there was a huge concern that, if we voted to delist 

List 4s, or if we -- I'm going to say the analogy 

is, if we say you have to list resins, that the 

disruption to the industry would be huge.

And I don't know -- I guess this is a 

question for Jenny -- but I really don't know if 

the program has regulatory authority to say we're 

going to have an extensive time period where we 
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can review these things. It sounds like a great 

concept, but I'm not sure, while they're being 

petitioned for listing, that they could continue 

to be used, because we haven't specifically put 

them on the National List.

So, Jenny, do you want to chime in on 

that?

DR. TUCKER: Sure, I'm happy to chime 

in.

And it takes us right back to the very 

beginning of this process. So, this process came 

to the Board because there was a conflict between 

certifiers, since certifiers have the same 

struggle that you guys did in thinking about this 

issue. And it led to different decisions.

And this is my chance to do a huge 

shoutout for certifiers, because the things that 

you guys have been struggling with on this issue, 

they struggle with every day. And so, certifiers 

have made these decisions as to whether to allow 

this or not. And they were mixed on that.

And so, that's why it came to the Board, 
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was because it came to us through a certifier 

conflict. Certifiers had made different 

decisions in good faith, just like with paper pots.

So, the status quo right now is that 

certifiers are arguing this. This is a source of 

inconsistency. They have interpreted it 

differently. We, however, did not issue a Notice 

of Noncompliance to the certifiers, to any 

certifier on this. So, the certifier that was more 

liberal in their allowances or provided more 

allowances on this topic, they did not receive a 

Notice of Noncompliance.

So, that kind of tells you that we 

believe that the decision that the certifiers have 

made, particularly the ones who have provided 

greater allowance, that we don't believe they did 

something illegal, because if they did, they would 

have gotten a noncompliance.

And, in fact, sometimes material 

conflicts are handled just that way. A certifier 

may an error; they made an illegal decision, and 

we give them a Notice of Noncompliance, and they 
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have to fix it. And everybody has to change their 

practices accordingly.

That's not this case. So, at this 

point, you have certifiers doing it both ways out 

there, and we have not indicated that one of those 

is noncompliant because, similar to paper pots, 

people made these decisions in good faith. And 

these are really hard decisions and have very 

compelling arguments on why they thought it was 

legal.

So, that leaves us in either a position 

like paper pots, where if the Board were going to 

work on it, we would -- we're not going to change 

something that's going to have an economic impact 

without rulemaking. And so, we would continue to 

allow the status quo while the Board was working 

on it.

Or, if we did rulemaking, if you send 

us a recommendation on this and we do rulemaking, 

then there would be a lengthy public comment 

process and likely an implementation period. So, 

if a rule was finalized to change the current status 
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quo, industry would need time to adjust practices 

and equipment, and they would be given an 

implementation period.

So, those are the two ways the 

timeframes provide, either a continued allowance 

because people made decisions in good faith, and 

certifiers have a hard job and no one did anything 

wrong here as far as we're concerned legally. They 

make different decisions, but that doesn't mean 

somebody was wrong and somebody was right. So, 

that's one path, would be to continue the allowance 

that's already in practice. Or the second would 

be to do rulemaking, and then, provide a long 

implementation period.

Does that answer the question? It's 

a little bit more context, but I think that's 

important because we haven't given you that many 

of these material conflicts. And I think it's 

really important to remember that certifiers are 

making these decisions every single day. And so, 

this has been a very public process, which is great. 

Sometimes there are conflicts and this is what 
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happens in good faith.

MR. ELA: Jenny, I know Sue has got a 

comment, and I know we're going to need to move 

on, but I have a question on that. With paper pots, 

you -- the program, not you personally -- were going 

to disallow use of them because they were not 

using -- because they did not meet the newspaper 

definition. And you didn't have authority to 

allow use of them, once you all determined that 

they were not technically allowed.

The only way we were able to get around 

that, so that they could continue to be used, was 

that note that, if the plant was taken out of the 

paper pot, the paper pot then could be recycled 

and put back in the ground. And that seemed like 

a pretty important thing to the program to give 

you regulatory cover to allow their continued use 

until we decided that issue.

I don't quite see the difference 

between that and this. If we say resins need to 

be listed, just being technical, how do you within 

your authority continue to allow them to be used?
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DR. TUCKER: Well, you could make a 

recommendation. Right now, they are allowed to 

be used. So, the status quo applies. They are 

allowed to be used because certifiers have 

interpreted -- again, we believe in good faith, 

and looking at that decision process, or else it 

wouldn't have come to you in the first place. We 

would have issued a Notice of Noncompliance. 

Based on our analysis of the certifier conflict, 

we determined that those certifiers had a legally 

justifiable position, and that's why it came to 

you.

So, given that that interpretation was 

made by the program in sending it to you that we 

thought the interpretation the certifiers made was 

valid, that's why we wanted you to weigh in on it 

as far as we're concerned. Therefore, it is 

allowed until a rulemaking made it prohibited. 

So, your recommendation would not change that 

decision.

And again, I think certifiers made 

reasonable decisions here that even this group has 
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articulated in terms of, well, we're not sure we 

think that these should be, need to be listed. 

And so, this is just a really hard topic.

MR. ELA: Well, I don't fully 

understand, but I trust your interpretation of 

this. So, I don't need to question it.

So, we've got Sue, and then, Mindee. 

And then, I know we're starting to become 

time-constrained. So, go ahead, Sue.

MS. BAIRD: Right. I heard, Steve, 

your comment that sometimes there may be contact, 

maybe not, depending on the process of the ion 

exchange of the resins. And I hope that that's 

what I heard, interpreting what I heard.

Is this somewhat analogous to boiler 

additives? Because sometimes boiler additives 

never have contact with the product. Sometimes 

they may be in a jacketed system. Sometimes they 

would. But, nevertheless, the certifier is 

required to look at those boiler additives and 

determine whether they're compliant or not. Now 

I'm asking the question. I don't know. So, 
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that's the reason I'm asking.

MR. ELA: Sure. No, great question. 

In fact, we've personally run into that because 

we have a steam kettle that we use on our handling 

side, but the boiler avenues and the steam kettle 

are just completely physically separated from the 

product. So, there's no interaction. So, our 

certifier interprets that as, you know, they don't 

need to be added to the list because there is no 

interaction.

But boiler additives where the steam 

does potentially come in contact, yes, they do need 

to be listed. And I think those fall in the 

secondary food additive category.

MS. BAIRD: Exactly, exactly.

MR. ELA: They're not defined as a food 

contact surface.

MS. BAIRD: That's right.

MR. ELA: So, here, that's the break 

right there: secondary food additive/food 

contact surface. I apologize, we've used food 

contact substance versus surface, and I believe 
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surface is the correct term.

MS. BAIRD: Right, right. So, is 

there a way that we could move forward with that 

type of differentiation? If it has contact, it's 

the process, which they would submit to the 

certifier. If it's determined to have either 

direct or indirect contact with the food, then they 

must be listed. But, if not, then they are 

allowed. And again, I'm asking a question because 

I have not done research on these that you have.

MR. ELA: The resins would have contact 

with the food because that's how the ion exchange 

occurs. The product goes over the resins and the 

ions, and then, they are exchanged. So, the 

question is, like you say -- there is no question 

that the recharged materials that affect that ion 

do need to be on the list. But I guess the question 

is, do the resins have a technical effect on the 

food or are they just there to hold the ions? And 

my sense is they're just there to hold the ions; 

they do not have a technical effect on the 

food -- but, coming back to legal definitions 
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again.

So, let's finish up with Mindee, and 

then, we will go from there.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you.

A dense subject and I appreciate your 

relentless, Steve, and everyone else pursuing this 

one.

I think, for me, I'm a little both ends 

on do we go back to Subcommittee or do we vote on 

this. I love Dave for pointing out that we're 

doing a weighted sensitivity analysis all the time. 

And I feel like, in the sense of representing what 

a consumer would say to me on this subject, I feel 

like when I'm able to land it for the consumer that 

the FDA has authority over something like this, 

and that's how we move, it really works for them. 

And so, I like that ethos of really clear 

understanding around what the resin subject is.

And I see the path that you're making, 

Steve, in that if we vote this -- correct me if 

I'm wrong -- if we vote this through, that we are 

going to get some more information back about the 
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resins, and then, be able to move forward on some 

clarity.

Because I do want to stay in touch with 

the stakeholder feedback to stay in touch and stay 

involved in the decisionmaking around this, and 

that our process is really important to them and 

being involved is really important to them.

So, I feel like we have a really clear 

consensus from the community on the recharge, and 

we still have this question on the resins. And 

so, if we could make short work in this one last 

semester of making a proposal that clearly lets 

us vote on the recharge isolated from anything 

else, and then, either in the time interim be able 

to hear back on the resins questions and have that 

be like an FDA call, or a direction from the program 

call, and then, we vote on that, I feel really 

comfortable that I can stand there and say to a 

consumer, "We did our due diligence. We know what 

the legalities are. This is ours and this isn't."

Somehow, that's where I would want to 

land. And so, if going back to Subcommittee gets 
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us to that, then that's what I would want to do. 

If not, I'm ready to vote.

MR. ELA: I guess my, again, personal 

response as a Board member -- I don't want to 

represent anybody else -- is that I think I haven't 

heard anybody in the certification community 

grouse about the recharge materials needing to be 

on the list. I think certifiers, as far as I can 

see, are in agreement on that. In some ways, do 

we need to reiterate that? No, there's consensus 

on that one.

It really is the resins issue. I mean, 

there's no doubt that, to me -- I mean, some of 

these resins are listed on the food contact surface 

list. That is clear. So, I think, then, it 

becomes legally, again, how the program takes that 

and runs with it.

So, I'll just say again I would have 

written this proposal differently if I didn't come 

down on the side of it is beyond our capability. 

It really is a technical/legal definition at this 

point as to which way they fall. I think the 
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certifier discrepancy is part of that, you know, 

that some feel one way; some feel another. And 

Asa has offered to take it over, which I'm fine 

with.

If we sent it back to Subcommittee, I 

think we're going to end up in the same debate. 

If we say, okay, resins need to be listed, then 

we're going to be back in the same scale of justice 

that one side is going to say yes and one side is 

going to say no, and we're still stuck.

I don't see a way to create an unanimous 

vote either way on the Board, honestly. But I 

don't know if that answers your question at all.

MS. JEFFERY: Well, I mean, I think 

it's a process, not philosophical question, that 

I'm driving at right now. I do agree with you that 

we're pretty agreed on the recharge across the 

Board, and that in the sense of going back to 

Subcommittee, is it going to be functional in the 

process and help us with both the stakeholder 

concern that this Board stays in touch with the 

process really clearly and the concern of the 
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consumer that we're representing? I feel really 

good about like letting go of the resins being on 

the National List if we have that clear statement.

And so, I think it would be functional 

to go back to Subcommittee if we think we can get 

that. Because we're okay with status quo 

operations right now, and I think it's okay for 

us to really get this right, given the level of 

complexity that we're dealing with and how much 

energy are putting towards this.

And so, for me, the question is, if we 

go back to Subcommittee, can we get that umbrella 

from the FDA and/or from the program, so that when 

we go back to our stakeholders, we're like, "Yeah, 

this isn't ours. We're clear on that. So, the 

resins aren't on the National List." Or, if we 

can't get that clarity, then I don't know what the 

answer is.

But I do like this notion of like we're 

clear on recharge. Let's clearly vote on 

recharge, and/or can we get it in any more clear 

form from a regulatory standpoint about whose the 
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resins is?

So, for me, the only functionality of 

going back to the Subcommittee is, can we get that 

and land it in our one more semester of the 

collective intelligence who's been involved with 

this conversation for so long on the Board?

MR. ELA: Yes, and I hear that 

question, and my short answer would be no. I don't 

see that we're going to get that. The TR said, 

essentially, there's no known or no literature 

saying that these break down and adulterate food. 

Some of our stakeholders have said, "Yes, they 

do." Others have said, "No, they don't." I don't 

think we're going to get science/scientific 

articles that are going to clarify that one way 

or the other. I think, if so, we would have already 

gotten them.

So, again, my feeling to your question 

is, no, we can send it back and there's going to 

be no quick fix. We're going to be right back in 

the same --

MS. JEFFERY: I think my question is 
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more towards regulatory clarity, like in the sense 

of interagency help, than it is towards the science 

on the resin issue, you know.

MR. ELA: FDA has made their position 

clear. I don't think they're going to change it. 

We could go to them and ask them these questions, 

but they're just going to point to their list and 

say, "Well, it's there."

So, again, personal opinion, I don't 

see that we're going to get any more clarity on 

those issues by waiting. I don't think anybody 

is going to go further on that. So, again, my 

interpretation.

But one last thing, Kyla, and then, we 

should move forward.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I mean, yes, the 

status quo is fine, but, ultimately, it's not a 

great place for us live in, right? So, I do think 

we need a direction one way or another, so that 

certifiers can be aligned at some moment in time, 

whenever that is.

And so, I don't know. I guess I'm just 
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wondering -- I know we've talked about this, and 

it seems to be that there is some appetite to take 

it back to Subcommittee if we can get some help.

So, I don't know, Jenny, if you're able 

to speak to that at all. Like is that a 

possibility? What's going on there? Or not? 

Like can we count on that? Can we not count on 

that?

DR. TUCKER: I mean, I think, yes, when 

we sent our original notice to the Board that 

actually constrained this, we did share a specific 

interpretation. And all this was in the Board 

agenda that you got. We got responses back from 

the certifiers that said that they disagreed with 

our interpretation. And we, in reading their 

explanations, they did seem to have a legally 

defensible basis.

And so, I don't know if we're going to 

get more clarity from FDA or not. And so, I think 

it would be helpful to know, if you do send it to 

the program, what do you specifically want us to 

do? Are there sort of specific questions you would 
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like, and then, have it come back to you? Or are 

you kind of punting it to us for good and saying, 

"Just be clear on whatever the decision is and what 

the basis for that decision is."

I'll be honest, if we made a decision 

that was more constrained, because that's what we 

tried to do the first time in making the decision, 

that would require a rulemaking. Essentially, in 

telling the certifiers our very first thing, our 

first response, the feedback indicated that there 

would be an economic impact if we constrained it. 

And so, help us in your cover, if you send it to 

us, help us in your cover sheet. Do you want it 

back after you learn certain things and tell us 

what you want to learn, or do you just want us to 

do the best we can to come up with the best legal 

determination and just be very clear on it, which 

would probably mean some type of notice to 

certifiers with sort of an interpretative 

analysis. But, again, making it more constrained 

than it currently is would require a rulemaking.

So, we would really have to look at 
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that. I'm not going to make a commitment on the 

phone on that. There's an awful lot -- I think 

I would place inerts higher on the priority list 

than this, and we only have so many people who are 

working on materials. We've got a lot of people 

working on materials, and I don't see this as 

something -- I'm going to be honest -- that would 

be a high priority right now, given competing 

items. As Steve said, there's only so much 

attention we have.

MR. ELA: So, I'm going to cut off 

discussion. I think it's been great. Yes, I 

think it's all been brought up. You've heard what 

Jenny said.

So, we have two paths here, just to be 

clear to the Board members, especially the new 

ones. I can entertain a motion to send it back 

to Subcommittee. If that's seconded, we can vote 

on that. If a majority of the Board votes to send 

it back to Subcommittee, it goes back to 

Subcommittee, and then, we have the next three or 

four months to try and come up with something
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different, or I guess the same, and send it back 

to the Board again as a proposal.

If the vote to send it back to 

Subcommittee fails, then we would proceed to the 

vote on the proposal as is. If nobody wants to 

vote to move it back to the Subcommittee, we will 

move to the vote on the proposal as it now stands.

So, does that make sense in how the 

process works?

(No response.)

I guess, as I'm thinking about it, there 

is one other process. We could defer the vote 

until tomorrow and let it kind of sit overnight 

for people, not to complicate things.

Brian, you have your hand up. Is it 

a procedural question?

I'm not hearing you, Brian.

MR. CALDWELL: I said that we vote 

tomorrow.

MR. ELA: We can just, as consensus, 

say that we're going to move it until tomorrow. 

Okay?
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Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: I was going to suggest 

that we give ourselves another night to think about 

it.

MR. ELA: Okay. Does anybody on the 

Board object to deferring the vote until tomorrow? 

This is your chance to say yes or no.

MR. BRADMAN: I was going to, but if 

people feel they need the time, I won't.

MR. D'AMORE: Go ahead, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: No, I would like to get 

this done with, but if people -- you know, it's 

complicated and it's new to a lot of people, and 

we can wait until tomorrow.

MR. ELA: Okay. What I'm hearing is 

that the Board will defer this vote until tomorrow 

at the end of the day.

So, with that, Jerry, I will move on. 

We can move on to the next item, and I will try 

to make up the time as best we can.

DR. TUCKER: Hey, guys, every meeting 

needs some kind of cliffhanger, right? So, this 
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will be the cliffhanger of the meeting.

MR. D'AMORE: Okay. So, our next item 

is the sunset of agar-agar, reference 205.605(a), 

a food additive. And it will be presented by Kim 

Huseman.

MS. HUSEMAN: Do we want to go ahead 

or are we going to take a lunch break first?

MR. ELA: We will go until -- oh, gosh, 

I've got to look at this.

MS. HUSEMAN: I can do the substance, 

and then, we can --

MR. ELA: Let's do --

DR. DIMITRI: Michelle is sending us 

to lunch.

MR. ELA: Say it again?

MS. HUSEMAN: Okay.

MR. ELA: Let's do two. Let's do 

agar-agar and animal enzymes, and then, we'll go 

to lunch.

MS. HUSEMAN: Okay. So, agar-agar. 

Reading through the public comments -- okay, this 

one I thought would be pretty straightforward and 
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it's got a few complications to it.

So, agar-agar, the overwhelming 

undertones coming out of the comments were that, 

in some form, agar-agar is supported to be 

relisted, but there's some depth in background here 

to talk through. And I'll talk through it via 

public comments.

So, it has to do with how agar-agar is 

derived. Most importantly is where there seems 

to be a little bit of contention amongst some of 

the commenters. There's two forms of agar-agar. 

It can be made from Gelidium species, which is 

nonsynthetic, while agar-agar made from Gracilaria 

species is synthetic. And it's how the curing 

process, how the product is derived, and then, put 

into its final state.

So, there were comments made that are 

supportive of the nonsynthetic species, but we 

would like to see annotation stating from Gelidium 

species processed without alkaline pretreatment, 

and then, opposing to the listing of the synthetic 

one.
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And some commenters said that, no, 

there is not enough commercially available 

nonsynthetic or organic form of agar-agar, where 

others said that there was. So, there's multiple 

sides of those comments that was seen. One 

certifying body mentioned that they have five 

operations that are actually using a certified 

organic agar-agar.

Beyond that, I would say, to go back 

to the beginning component of this, it's that 

agar-agar products that contain it include 

dairy-free shredded cheeses, breakfast cereals, 

rice snacks, pudding, personal hair products, 

amongst many more.

And then, just to finally close with 

opening up the can of worms around the broader scope 

of marine materials, where agar-agar falls under 

a marine material, what's the Board's stance on 

that broader, overarching component and how does 

agar-agar fall into that?

So, that's pretty much the roundup of 

the public comments in its entirety, but an 
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underlying tone that I'm seeing here is there is 

support for agar-agar to be on the National List, 

but there needs to be some work on how it's worded 

and annotations accordingly as we go forward, maybe 

as a work agenda item.

MR. ELA: All right. Are there 

questions or comments, discussion for Kim?

(No response.)

All right. Let's move on, Jerry, to 

the next one, and then, we will break for lunch. 

So, Jerry, if you would introduce animal enzymes 

and read this for us?

MR. D'AMORE: Do you think unmuting 

would help?

MR. ELA: It might, yes.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes. A second sunset, 

animal enzymes, reference 205.605(a), and also 

presented by Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you, Jerry.

Animal enzymes such as rennet have been 

used in the manufacturing of various cheeses and 

other dairy products for centuries. In order for 
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milk to coagulate into cheese, enzymes must be 

added to cleave milk proteins and cause the 

required coagulation.

Across the board, there's support for 

animal enzymes remaining essential for organic 

food production and support to relist. There are,

also, some comments that discuss the availability 

of organic rennet. So, products that conform with 

organic livestock and the feasibility of utilizing 

only product that has been derived from organic 

animals. There is clear understanding that this 

may not be commercially available today, but 

challenge what are the barriers and how can we 

overcome those barriers in order for organic rennet 

powder to be organic. There is a known entity that 

does have organic animals utilized in their rennet 

processing, but it's very, very small-scale.

One commenter said they use animal 

enzymes in the form of lipase in the production 

of their blue cheese, and to the best of their 

knowledge, there is no lipase formulation 

available direct from organic livestock.
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So, these are considerations to the 

stakeholders, that since the last review, have 

organic animal enzymes become commercially 

available? And the answer to that right now is, 

no, but can we challenge these barriers?

And then, if we go into the ancillary 

substances that are used in animal enzymes, it was 

noted by one of the commenters the TR did not fully 

investigate different ancillary substances; that 

it was very restrictive to just rennet and egg white 

lysozyme; that the details around catalase and 

trypsin are not readily available through the TR 

and needs to be evaluated.

And then, I guess lastly is that, is 

there an environmental impact? And although the 

TR states there isn't, there was a commenter that 

wanted to challenge that understanding saying that 

solvents, acids, and bases are used in the 

extraction formulation, and that disposal method 

and releases are in them.

Again, animal rennet, the underlying 

message is it's used for cheese and there's not 
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a substitute, but can we challenge that with 

organic livestock production being required to use 

as a possibility or have the research to understand 

that a little bit better?

And that's all I have, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you. Well done.

MR. ELA: And any questions? 

Comments? Discussion?

(No response.)

It looks like you're off the hook, Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Oh, wait. Sue has one. Sue 

has one. You're not off the hook.

MS. BAIRD: No, just a comment. I know 

that the challenge for organic animals is not so 

much that they couldn't raise the animals, but that 

there's just not sufficient enough processes that 

are certified organic or really, at least in the 

Midwest, have an economic reason to become 

certified. So, it's not that there would not be 

organic animals. There's just not an organic 

processor for those animals.
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MS. HUSEMAN: I think that's very 

valid, Sue. And the economic component to it is 

a huge piece of that. What's the overall 

incentive? It seems fairly random for production.

MR. ELA: Now you're off the hook, Kim. 

I figured I'd help you get your two done before 

lunch. So, you wouldn't have to be stressing or 

anything, not that you are anyhow.

So, we're going to take just a half-hour 

lunch break now. If everybody can come back at, 

it would be 12 after the hour. We will continue 

to work through handling things.

So, thank you.

(Whereupon, at 2:42 p.m., the foregoing 

matter went off the record for lunch and went back 

on the record at 3:13 p.m.)

MR. ELA: I think we will restart since 

it is 12 after the hour.

Michelle, are you ready?

MS. ARSENAULT: I'm ready, as is Jared 

and Devon.

MR. ELA: All right. We will take up 
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where we left off. Jerry, it is in your court to 

start.

MR. D'AMORE: I don't have visibility 

to the full screen, but I'm assuming we're all here 

then?

MR. ELA: We will have Michelle do the 

count, but this is when we said we would do the 

start. So, go ahead with calcium sulfate.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, I see Wood. So, 

I'm heartened that we can continue.

MR. TURNER: I'm here.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, I see you.

MR. TURNER: I'm ready to go.

MR. D'AMORE: Good for you.

So, our next sunset is calcium sulfate, 

mined, reference 205.605(a), and it's presented 

by Wood Turner.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Jerry.

So, we have calcium sulfate, mined. 

And the reason it's called out that way is because 

it's listed as the natural sources of it from a 

mining perspective. It can be produced through 
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synthetic sources. It is mined or a natural form 

of calcium sulfate.

It is not annotated currently, and it 

will come up in a second when I give you some 

feedback from the stakeholders. Its primary use 

is as a coagulant in tofu manufacturing. It is 

considered essential by some to soften silken tofu 

types. It's also used as a yeast food in dough 

conditioner or water conditioner. It's been using 

as a firming agent in canned food, a gelling 

ingredient. It's been used in baking powder, and 

interestingly, it's used in industry for bone 

regeneration.

As I said, it can be obtained from 

natural or synthetic sources, and the listing is 

restricted to those mined sources, of which gypsum 

is the primary source. You know, gypsum is mined 

in an open quarry or via deep mining. It is ground 

and separated and it can be sold in a pure form. 

It may contain some impurities of calcium 

carbonate and silica. Interestingly, it can form 

as a byproduct from many different kinds of 
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processing, including emissions from fossil fuel 

power stations. The material is generally 

recognized as safe. Again, we are talking about 

the mined version of calcium sulfate.

It does have some restrictions 

internationally in terms of how can be used. In 

other words, some annotations and minor other 

international bodies for how it can be used, 

specifically on the coagulation side of things.

I do want to flag that there are 

environmental questions related to the mining of 

calcium sulfate. A lot of calcium sulfate, as far 

as we understand, comes from very specific areas 

and has exposed several public land areas, one 

that's been the source of a lot of debate back and 

forth, political debate, over the last several 

years, Grand Staircase-Escalante National 

Monument in Utah.

It's very unclear whether the 

activities related to calcium sulfate are having 

landscape damage, but it does beg the question 

whether there's an opportunity to potentially look 
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deeper at some of these environmental issues as 

a result of the fact that there has not been a TR 

on this or any kind of technical report on this 

in 19 years. And we are specifically talking about 

the mined aspects of it.

A lot of feedback in the past from the 

community. In some ways, it's kind of similar to 

what we're hearing today. Some suggest that they 

would like to see it retained. There may be some 

other materials that are available for use. 

Others have asked in the past for annotation 

related to coagulation of bean curd and the like, 

that kind of feedback. Ultimately, in 2016, the 

Subcommittee advanced it for relisting and the 

Board upheld it, obviously.

Current feedback, we have certifiers 

and stakeholders who are suggesting that there are 

fairly limited numbers of folks in the database, 

members and certified clients who are using calcium 

sulfate. Some have actually reported that there's 

zero who use calcium sulfate, but, again, that may 

be a geographic distinction more than anything.
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Some organic farming organizations 

have supported relisting pretty clearly. And 

again, I want to take that certification, sort of 

limited numbers, zero numbers. Many members, I 

mean there's a big variety based on sort of where, 

obviously, processing locations for tofu and other 

materials are occurring. It may be a reason why 

some of the certification varies from certifier 

to certifier.

Again, another fairly strongly worded 

support for some of the environmental 

considerations, urging some people to look at some 

of the environmental concerns, either through a 

TR or another means, and a strongly worded concern 

that we should go ahead and annotate this listing 

for coagulation in bean curd specifically.

So, that's the general feedback I hear 

today. I would just suggest to the community that 

there is information out there that could give us

a clearer sense of some of the real implications 

from a landscape damage perspective on the mining 

side of things that would be really useful.
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So, that's what I have at the moment, 

Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: That's good.

Steve, are you there or shall I ask for 

questions and comments?

MR. ELA: I'm here.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you, sir.

MR. ELA: Are there questions, 

discussions, comments?

(No response.)

I am not seeing any. So, we'll turn 

it back to you, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, the next sunset is 

carrageenan at 205.605(a), and it's mine to do.

I'd like to start by saying that a 

stakeholder, through written comment, pointed out 

that my opening statement under "use" is 

misleading, and I actually agree. And I will state 

that carrageenan is not Irish moss, but, rather, 

an extracted form of Irish moss. To be clear, 

there are other edible red algae from which 

carrageenan can be extracted. I need to make this 
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same distinction in the second sentence in our 

discussion document.

On this one, considerable space in our 

discussion has been devoted to environmental 

issues, and I'd like to give the following summary:

The vast majority of source material 

is farmed outside of the United States. And I 

would ask, what can we realistically do to 

influence farming practices?

Two, while earlier farming practices 

in specific regions did have measurable negative 

impact on neighboring habitats, these impacts were 

noted, along with specific remedies. Again, what 

can we realistically do to monitor and measure such 

progress?

Three, this is a food source requiring 

no fresh water or chemical inputs. There is good 

reason to believe that properly placed production 

sites could actually yield significant benefits 

to the environment; i.e., remove impurities from 

the water, buffer against wave action, help 

stabilize marine pH, et cetera.
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Concerning international acceptance, 

none of our six commonly referenced international 

organizations bans carrageenan, and IFOAM actually 

allows carrageenan as a food additive without 

annotation.

The next issue has given me a bit of 

problem because I've had some late, i.e., posts 

written and oral comment, petitions, if you will, 

to relook at that. And I'll get to that at the 

end of this report. So, what I'm reading to you 

now is what I had before the interest groups showed 

themselves.

So, quite arguably, internally for us, 

we have discussed human health concerns more than 

anything else. The largest part of this 

Subcommittee review is devoted to the long history 

of the debate. It appeared to me that the original 

studies were confused by evaluation of poligeenan 

rather than carrageenan. Poligeenan is a degraded 

form of carrageenan.

Be that completely true or not, I take 

comfort in the 2014 Joint FAO/WHO position that 
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says, quote, "New studies allay the earlier 

concerns of carrageenan, which is unlikely to be 

absorbed, may have direct effect on the immature 

gut." This was in reference to carrageenan's use 

in baby formulas.

Going to the questions we asked and 

stakeholder responses, it's what I would consider 

rather light. We had somewhere around 15 

responses, written and oral. A full 70 percent 

were in favor of relisting. Two just reported as 

not using. But the naysayers, again, had some 

compelling arguments.

So, to our stakeholder questions, the 

first one I answered already, which is, "Should 

there be an effort to outline best management 

practices for seaweed farming?" And just because 

I answered it, I'm not at all suggesting that my 

answer is right. I just don't know how we can 

control it, and so, how much weight should we give 

to that at all.

The second which was, "Do seaweed 

farming practices for carrageenan production 
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conflict with the proposed marine rules/guidelines 

passed by the NOSB last year?" On this question, 

no stakeholders responded at all. And I guess my 

short answer to that would be it could, but not 

yet. And that's from my reading, which, again, 

you may need to help me with. I see the guidance 

focusing mostly on sustainability and whether 

marine inputs should be given organic 

certification. So, the document more seems like 

a thought piece for future guidelines, rather than 

something that would impact our decision on this 

now.

The third question, "Is carrageenan 

essential for production of organic products? If 

so, which?" And I'm pulling them all together 

here, and I think I'm taking care of the stakeholder 

group with this explanation. Carrageenan is not 

necessary for the production of any organic 

products, but it is highly desirable, as it 

improves emulsification and mouthfeel in a good 

number of dairy and plant-based dairy food 

replacement products.
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"Are carrageenan alternatives 

available to replace all current uses?" I would 

suggest that guar gum and xanthan gum appear to 

be somewhat interchangeable, but, again, you get 

back to some of the subtleties of functionality 

on that one.

"Would lack of carrageenan 

availability limit the opportunities to produce 

vegan products?" No, but it may, again, come back 

to increasing the appeal of really alternatives 

in terms of emulsification and thickening.

So, this is the one where I gave an 

answer based on public written and oral comments. 

And the question is, is there new information on 

the safety concerns of carrageenan? And my 

original answer was the claims about carrageenan 

health impacts are increasingly likely due to 

confusion between carrageenan and poligeenan.

I, myself, as I go forward with this, 

have been counseled by several folks that I respect 

that I need to look at this more carefully and take 

into consideration the sources of the yeas and the 
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nays on that issue.

So, that's the report, folks.

MR. ELA: All right. Discussion, 

comments, questions for Jerry?

(No response.)

Jerry, I'll just ask one. Oh, wait, 

Asa is first. Go ahead, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: Sorry, go ahead, Steve. 

I'm having --

MR. ELA: That's fine. Go ahead.

MR. D'AMORE: You're on, Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay. Well, one thought 

I have from this material -- and this is maybe kind 

of a more philosophical issue -- but kind of the 

idea of, I think it's called stare decisis, which 

they use to grill Supreme Court nominees about 

precedent. And, you know, a prior Board 

recommended removal of this. And what level does 

it have to get to for us to potentially go against 

that decision? I guess that's something I'm just 

putting out there to the Board.

Of course, with sunset reviews, we're 
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always reviewing them every five years, but this 

was unique where there was a recommendation to 

remove it, which did not take place, and we're 

deciding on it again. And I almost feel at some 

levels that we have to respect the earlier 

decision. When we review a new sunset, there's 

potentially new information available, and we do 

sometimes reconsider things. But this was a 

fairly concrete and large majority recommendation 

that did not get followed up on, and that's caused 

issues with us on other votes in my tenure. And 

I just put it out there about where people feel 

about that.

MR. ELA: No, and thank you for that 

comment, Asa. Would it be fair to say that what 

you're referencing did deal highly with the human 

health concerns of the material?

MR. BRADMAN: Well, the decision, the 

last recommendation.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes. No, the one where 

we voted to reject and we were overridden. I mean, 

the rejection process, then, was that, to your 
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recollection, a human health-generated concern or 

is there broader --

MR. BRADMAN: I think human health was 

the driving factor. That was a little before my 

time. So, I've just seen the older materials. 

I didn't actually participate in that.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, Asa. Yes, so when 

I made reference to sort of late-hour comments from 

people I respect, it's all around that. And I've 

already committed to myself and to this group that 

I will look at it or we will look at it, and we'll 

have discussions on that.

MR. ELA: All right. Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Sure. Thank you, Jerry.

There was one comment that stood out 

to me on this. Well, there were several, but the 

one was that maybe we need to look at considering 

this as a synthetic substance --

MR. D'AMORE: Uh-hum.

MS. BRUCH: -- instead of a 

nonsynthetic. I know that's a little outside of 

the sunset process, but I just wanted to bring that 
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up.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes. And thank you for 

doing that.

In my reading, looking at the entire 

back-and-forth, I sort of blew past that and 

respect your thoughts on that. But it appeared 

to me to be fairly well considered on the last 

go-around, but I'll put synthetic on that list, 

too.

MR. ELA: Other questions?

(No response.)

And I'm trying to remember, Jerry, that 

came on right after -- well, it was just preceding 

when I got on the Board, and I know it was a little 

bit of a hot-button topic because people were still 

talking about it when I came on.

And I think it was human health, and 

it's been noted to me that it was also essentiality 

as to whether there were alternatives available 

for it, in addition to the human health.

And then, I believe in rulemaking, or 

I don't know if it got to rulemaking, but it was 
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we can't consider cost, but the program has to 

consider cost in rulemaking. And so, I think that 

may have, the cost impact may have derailed it, 

just as an FYI.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, I would concur with 

that last statement entirely. As it went through 

the process, it was, to me, anyway, quite evident 

that the cost impacts did come in at the NOP level.

Essentiality surprises me. As I've 

gone through it, I think that's one of the things 

that pretty clearly is demonstrated that there are 

other things that could replace it, but, in terms 

of functionality and essentiality, that one seemed 

to be pretty clear to me.

But, again, that's why we're doing 

this. So, we've got three areas that I think we 

should be looking at. And for me personally, the 

human health concerning one is back on the radar.

MR. ELA: Fair enough. I guess I'd 

like to see as part of the discussion for this 

summer -- and I think you may have covered it -- but 

a number of manufacturers have removed carrageenan 
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from their products, just kind of based on our 

recommendation before.

And so, I guess, are we down to the 

products that absolutely require it or has the 

removal of it kind of demonstrated that it's not 

essential? And I don't expect you to answer that. 

I would like to see that covered.

MR. D'AMORE: No, but you've given 

segue. I actually have individual comments, too. 

And to that particular point of human health 

concerns, and the fact that it's coming up again, 

and specifically, Steve, to the fact that, you 

know, that we should be discussing it, the quote

was, "Hey, it takes a long time to overcome bad 

press." And it was the bad press at the time that 

prompted people to take it off of their inventory.

I also have one other one concerning 

functionality: you've got to trust that the 

functionality is there because nobody would eat 

this stuff -- they didn't actually say, 

"stuff" -- because it is delicious.

(Laughter.)
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MR. ELA: Fair enough.

Mindee has got a comment.

MS. JEFFERY: Yes, thanks for all the 

work on this subject.

I definitely talked to a lot of 

consumers about this one five years ago. And I 

think mouthfeel and how a product stabilizes on 

the shelf impacts consumer perceptions. And I 

think there's an interesting tension of, do we keep 

carrageenan because it makes things feel nicer in 

your experience and because we don't want to keep 

shaking up this kind of issues? And so, I kind 

of want to just hear a little bit more on that front, 

as we go into the next meeting and, also -- I'm 

sorry, I just lost my train of thought there.

MR. D'AMORE: That's all right. While 

you're thinking about it, I mean, that piece of 

it started with chocolate milk back then.

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. D'AMORE: And so, you're raising, 

in my mind, the question from pure mouthfeel to 

what are our responsibilities, and I agree with 
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that.

MR. ELA: Mindee, did you think of your 

other --

MS. JEFFERY: Well, no, I just like the 

contemplation that Asa brought up, too, in that 

a previous Board voting to delist. It has an 

impact on me. And so, I think I was just mulling 

that one over, too. So, thank you.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: One last thing for Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I appreciated your 

comment, Steve, about are we down to just, you know, 

whatever. Yes, there are a lot of products that 

don't include it, whatever. But there may be some, 

like vegan marshmallows, or something like that. 

I don't know; would those just turn into like vegan 

marshmallow soup or something? I don't know. I 

would rather have a marshmallow that I could make 

a s'more with.

So, anyway, just try to think about what 

other things like really do need it. One could 

argue vegan marshmallows don't need to be made as 
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an organic, but I would argue against that. I have 

lots of friends and family that are vegan that would 

prefer a vegan marshmallow, or an organic vegan 

marshmallow than a non-organic vegan marshmallow.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, you so closely 

mirror one of my call-ins on this one with exactly 

what you said. And they actually said, 

"marshmallow soup". So, you're on target with 

that.

MR. ELA: Well, I personally really 

dislike marshmallows in any form.

(Laughter.)

MS. JEFFERY: I thought of my other 

point, if you don't mind.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: The commenter that said 

something about, if it's in ice cream, it might 

not be on the label, I don't know, I can't remember 

exactly who that was, but that's a point I'm 

interested in.

And from my long research in retail, 

I've never seen an organic vegan marshmallow, and 
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I think it's the gelatin.

So, Nate, can you work on some organic 

gelatin for us?

(Laughter.)

MR. POWELL-PALM: Got it coming.

MR. D'AMORE: So, you're specifically 

asking about labeling and the identity of the 

product on the label?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes, because I thought 

I heard that in like oral public comment maybe, 

that like if they're using it as a processity, it 

might on the label. And I don't know if this is 

accurate. So, I'm sorry, my recollection is 

nebulous here.

But if that's an issue, I find some 

validity to the health concern folks because I do 

think there's a contingent of folks that do react 

negatively. I don't know if that's a reason for 

me to prohibit it. I mean, I'm gluten-free and 

I don't expect the rest of the world to be 

gluten-free, but I do love how much market 

development there is on gluten-free. And so, if 
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there's a transparency issue, I would love to 

substantiate that and understand it really 

clearly.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, and that's fair, 

Mindee. I said at the beginning of the public 

comment piece that 70 percent were clearly in favor 

of it, but they were just in favor of it. The 30 

percent that weren't in favor of it were adamantly 

not in favor of it. They were strongly not in favor 

of it. And human health concerns, and now tying 

it into whether or not they can even identify it 

on a label, I think is extremely valid.

MR. ELA: Yes. Well, and I want to be 

clear to all the marshmallow lovers out there that 

my personal opinions will not cause me to 

discriminate against you all. So, the more you 

all eat, the fewer there are for me, and that makes 

me happy.

(Laughter.)

All right, Jerry, let's go ahead and 

move on.

MR. D'AMORE: Okay. The next sunset, 
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glucono delta-lactone, reference 205.605(a), and, 

Wood, you're up again, sir.

MR. TURNER: I am, and I'm going to, 

for the benefit of the ASL interpreter, I'm just 

going to refer to this as GDL.

(Laughter.)

MR. D'AMORE: I wish you would have 

helped me out with that.

MR. TURNER: It's a material similar 

to my previous material, calcium sulfate. It's 

something primarily used in the production of tofu, 

particularly silken tofu. And it's generally, 

while we're talking about mouthfeel, it's 

generally thought to be the only material that can 

produce the physical sensory components favored 

in that particular type of tofu, unlike some other 

materials like vinegar or lemon juice.

It serves as a coagulant. It can also 

be used as a curing or pickling agent, a leavening 

agent, or a pH control agent. It can also be used 

in feta cheese. It's less tangy than citric acid. 

And it's generally recognized as safe.
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There are a variety of ways it can be 

produced. The most common form has gluconic acid 

production. It's called the Blom, B-L-O-M, 

process in which gluconic acid is produced by the 

fermentation of glucose syrups. Sodium hydroxide 

and calcium carbonate can be added to it to produce 

a gluconate salt. It's isolated via evaporation 

and crystallization, and then, converted, 

interestingly, via ion exchange. And that's what 

produces GDL.

It's considered to be a product that's 

greater than 99 percent pure. It has no other 

substances present.

Unlike the calcium sulfate -- again, 

I don't really know enough to distinguish between 

the different uses of calcium sulfate and GDL -- but 

GDL is not a material that is accepted 

internationally. It's not a listed substance in 

Canada, the EU, Japan, the Codex, or IFOAM.

We found a little bit difficult to 

document any meaningful well-documented 

environmental or human health issues associated 
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with GDL. There's been some consideration that 

it might cause minor bladder discomfort or back 

pain.

So, there's been currently no elevated 

risk within this body under previous consideration 

related to environmental considerations.

The original petition was this 

substance was for the coagulation of tofu, although 

it's not annotated as such or it's not classified 

as such. And so, there are several other 

coagulants that have been indicated as potentially 

having similar uses as GDL. So, it's unclear about 

the essentiality here.

One of the things that in the previous 

cycle the Handling Subcommittee sought to 

understand was whether there were other uses of 

the material. And we have heard, as a result, that 

it can be used in feta cheese and other things.

I think the lingering question is sort 

of -- I think from the community as a whole, there's 

really strong feedback to continue to include GDL 

on the list. We need to make sure there's no GDL 
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being produced via synthetic means, and that's been 

fairly strongly worded.

There's other organizations that have 

considered this to be -- and I would say more 

strongly worded than the previous material, 

calcium sulfate. Folks consider this to be 

nonessential in that there are other alternatives 

that could meet this same expectation, the same 

sort of sensory expectation. Again, that's one 

of the situations where one may say one thing; the 

other may say another thing. So, I'd love to hear 

more from the community on that.

And again, similar to other 

materials -- and again, I'm quickly realizing that 

this is a hard thing to base decisions on -- but 

some certifiers say that a lot of their folks use 

GDL, and others say that very few, if none, use 

it.

We've asked questions of the 

stakeholders. We haven't gotten really as many 

direct responses to these questions as I would have 

expected. And that may be an indication that 
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they're aware that concern lives on this particular 

material. But we've asked how widespread the use 

of the material is and gotten sort of a tepid 

response.

I am wondering if there's any evidence 

that there's any excluded methods associated with 

the production of GDL. So, that goes to that 

question of annotation, which I know lives outside 

of this sunset process, but the idea of annotation 

that would indicate that there's no synthetic 

production involved in GDL.

And then, finally, getting some clarity 

on the alternatives of GDL and whether they deliver 

the same product quality and functionality. And 

again, nothing definitive yet in this cycle of 

comments, but I would just ask those questions of 

the community again.

That's what I have at the moment, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you. Nicely done.

MR. ELA: Okay. Amy has a comment.

MS. BRUCH: Wood, thanks for reviewing 

that.
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I did find one comment, in particular, 

that mentioned maybe the annotation was a bit 

limiting when it just says it's prohibited with 

bromine water; that there might be other ways to 

produce this that maybe need to be annotated as 

well.

And then, it also, in your reference 

to excluded methods, says that some of the enzymes 

that go into produce GDL may be genetically 

engineered.

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MS. BRUCH: So, I did find one instance 

of that, too.

MR. TURNER: That's a good point. 

Sorry. Thanks for elevating those comments, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Uh-hum.

MR. TURNER: I noted those as well. 

And I should have been a little bit more clear. 

I should have been clearer in the annotation about 

the production by the oxidation of D-glucose with 

bromine water. It is prohibited under the rules. 

Sorry about that. Thanks.
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MS. BRUCH: Oh, no problem. Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes, I just wanted to maybe 

explain a little bit about why some certifiers may 

not have reviewed these. I know PCO doesn't 

certify nearly as many handlers as some certifiers 

do. So, we just may not have any operations that 

are making silken tofu or just other types of 

smaller certifiers that focus more on farms and 

not handling operations. So, I think that that 

would explain the difference of which certifiers 

are reporting and which are not.

MR. TURNER: That's what I was trying 

to say fairly clumsily. Thanks for telling us that 

from the frontlines. I appreciate that.

MR. ELA: I don't see any others. So, 

back to you, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Okay. Our next sunset, 

tartaric acid, 205.605(a), Steve, that's you.

MR. ELA: Yes, I just perked up my ears.

MR. D'AMORE: Can you keep it under an 

hour, do you think?
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(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Yes, I'll try on this one. 

I was like, oh, no, that's me. I can keep this 

one short, though.

Tartaric acid, really the notice of 

comments are that it's essential because it is 

important to adjust pH without the use of a 

synthetic chemical like sulfur dioxide. The 

alternatives are not sufficient because there are 

times when we do not need to adjust the pH, and 

if the material were prohibited, it would injure 

people because they've spent years perfecting a 

synthetic-free wine.

But most of the comments really came 

down to, is there an organic alternative available? 

Tartaric acid is made from wine. And so, the 

question is, is there enough supply of organic wine 

available now to be able to make this product 

organically?

One person said that there's not enough 

market demand yet for it. So, it does not exist. 

But a number of people also said, you know, this 
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is the chicken-and-the-egg thing of, until you 

delist it, there won't be enough organic tartaric

acid to meet the demand.

So, I think really the organic supply 

question is the biggest one on this. And so, I 

would hope for next fall's comments that that could 

be fleshed out a little bit among our stakeholders 

or from our stakeholders. You know, when is the 

time to vote to delist something to encourage the 

organic market in this? Certainly, one person 

said to is there is any reason that tartaric could 

not be made from organic wine, they said absolutely 

not. It's just it would take some time for 

manufacturers to develop an organic version at the 

necessary scale.

So, that's it. Did I come in under an 

hour?

MR. D'AMORE: Well done, yes.

MR. ELA: Kim has a question.

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes, I'll make it 

relatively quick.

I just wanted to point out I saw in one 
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of the comments here that the tartaric acid is used 

to adjust the pH and avoid the use of synthetic 

chemicals, but that at times they don't need to 

adjust the pH. So, I think just going back to the 

stakeholders, you know, how often does that pH need 

to be adjusted? I mean, what's the overall use 

of tartaric acid holistically? So, just a comment 

about that component.

MR. ELA: Yes, and that's a great 

point. As I was just presenting this, I hadn't 

picked up, as I read this, until just now, of 

course -- you always pick things up in the moment 

that you don't want to do that. I mean, one of 

them said, you know, it is to adjust pH. And 

somebody else said they don't need it to adjust 

pH. So, that is a little conflicting. I guess 

I would like to know more about that as well. But 

it certainly seems like, for most winemakers, it 

is a very useful ingredient and certainly helps 

make better wine. But I think that's a great 

point, Kim.

All right, Jerry, back to you.
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MR. D'AMORE: I'd like to make a quick 

comment to that. I would suspect that the bricks 

of the incoming grape might have a lot to do, and 

it might be sporadic or it might be in geographies 

quite necessary most of the time.

MR. ELA: Yes.

MR. D'AMORE: I don't know.

MR. ELA: I'm guessing that, too. 

It's probably specific starting points with the 

wine or with the grapes.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, with our next 

sunset, which is cellulose, 205.605(b), we have 

a first-time presenter, but I have no concerns 

about that.

Carolyn, you're on.

DR. DIMITRI: Oh, I was going to thank 

Steve for giving me such a straightforward and 

simple product. Well, I was wondering with the 

tartaric acid -- it's made me panic for a second.

So, in terms of whether this product 

is essential for organic production, the 

certifiers and the end users indicated that it's 
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not widely used, but for the people who need it, 

it's essential for their process for those three 

allowed uses.

Okay. And then, the next question asks 

about ancillary substances, and one group reports

glycerin or glycerol is used, but it's not on our 

list.

And for three, basically, all of the 

comments indicated that cellulose from sources 

other than wood pulp just don't perform quite as 

well.

And no one was able to answer Question 

4.

And I would say, overall, everyone, 

except for one or two people, indicated that this 

should be relisted. And then, one group said it's 

not essential, and then, another group pointed out 

that, at the very least, sourcing should be done 

in a way that minimizing environmental impact.

And that's my report.

MR. ELA: It takes me a minute to get 

off mute here.
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So, any questions, comments, 

discussion for Carolyn?

(No response.)

The Board's being nice to you, Carolyn. 

Next year, you get a little harder one.

DR. DIMITRI: Okay. Thank you for 

this year of grace.

MR. ELA: You will be in the full thick 

of it. But great job. Thanks for getting your 

first one under your belt.

Next, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Steve, the next one, 

broadly spoken, is chlorine materials under 

205.605(b). Asa is taking care of that, but he's 

taking care of four things under that general 

heading, and we'll do them one at a time. So, the 

next one up is chlorine materials, calcium 

hypochlorite.

Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Actually, maybe we 

should talk about them as a group here.

MR. D'AMORE: Okay.
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MR. BRADMAN: Just because there's, I 

think, an overlap, if that's okay.

MR. D'AMORE: You know, I guess I can't 

answer the okay in terms of what we have to produce. 

I mean, if it's okay, it's okay with me.

MR. ELA: Yes, I'd do it as a group, 

Asa.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, okay. Of course, 

this is in some ways a complex topic. I hope we 

don't spend too much time on this. But, of course, 

chlorine materials overlap with many of the issues 

that we're talking about with respect to 

disinfectants and sanitizers.

I also want to clarify, you know, when 

we talk about disinfection, there's different 

stages. There's basic cleaning, which doesn't 

require a sanitizer or disinfectant. And then, 

there's sanitizing, which is kind of -- somebody 

will correct me for this -- it's 99 percent, or 

maybe it's three 9s, 99.9. And then, when we get 

up to disinfection, we're talking about five 9s 

in terms of reduction of pathogens. So, we should 
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be careful to distinguish between those uses.

Chlorine materials, as we know, are 

used as disinfectants and sanitizers to control 

pathogens in food processing environments. In 

many ways, I think we're going to come through this 

and say they are essential. Certainly, if we look 

out in community comments, there's demand for them. 

They're one of the most effective tools to comply 

with FSMA, but they also raise a lot of concerns 

both in terms of hazards to human health and the 

environment. And I think that's where we have to 

continue to do deep thinking about the use of 

sanitizers, which are very powerful pesticides and 

much more toxic than many of the materials we might, 

for example, allow for field use and things like 

that.

There's, I think, a remarkable level 

of comments by stakeholders in this round of public 

comments. I mention I thought really thoughtful 

comments by Beyond Pesticides. Also, there's 

great comments from OWPC and CROPP Cooperative, 

and others, just to call out OEFFA, OMRI. Just 
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to call out, all of us, there's some great reads 

in the current public comments with respect to 

sanitizers, chlorine, in particular, but also 

sanitizers in general. And I know we're supposed 

to be talking just about the sunset here, but, of 

course, this is lodged in a much bigger issue.

When we talk about chlorine compounds, 

they have hazards. And I would really like to 

emphasize that they are hazardous to the 

environment and human health. I've said this 

before when I've been working in the Salinas 

Valley. Many workers, agricultural workers, in 

processing facilities complain bitterly about 

bleach and other chlorine exposures. I've also 

reviewed exposures in a shrimp processing 

facility, and people were essentially the 

indicators of overexposure with severe respiratory 

and ocular and other kinds of facts.

When we talk about this use for contact 

with food, we're usually talking about levels that 

are at the safe drinking water standards. But 

these materials are used in a lot of different 
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settings in food processing environments. You 

know, it could be a fruit dip, surface cleaning, 

and other uses.

Many facilities I've gone into, you 

know, you have to walk through a pan of water with 

bleach in it. Those are usually up at 100 parts 

per million, and you can smell bleach in the room. 

Of course, the odor level is probably below the 

adverse health effect level, but it's just an 

indicator that we're being exposed, and often, I 

believe those exposures exceed an occupational 

health threshold.

Getting back to that, though, I have 

tried to review occupational exposures related to 

these materials and there's surprisingly little 

out there. There was one comment about the safe 

use of these materials being governed by FDA and 

EPA label, and I think that's true in some cases, 

but I've just had enough experience with 

pesticides, that sometimes even the label 

protections don't protect people from adverse 

health outcomes, particularly if other factors are 
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to be considered, like ventilation and personal 

protection.

So, in general, I think these do raise 

concerns about use and there's a need for better 

assessment of human health impacts, both in terms 

of their use directly in processing, like contact 

with food and equipment, but also elsewhere in food 

handling environments where we're talking about 

floors and boots, and things like that.

There's one comment that we should be 

listing higher concentrations if they're being 

used in other settings, in other mechanisms, other 

than just at the safe drinking water levels in 

water. I think it would be interesting to include 

some of those references that are available through 

international standards for 

sanitizing/disinfection with these materials.

There's a lot of interest in the 

discussions around sanitizers and chlorine. In 

particular is what are the alternatives. And 

we've talked about on the Board and other settings 

that there are a number of materials evaluated by 
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EPA and are in the design for the environment, Safer 

Chemicals List, and some of those may be valuable 

alternatives.

But, in talking with folks in the field 

in this, including Joelle, our plumber member here, 

and others, it's kind of a Wild West environment 

in some ways. It's not clear how different

sanitizers and disinfectants meet the goals of food 

safety. And therefore, when there are products 

that are known to address specific contamination 

problems, there is a tendency to rely on those and 

to beware of experimentation.

So, for example, if we were to suggest 

citric acid or some other approach, if there was 

a food outbreak, food disease outbreak, where an 

alternative material was being used, even if it 

was approved, that could open up lots of liability 

and other concerns that really obviate any food 

manager to make that choice, to kind of go out of 

the ring on that.

So, there's not just what's out there, 

but there's the kind of status quo and tradition 
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of using materials that we know are safe. And 

also, when we look at pathogen reduction, like 

whether we're looking at three 9s or five 9s, often 

these evaluations don't consider things like 

biofilms or other kinds of agglomerations of 

pathogens that might not be reachable with some 

materials. And so, the relative efficacy for 

unique pathogen population differences would be 

a concern, particularly around biofilms.

Another piece of this, you know, 

there's a lot of interest in microbial ecology. 

And we asked these questions of the panel, you 

know, could there be an approach to pathogen

control that kind of fosters healthy pathogens at 

the expense of pathogenetic, and just not healthy 

pathogens, healthy microbial populations that are 

not pathogens, and therefore, discourage 

colonization by pathogenetic bacteria? And the 

information that I've gotten back on that, at least 

verbally, is the answer is no.

In soil populations, yes, when we look 

at populations of pathogenetic bacterial in soil, 
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it seems like there are ways to encourage 

nonpathogenetic bacteria. But, in a food

processing place, given the colonization and 

recolonization, and the need to constantly even 

simply clean, and then, follow up with 

disinfection, that there's really no way to try 

to allow a population of microbes to exist, to try 

to outcompete a pathogen, just because the 

pathogens sometimes are just as good at competing.

So, in many ways, I feel like we're kind 

of stuck with the chlorine materials, but there 

seems to be a real consensus, too, even among people 

I've talked to who are responsible for HACCP plans, 

Hazard Analysis Protocol Control Point Plans, that 

they like to minimize chlorine use to the extent 

possible. And it is mainly because of the human 

health concerns. But, to meet FSMA criteria, that 

they are an essential and needed tool.

So, my sense with this, and as we go 

through it, we're probably going to relist these. 

We're talking about sunset, not necessarily 

annotation here. But, again, I would suggest that 
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we all kind of read through the comments that have 

been submitted. I think there's great thinking 

that went into the comments this time around.

I was also going to highlight a little 

bit the OWPC comments of concern about our 

framework for sanitizers, in that we really should 

be withdrawing that concept. And I think I agree 

if there's some sort of formal framework for 

evaluating sanitizers, that has to go through 

review, but I do think that our panel helped us 

think about these materials.

And just a reminder, too, we have two 

materials coming up for evaluation, including CPC 

and there's a new petition for peroxylactic acid 

that will be coming up this fall, and beyond my 

time on the Board, for discussion and voting. So, 

just a reminder that, beyond just the chlorine 

compounds, the sanitizer issue is front and present 

in many ways.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Asa.

Are there questions, comments, 

discussion?
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Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Thanks, Asa.

So, when I was reading through the 

comments, some of the things that popped out to 

me, and I hope will help us as we move forward in 

the broader review, although it may take us a bit 

of time to get there, but I think that there's still 

a call to really do that, have that like wider 

review. So, anyway, some comments that jumped out 

to me that were along the same lines were from OTA 

and OMRI, and then, in OWPC's comments, oral 

comments mostly, but talking about more robust 

practice standards to really put that framework 

on how sanitizers and disinfectants are used and 

not be just reviewed out of context, but sort of 

part of that whole systems approach.

So, whether or not that's just a 

hierarchical approach like other parts of the 

regulations or not, but sometimes just how the 

sanitizers, and when and where, and whatever, are 

used, it's really hard sometimes to figure out what 

the practice standard is that goes along with that. 
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So, that could be a way for us to move forward, 

is to consider that.

And then, also brought up in some of 

those same comments that perhaps having a whole 

separate part of the National List would be also 

in our best interest because, currently, these are 

listed on the part of the National List with other 

ingredients that are used in or on, like as 

ingredients, and obviously, these materials are 

not ingredients. So, just also something for us 

to consider as we move forward.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I mean, I think 

those are all great. The use of these materials 

raises a lot of issues for organic integrity, food 

safety, and they are powerful chemicals. And I 

definitely agree with a lot of that.

And then, there's this tension, of 

course, as for reviewing the chlorine compounds 

right now. We're looking at a narrow sunset 

review, but it raises all these larger issues that 

are part of an ongoing discussion.

MR. ELA: We've got a question or a 
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comment from Rick, and then, Wood.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, yes, nice 

presentation, Asa. And a couple of things that 

you mentioned I'd like to talk about.

One is the bar to get someone to adopt 

a new disinfectant is very high. I've been 

involved in a number of food-borne outbreaks and 

lawsuits, and no one wants to be up on the stand 

where they have people that have died because of 

E. coli 0157 and they used a new disinfectant. 

So, I think it's going to be very hard.

The other thing that always interests 

me is two of the outbreaks I worked on -- one was 

hepatitis A and the other was an 0157 -- both 

produce products had been washed in chlorine, in 

a chlorine wash. And as strong as it is, it's not 

perfect. So, I think there's still room for other

kinds of items because, obviously, you can't make 

the chlorine wash so strong that you destroy the 

food product. So, I think there's room for new 

things in the field. So, it's an interesting 

problem, and I don't know how we solve it, but we 
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certainly have to look at it.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, and there are some 

new technologies coming out that actually might 

be very appropriate in our setting. One that's 

kind of under evaluation is something called 

nanobubbles. And I think the word "nano" here 

should not freak people out. But I think that 

we'll need to look at it carefully. We're talking 

about nanobubbles, not nanoparticles, but it seems 

to be a way to perhaps deliver and more effectively 

remove bacteria.

The other thing is like whole-room 

ultraviolet light bathing. You know, there's a 

lot of work going on with COVID right now and 

hospital control. I've been evaluating some of 

these things in other contexts, and I don't know 

quite their applicability to a food environment, 

but I think that could be promising, and done right, 

actually, is not chemical, and if done right, does 

not pose any risk to people.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. I think one of 

the things that I sort of like, and they use it 
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in spices, is irradiation, but, obviously, the 

concept, people hear that word, and they're afraid 

that their food is going to become radioactive.

But there are other things. There's 

some cold plasma fusion that's working actually 

on COVID. It works very well in rooms. So, I 

think there's new things coming, but, right now, 

I don't think anybody is going to want to change.

MR. ELA: Wood has a comment.

MR. TURNER: Yes, I have a question for 

Kyla or any sort buyers who want to jump in here.

Are you suggesting in your comments, 

Kyla, that there's a possibility that this could 

be, that one way for us to handle this might be 

it's almost like lifting a sanitizing protocol? 

In other words, I realize I'm opening up a can 

of worms as I say this, because I'm sure that's 

not within our scope, but it almost feels like 

that's what is necessary here. Like how do we help 

guide the standardization conversation in the 

context of sort of material recycling or sort of 

best practices? And I'm curious about your 
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question on that and one other question I'd give 

for you or for Asa.

And I'm asking this more because you've 

basically presented for me, and to some extent Asa, 

the Crops Subcommittee version of the same 

question. But I'm curious. I think one of the 

things that feels lacking in the comments, we are 

focusing on this primarily from a human health 

perspective, but these materials can be incredibly 

toxic to aquatic systems. And I don't see enough 

of a conversation about that issue happening among 

stakeholders or whether there's evidence to 

suggest that the use of these materials is so 

responsible and so contained at processing 

facilities, around farms, that we're seeing no 

associated damage to aquatic systems.

So, I don't know if you have any 

thoughts on that point, Asa, but I guess I'll start 

with the question to Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes, Wood. So, there were 

several comments that referenced how the Canadian 

standards are actually set up. And so, take a look 
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at OTA's comments on that, but I think that others 

referenced that as well. And so, they have that 

divided up for materials without a mandatory 

removal event, with a mandatory removal event, or, 

you know, things along those lines.

And some of the other comments there 

were talking about like the facility pest 

management practice standard that's currently in 

the regulations talks about preventative measures, 

and then, mechanical and physical and biological 

controls, and then, materials that are on the 

National List, and then, materials that aren't on 

the National List. So, like there's this whole 

like stepped approach. And so, there could be 

something that is similarly developed for 

sanitizers, cleaners and sanitizers.

MR. BRADMAN: I think, also, perhaps 

caution that we have to be really careful not to 

try to develop kind of a top-down management 

approach. Reading the OWPC, I think they lay out 

examples of many different environments where 

these materials are used, and there's not a 
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one-size-fits-al discussion by the CROPP 

Cooperative comments, but the written and oral 

presentation, and the issues around tank 

sanitizing, for example, just kind of represent 

a lot of the challenges on how to operationalize 

both a food system that's safe and has to meet FSMA 

and other criteria. And not just meeting these 

regulations, but the regulations are there because 

people can get sick and die from these pathogens.

So, I think this is just challenging 

because it's complex, both in terms of materials, 

but also in terms of individual business practices 

that may vary by industry and, also, within an 

industry.

MR. ELA: All right. We have another 

question from Sue, and then, while it's an 

unusually important topic, we probably need to move 

on.

MS. BAIRD: Yes, maybe more of a 

comment than a question, but kind of responding 

to Rick and I think Asa, who will mention other 

very effective methods such as ozone irradiation. 
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Of course, irradiation is not allowed in organics, 

but some of these methods that are very effective, 

and yet, I guess I have to represent my small 

farmer/processors world. And many of those 

persons/facilities, including my own little food 

hub here, would not be able to implement those 

methods. So, remember that we are an industry of 

both large corporations and of very small 

facilities.

MR. ELA: Very good point, Sue.

Any last-minute comments before we move 

on?

(No response.)

All right. Thank you, Asa. You 

picked off a tough one on this, and all the others 

on the various committees. So, obviously, a very 

poignant question as we keep moving forward.

So, Jerry, back to you.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, Steve, I'll give 

you an opportunity to manage time. You're up next 

on potassium hydroxide, reference 205.605(b).

And I'm going to actually read one piece 
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of it because I find it telling. "Prohibited for 

use in lye peeling of fruits and vegetables, except 

when used for peeling peaches." That one always 

fascinated me.

MR. ELA: Yes, I can speak from 

experience that peeling peaches, the pit causes 

immense problems.

(Laughter.)

But, yes, potassium hydroxide, you 

know, one of the comments was it's a wide-open 

listing, except for the prohibition for peeling. 

And so, several stakeholders noted that they would 

really rather have it listed for what it could be 

used for, rather than for what it can't be used 

for. But that's just a note on annotations, which 

we really can't change now, but read that into the 

record.

There certainly are health hazards from 

it because it's very highly corrosive and can cause 

severe burns to various body parts, just like a 

strong acid would. A strong lye is the same 

problem.
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And then, also, environmental concerns 

just in case there is a spill or a disposal of large 

volumes of water with potassium ions in it.

Also, I mean, just kind of reflecting 

on what we just talked about, sanitizers, but it 

is a hazardous material and it is toxic. So, the 

question is, is it essential and are the various 

uses for it essential?

Other commenters did say it was 

essential just as an anti-foamer and pH adjuster, 

and that other products or other alternatives 

aren't sufficient just because potassium hydroxide 

is more soluble than some others. And if we 

prohibited it, we would really need to identify 

something in the same role for standardization and 

product stability and pH adjustment along with 

peeling peaches.

So, that's a very quick summary, but 

I will open it up to questions or comments.

(No response.)

All right. Take that, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Hey, well done.
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Okay. Our next sunset, potassium 

lactate, reference 205.605(b), is mine to do.

It's used as a microbial agent and pH 

regulator. It comes in a liquid and may be added 

to meat as an anti-microbial agent. Confirmed 

that it is generally recognized as safe. The FDA 

does not authorize its use in infant foods and 

formulas. It does not appear to cause human health 

concerns. Environmental concerns have been 

discussed and seem to pose no real concern. The 

EPA adds to that that it has low potential to 

persist in the environment.

Of note for me, anyway, is that it is 

not accepted by the Canadian Standards Board, the 

European Economic Community, the International 

Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements, or 

IFOAM, and the Japanese Agricultural Standards, 

JAS. Potassium lactate has been allowed for use 

in organic handling since 2004.

Between both oral and written comments, 

there were less than 10 responders regarding 

potassium lactate. Most were in favor of 
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relisting.

In looking at the uses table provided, 

it does not appear as though this is a heavily used 

material.

We had one single question of our 

stakeholders: "What distinguishes potassium 

lactate from sodium lactate in terms of 

functionality, and is it important?" The sum 

total of the responses, which again were not much, 

would be summarized as potassium lactate offers 

similar anti-microbial function as sodium lactate, 

but without added salt or a salty taste. It is 

attractive to consumers looking for less sodium 

intake.

And that's it.

MR. ELA: Questions for Jerry?

(No response.)

I am not seeing any, Jerry, and it was 

just pointed out to me that we skipped silicon 

dioxide.

MR. D'AMORE: Oh, well, you know, 

that's interesting. In my book, silicon dioxide 
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is next.

MR. ELA: Okay. Well, it is 

officially because that's the way it works out.

MR. D'AMORE: Because that's what I did 

to the poor candidate here. I beg your pardon, 

but, for me, it is in sequence. And I think that 

was done deliberately so I didn't have to present 

silicon dioxide right on top of potassium, and it 

would demonstrate that I am saying actually just 

about the same thing. So, thank you for the 

interlude.

Silicon dioxide, reference 205.605(b), 

a sunset presented by Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes, the agenda and the 

binder were a little bit out of order, but that's 

okay.

Okay, silicon dioxide, I was laughing 

when I was given this material. I was like, of 

course, the certifier gets the material that has 

a commercial availability annotation, our favorite 

thing.

Anyway, silicon dioxide is used as an 
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anti-caking agent in several foods. It's a 

stabilizer in beer production. It's used as an 

absorbent in tableted foods, a carrier, and as well 

as a defoaming agent.

Most of the public comments were in 

support of relisting. I will say that there were 

some comments that urged the Board to look at the 

original annotation that was passed because there 

is a difference between the annotation that is 

listed on the National List and what was originally 

passed. So, there was an explanation in 

rulemaking as to why the program went that route. 

But, anyway, I just wanted to bring that up.

As for the questions, the first 

question, "Are there organic alternatives to 

silicon dioxide that are more suitable to the uses 

described above in which rice hulls are not 

viable?" There were a couple of comments that said 

that there are limited applications where organic 

substitutes might provide acceptable performance, 

but that these alternatives do not achieve suitable 

functionality in all organic applications where 
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silicon dioxide is currently being used.

And there was quite a bit of comment 

in regards to just the percentage and the ratios 

that needed to be used, that it's not a one-to-one. 

And so, that creates problems in having to use 

more organic rice hulls, and then, that results 

in -- which affects like the taste and things along 

those lines.

So, the second question was about, "Is 

there a reliable and consistent commercial 

availability of rice hulls for the applications 

in which it performs well?" I didn't really see 

a response to that particular question. So, if 

I missed any specific responses to that question, 

please let me know.

The third question was, "How prevalent 

is the use of silicon dioxide as a defoamer?" I 

would say that one certifier commented that one 

out of five materials that they've reviewed was 

specifically as a defoamer. And then, OTA did 

have, like I had talked about before, they sent 

out a survey, and like two respondents had replied. 
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And of those two respondents, they had only 

mentioned the use as a defoamer.

And then, the last one about, "How 

prevalent is the use of silicon dioxide for other 

allowed purposes?" So, there was quite a lot of 

comments about being used in the production of 

supplements, beverage mix powders, beer. It's 

used commonly as an ancillary anti-caking 

ingredient in flavors, nutrients, vitamins, and 

minerals, lots of, again, just an anti-caking agent 

and float agent in the spice industry, and then,

in powdered flavors.

And that's what I got.

MR. ELA: Good job, Kyla, your first 

sunset, even though you've heard many.

Are there any questions for Kyla?

(No response.)

All right. You got off easy. Thank 

you.

We'll go back to you, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Well, thank you, sir.

The next one, sodium lactate, is 
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205.605(b). Used as an anti-microbial agent and 

pH regulator. That may sound awfully similar to 

you.

And then, just to save time, and 

assuring you that virtually every word that I said 

about potassium lactate is essentially the same 

all the way through to the questions, I'll get down 

to the last part of the report.

Between both oral and written 

commenters, there were less than 10 responders 

regarding sodium lactate. Most were in favor of 

relisting.

And looking at the uses table provided, 

it does not appear as though this is a heavily used 

material.

Our single question to stakeholders 

was, "Why has JAS, IFOAM, and the Canadian 

Standards prohibited the use of sodium lactate?" 

And the responses were pretty uniform, the few 

that there were. It is that it is a synthetic 

material and there are nonsynthetic and naturally 

derived alternatives.
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That's it, folks.

MR. ELA: All right. Questions and 

comments?

(No response.)

Sounds great. Jerry, you were so fast, 

I couldn't get off mute. So, all right, you can 

move off sunsets into the next section.

Just as a time check, we're at 25 after 

the hour. We're supposed to finish at the top of 

the hour. I know we've got a couple of things here 

that may take up that whole time. So, we could 

go just a little bit over, but we'll see how these 

next two discussion documents go. But just as a 

heads-up for folks.

All right, Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Okay. Well, the next 

one is mine to do as well. It's a petition, 

material discussion document. It's zein. And 

that's probably the hardest thing about this whole 

discussion document, is the pronunciation of the 

material itself. So, zein.

The NOSB received the petition in 
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February of 2020. The TR was requested in 2020 

and delivered on the 21st of January this year. 

The Subcommittee has reviewed this position and 

the TR, and it was deemed as sufficient on the 2nd 

of February.

On 16 February, a discussion document 

was put together to request comments from the 

stakeholder community for this spring session. 

The response was light with less than 12 total 

comments from both the oral and written commenters.

Eight of the comments came from two 

entities, as they contributed both to the oral and 

written sessions. There was not one single 

comment in favor of the position. One responder 

did not take a position regarding yea or nay, but 

gave a lengthy and thoughtful comment regarding 

how we should look at this petition.

Of particular interest to me was the 

most strongly against the petition, but did not 

comment to the petition material itself, but, 

rather, to the use of any product of any particular 

kind; i.e., the general use of preservatives to 
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extend shelf life. All the comments given on this 

one were detailed and thoughtful.

Specifically, to our stakeholder 

responses to the questions presented in the 

discussion document is as follows:

One, "Zein is made from" -- excuse me, 

this will be brief -- "Zein is made from cornmeal 

that is wet-milled. How much, if any, sulphur 

residue is left in the final product?"

And the answer is the wet-milling 

steeps of the corn -- excuse me -- the wet-milling 

steeps the corn in the hot water solution for 24 

to 48 hours. The solution has been held at between 

somewhere between 0.1 to 0.5 percent sulphur 

dioxide in mix. None of the responses had any 

precise numbers to share, saying mostly, "Not much, 

if any."

The best answer came from an 

organization that put a long and thoughtful paper 

regarding this petition. However, they, too, did 

not have any specific data to answer the "how much" 

question, but concluded with, "Given the 
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specifications of zein and its labeling 

requirements, presumably, any residue left in the 

final product would not have a technical or 

functional effect."

The second question, "What are the 

hurdles to achieving organic zein?" The short 

answer appears to be sufficient quantities of 

organic cornmeal.

With that taken care of, the question 

of inputs would be next. The organic ethanol, as 

perhaps the best candidate to replace sulphur 

dioxide, is also itself in limited supply. Here, 

one of our reoccurring dilemmas come into play. 

Would we be stifling innovation by proceeding with 

this petition?

After months of looking at this 

petition, there's only one thing I'm confident of; 

namely, that unless seriously incentivized, the 

wet-milling of conventional cornmeal and the use 

of sulphur dioxide in the process will remain the 

method of choice. However, with that said, I am 

not sure that the demand for the product organic 
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zein is strong enough at this point to push 

production.

No. 3, "What sectors of the organic food 

market would benefit the most from the addition 

of zein to the National List, and how much shelf 

life would it improve?"

The question is in itself a little bit 

leading and provoked what I referenced earlier to 

a well-thought-out or lengthy document talking 

about the need for anything that produces shelf 

life. So, the petition itself is not specific to 

shelf life. It includes shelf life, increasing 

shelf life as part of its petition, but has, in 

my mind, stronger points; i.e., it's hydrophobic 

and is the best, in my reading, available product 

for things like pharmaceuticals, pills, keeping 

water in and keeping moisture out. It's a barrier.

The most common response to this 

question was, "I don't know anybody who wants it." 

And part of some answers was, "We don't know until 

we try." Two pretty opposing answers.

There is good evidence that zein is, 
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or could become, the best alternative for vegan 

consumers, given some stated functionality 

characters vis-a-vis other coatings.

Further, as it is hydrophobic, zein 

appears to have a strong following in the 

pharmaceutical industry.

The last question, "Do we need to 

revisit the classification as a nonsynthetic or 

is it the established precedent?" This question 

provoked strong comments both ways, some saying 

that there is no precedent to keeping it as a 

nonsynthetic; others saying just the opposite, 

citing the long and contentious debate over corn 

steeps that occur.

I have a last paragraph that is mine. 

And it deals with the push and the pull of what 

we're trying to do. If this product isn't brought 

forward -- let's start with the fact that there 

is no commercially available organic zein today. 

So, what does that mean to us in considering this 

petition?

There is no market for it. If we allow 
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it to go forward, will a market be created, and 

will that be good for the people we represent? 

So, that, to me, will become one of the questions 

that, in my opinion, needs to be answered. And 

I think I probably already gave away my leaning 

on that particular issue.

So, that's all I have for that product.

MR. ELA: Okay. Questions, comments, 

et cetera, for Jerry on this as a discussion 

document?

(No response.)

Jerry, I am not seeing any, and I 

guess --

MR. D'AMORE: That's sort of like our 

stakeholder community. Okay.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Yes.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you very much.

MR. ELA: I'm guessing you're going to 

get to write a proposal next meeting on this one, 

but --

MR. D'AMORE: I would say you're right.
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MR. ELA: We are going to move on to 

the last one, Jerry, if you want to introduce it.

MR. D'AMORE: Sure. Hold on. I 

already know what it -- okay, the next Handling 

Committee discussion document, fish oil 

annotation, a discussion presented by Asa.

And you're muted, sir. Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Okay. Can you hear me 

now?

MR. D'AMORE: Uh-hum.

MR. BRADMAN: This is kind of another 

complicated marine materials issue, but this came 

up with the sunset review of fish oil, I think it 

was last fall, a year ago last fall. No, last fall. 

And the Handling Committee felt like, to renew 

the sunset, there needed to be some explicit 

consideration of environmental concerns around 

harvesting products from fish from the ocean, or 

fish in general, and using them as an ingredient 

in organic products.

The sunset did pass, a very large 

margin. So, people weren't opposed to that. 
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There are some objections to the actual listing 

of fish oil on the National List. And I apologize 

because I did make a comment in the review that 

I hope wasn't interpreted as being snide, that the 

objections to the listing I felt like weren't 

relevant to this review of how do we protect the 

ecology of fish for use of this. But I agree, 

certainly, if we eliminated fish oil from the 

National List as an ingredient, that would make 

this whole discussion moot. But it was relisted, 

and there are some challenging issues here.

Last fall, Tom had prepared a suggested 

annotation to the listing, and that's what we're 

talking about here, an annotation to modify what's 

acceptable for fish oil material. And basically, 

what he came up with was a review of the definitions 

of fish stock exploitation by both the U.S. NOAA, 

the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Administration, and then, also, the FAO. And 

based on those definitions, those could guide what 

was -- that as long as oil was extracted from fish 

from populations that were sustainable or not 
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endangered, that that would be the basis for the 

sanitation.

And then, there were a number of 

comments in response to that that raised concerns 

about inconsistency for certifiers, that there 

were different standards used by FAO and the NOAA; 

and that, also, there are fish populations, some 

of which may be very sustainably exploited, but 

are not necessarily covered by any of those. And 

so, there was kind of a general sense that the 

proposal as it stood wouldn't work.

And those comments came from, you know, 

some people, industry groups, and also some others 

as well. The industry groups are DSM and GOED. 

You can see their comments both last round and 

this round.

So, I inherited this and have had a 

number of discussions with folks in different parts 

of kind of the marine ecology arena, including 

NOAA, scientists from the NOAA office in Monterey 

Bay; also, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch 

Program, and also from the Marine Sustainability 
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Council, which is kind of like a third-party 

certifier around integrity of use of marine fish 

populations. And that is kind of what has formed 

this discussion document.

And we came up with these kind of three 

alternatives, some based on comments last spring, 

and then, others based on conversations both with 

MSC and the Monterey Bay Aquarium folks. And these 

were also both reviewed by the NOAA scientists.

Basically, it would be changes to the 

proposed annotation by adding "sourced from 

fishing industry byproduct only and certified 

sustainable by a third party". So, that's the 

simplest option.

And then, a more specific one that would 

have the same requirements for sourcing, but 

certified against the International Social and 

Environmental Accreditation and Labeling 

Alliance, ISEAL, Code-compliant or Global Seafood 

Sustainability Initiative. These are groups 

that, basically, kind of vouch for the certifiers. 

And then, a second option to rely on the Seafood 
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Watch criteria.

So, we've gotten a number of comments 

on that, and they have varied. Also, actually, 

this is an important point. A couple of commenters 

I think were conflating the term "byproduct" versus 

"bycatch". In the proposal, we have a source from 

the fishing industry "byproduct".

And there, we're talking about fish oil 

being a secondary product from harvested fish. 

So, we're not talking about fishing solely for 

production of oil -- and I want to make that 

distinction -- versus "bycatch," which bycatch 

would be deriving it from unintended species that 

were captured and killed versus the target species. 

So, if you're harvesting tuna and you're killing 

turtles and sharks, we're not talking about 

deriving the oil from the turtles and sharks. 

We're talking about as a byproduct of processing 

tuna, say, for canned tuna. We're talking about 

if that's a sustainable harvest, then a byproduct 

of that would be extracting oil from those tuna 

and making that a product that could be used in 
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organic foods.

I just want to distinguish that. We're

not talking about bycatch, and it's clear that, 

if we move ahead with the proposal, we need to have 

a very clear definition of what "byproduct" is.

In terms of the specific proposals, 

there were concerns for all of them, although there 

was the strongest support for No. 1 and No. 2. 

And then, in a way, I think No. 2 was considered 

more specific. People tended to prefer No. 1, but 

I think No. 1, which is just a simple third-party 

certifying choice, is too vague and leaves too much 

room for problems.

And we've outlined some of the issues 

in this proposal. And I think these are all kind 

of concerns for us to consider when we're talking 

about this: that by relying on third-party 

certification, we're outsourcing a standard that's 

outside the USDA and that's outside in some ways 

even control of the United States. So, that's 

something to consider. We outlined those three 

concerns about being outside the U.S. There also 
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could be a concern for green-washing if there are 

third-party certifiers that don't meet a viable 

standard, you know, that are kind of there for show. 

And also, the possibility of excluding 

smaller-scale producers that can't afford a 

third-party certification. I think some of those 

limitations still remain, even if we choose any 

of the options we have, although I think they are 

least possible with the No. 2 option.

There were some concerns about the 

Seafood Watch one -- that's our No. 3 -- and the 

possibility of allowing fish that meet their green 

or yellow standard. If you're familiar with 

Seafood Watch, they have green, yellow, and red. 

And yellow is perhaps more marginal, and perhaps 

that would be not acceptable because there's too 

much uncertainty.

In terms of comments, a group from PCC, 

many of you know from the Northwest market, they 

felt that they were all inadequate, and that No. 

2 was too broad and larger-scale. However, when 

we looked at comments from other certifiers like 
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QAI and, also, the CROPP Cooperative, and then, 

also, comments from DSM and GOED, two of the 

producers, they lean towards No. 1 and 2. And I 

think they're willing to live with No. 2. QAI was 

the least comfortable with option 2, that it would 

be unenforceable. However, there were other 

comments that really felt that 1 and 2, and 

particularly No. 2, is workable.

There was a bit of a complaint, I think, 

in some ways from a smaller group called Friend 

of the Sea, World Sustainability Organization. 

I think they felt that they would potentially be 

excluded because they represented smaller groups 

and wouldn't be able to fit into maybe what was 

viewed as kind of big league sustainability 

certification. And some of these sustainable 

certifiers are businesses. Like we have in the 

organic world, many of the certifiers are 

for-profit companies.

So, I'm going through my notes here. 

And then, a final comment, too, is that we need 

to have a certified aquaculture standard. And if 
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that were the case, then we would be able to easily 

point source material to actually organic fish. 

And that would, again, actually, make this 

potentially moot because we would have an organic 

source.

And that was another common comment. 

And CROPP Cooperative actually said, if we had 

organic fish and it was sourced from organic fish,

we would absolutely go in that direction.

So, I think I've hit on the major points 

here, and I look forward to discussion.

MR. ELA: Great, Asa.

It looks like Kyla has a question.

MS. SMITH: Thanks, Asa.

I'm on the Handling Subcommittee, and 

this didn't occur to me until now, in reading the 

public comments. So, what I was thinking about, 

anyway, is, right now, these three options are 

focused on like the certification part. And I just 

wondered if there was an overarching accreditation 

scheme that would sort of wrap all of these up into 

like a certification. Like it would be one, like 
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option 1, basically, by a third-party certifier 

accredited to some particular ISO standard. I 

don't know if that exists or not.

And that brings me to my second point 

with one of the comments, or maybe it was a couple 

of comments, but talking about having specific 

certification schemes called out maybe gets us into 

a sticky wicket, like we are with the inerts thing, 

down the line should they -- I don't know -- change 

the name of their certification thing, or we don't 

agree with it anymore, or whatever. And then, that 

is like tied in the annotation.

And so, I understand that being vague 

leads to some inconsistencies, but being specific 

also has been challenging for the Board to grapple 

with. So, anyway, I don't know if there's like 

an overarching accreditation that would cover 

these things.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I think that's a 

great point. I think that was some of the idea 

behind the suggestion of No. 2, that the ISEAL and 

the GSSI kind of provide that broader validation 
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and accreditation to marine sustainability 

certification organizations, and that No. 1 was 

too vague.

But I think it's also possible that 

those could change. Some of their components are 

mandatory and some are voluntary. And we would 

probably have to limit it to the mandatory, which 

still wouldn't, I think, address concerns here. 

But, you're right, I mean, this is a situation 

where we're outsourcing a standard or a criteria 

to an outside organization.

At the same time, there aren't the 

resources here to deal with it. And maybe this 

can be considered also interim until we have an 

aquaculture standard, so we can have organic fish.

MR. ELA: Carolyn? And then, Wood.

MR. BRADMAN: And just one last thing. 

I don't believe there is an ISO standard for this.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Carolyn.

DR. DIMITRI: Okay. So, this is so 

fascinating. I mean, the whole fishing scene has 

been fraught with so many problems. I mean 
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everywhere you look.

Let me see. There, I had to unmute 

myself. It does a weird thing when you go into 

Spotlight.

So, anyway, this comment builds on a 

little bit what Kyla was saying. I mean, this idea 

of being certified as sustainable by a third-party 

certifier is just, I think, a little too vague 

because it just leaves room for anyone to like open 

up shop and become a third-party certifier without 

it having any bite.

So, I see with option 2 there is this 

effort to identify like legitimate bodies. And 

I don't even know how this would be done, whether 

there could be like a list of like here are the 

acceptable third-party certifiers, and the 

third-party certifiers would somehow have to -- I 

mean, I'm not saying they should petition us to 

get on the list, but there should be like maybe 

some process for a third-party certifier to go 

through some minimum vetting process. So, you can 

at least feel like something is being accomplished 
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other than just like saying third-party certifier; 

some company goes and gets it, and then, they just 

stamp it on their package, and who really knows?

I appreciate your nuanced description 

of this as well. It's very complex.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I mean, I think you 

raise -- you know, these are all challenging issues 

here. I mean, in some ways, the Seafood Watch one, 

perhaps if we took out the yellow category, maybe 

that would be the most simple. Some of the 

concerns are, though, that on the Seafood Watch, 

one concern was that it's desk-based versus some 

of the other organizations that actually do real 

inspections, although I have to check on that with 

the people at the Seafood Watch.

And then, the other thing is that, you 

know, they have a kind of public-facing consumer 

criteria for many fish, but they also address 

species on a commercial basis. And their list is 

a little bit longer. So, that might be a little 

more accessible in the sense that they're 

U.S.-based, but I don't think they have the global 
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reach that these other organizations have. So, 

again, the idea with ISO and GSSI was that they 

are a consortium, organizations that work across 

the seas, so to speak.

DR. DIMITRI: So, in a sense, it's 

basically these two organizations would be in 

charge of vetting whatever certification system, 

and we would, basically, trust those?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I don't know, it's 

not like they would vet them for us, but we would 

say that a certifier would have to get -- and this 

is how some people have suggested they would 

operationalize it, which they considered 

enforceable. They would expect like an 

attestation that they were getting fish from a 

stock that was evaluated by an organization that 

meets these standards. And so, there would be a 

process to document that compliance. And, of 

course, it would be, to some extent, honesty-based, 

but it would still be a step.

DR. DIMITRI: All right. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Next, we have Wood.
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MR. TURNER: Thanks, Asa. A great 

presentation.

I just wanted to acknowledge that I 

think that one of the beauties of this process is 

that we put these concepts out for consideration 

and get feedback on them. And it certainly helps 

to sort of clarify one's own perspective on some 

of these issues.

And sometimes it does it in sort of 

jarring ways. Like it's funny that you raised the 

PCC feedback, because I did think it was 

interesting. They were sort of defaulting to the 

option 3, where I was feeling like option 2 of the 

options sort of felt stronger and less sort of bound 

to something, you know, to an individual 

certification. I mean, Seafood Watch is great. 

I think it's great, but it's got its own -- to 

your point, you've raised some of the challenges 

with it -- it's got its own issues.

For me, where I end up landing on this, 

as a member of the Subcommittee, is that I actually 

feel like what this is telling me is that we do 
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need an aquaculture standard in organic, period, 

the end. Like that's what's needed here. We need 

this in a lot of different areas.

This is, to me, just a reflection of 

the continued need to kind of define these things 

more clearly, so that we actually stand by these 

things. Because what is beautiful about organic 

and what we're doing here is that we have the force 

of law behind us. And we all know that 

certifications across the board are fundamentally 

different from organic for that very important 

reason. And I just feel like it's just to me almost 

a call to action on that front to advocate more 

forcefully for the need for some of these more clear 

standards.

I know that's a big can of worms as well, 

Steve. And so, I'm just happy to put it out there, 

but that's what this discussion has brought forward 

from me.

MR. ELA: No, no can of worms. I think 

it's a great point, and that's one all our 

stakeholders have been making through this whole 
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meeting as well. And really, it's going to fall 

on your lap because Asa and I will be out of here.

(Laughter.)

So, you just committed yourself here.

But, Sue, you've got something to say?

MS. BAIRD: Yes, I do, but first a 

comment. You notice I've unmuted myself every 

time this time?

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Well done.

MS. BAIRD: I agree with everybody. 

Great job, Asa. This is a thorny question.

But, to the point that you said, that 

other certifying agents, third-party 

certification, it would be somewhat a point of 

trust. And that's true, but there is somewhat 

precedence against that, in that we accept OMRI, 

which is not a regulatory agency, to review our 

inputs that are used in organic production, or we 

accept CDFA when they verify that there's no 

pesticides -- that is a law -- no pesticides being 

applied to the land for three years. So, we have 
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precedence for accepting other certifications for 

input to products. Just a comment.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Yes, I'm just trying to think 

through that, Sue. But OMRI certifies products, 

not materials. That material list is only up to 

us. So, I'm trying to think if this is a parallel 

example or not. I'm going to have to think on that 

a little bit.

And I was going to say just, you know, 

we've run into this, I think, with List 4s. It 

is that, in the Safer Choice List -- and I think 

Jenny brought this up -- that Safer Choice, that's 

another agency which makes decisions with not 

necessarily any public comment, that, then, we take 

up and use. When we tie a fate to some of these 

other standards, we give away our strength to not 

comment on it. So, I am a little concerned about 

that, but I also recognize that we can't do 

anything, or can't do everything. So, it's a bit 

of a quandary. I think, actually, that's where 

Rick's comment comes in very strong that 
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aquaculture standards would be very --

MS. BAIRD: Right, but --

MR. ELA: Sue, did you want to say 

something?

MS. BAIRD: Just to follow up on that, 

aren't these agencies certified by the states? 

We heard that in that panel way back when. The 

states are overseeing these certification 

processes?

MR. BRADMAN: Well, these 

organizations are international. So, these would 

not be certified within a U.S. state or U.S. 

context.

MR. TURNER: And no explicit state 

endorsement, right, Asa? I mean, there's no 

explicit --

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I mean, that was 

why I think Tom originally thought let's use the 

Food and Agricultural Organization for non-U.S. 

waters and let's use NOAA for U.S. Waters. And 

the problem there is that there's inconsistencies 

between the definitions and standards that FAO and 
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NOAA use. And therefore, it wouldn't be 

comparable using product from fish stocks that were 

under different kind of -- well, in one case, 

regulatory; in other case, kind of sustainability 

evaluation. So, the goal of our discussions was 

to try to make it uniform.

MR. ELA: Other comments, questions?

(No response.)

I'm not seeing any more, Asa. I think 

that's a great discussion. I don't envy you in 

figuring out a direction to go with this at this 

point. I think our stakeholders gave great 

comments, and it's a thorny issue that we all know 

we want to address, and it comes down to the devil 

in the details, as always. So, thank you.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. Just one idea 

might be that, if we do come up with an annotation 

proposal, we can also have it contingent or have 

it expire once there's an aquaculture standard.

MR. ELA: Good point. Yes, that's 

fair.

Well, thank you for taking it on, Asa. 
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You've certainly taken on some big question 

topics, and I think we all really appreciate that.

With that, boy, I think we're going to 

come in under the wire here. So, I'm a little 

surprised, but we'll be nice to our ASL 

interpreters, as always.

And I do want to thank them again. As 

I've said before, they've really got to deal with 

all the technical jargon. And, Wood, thank you 

for making it simpler. But thank you to the ASL 

interpreters for making this more accessible to 

everyone in our stakeholder group.

So, with that, we will adjourn for 

today, and then, we are going to start again 

tomorrow at noon Eastern Time. That will be with 

the Crops Subcommittee. And then, later in the 

afternoon, we'll have deferred votes, which at 

least will include the ion exchange document and 

the presentation of our work agendas and materials 

update.

So, I sure appreciate it, everybody, 

and thank you for participating. And we will see 
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you tomorrow.

(Whereupon, at 5:00 p.m., the meeting 

was adjourned for the day, to reconvene the 

following day, Friday, April 30, 2021, at 12:00 

noon.)
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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

+ + + + +

NATIONAL ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD

+ + + + +

SPRING 2021 MEETING

+ + + + +

FRIDAY

APRIL 30, 2021

+ + + + +

The Board met via Videoconference at 

12:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Steve Ela, Chair, 

presiding.

PRESENT

STEVE ELA, Chair

NATE POWELL-PALM, Vice Chair

MINDEE JEFFERY, Secretary

SUE BAIRD

ASA BRADMAN

AMY BRUCH

BRIAN CALDWELL

JERRY D'AMORE

CAROLYN DIMITRI

RICK GREENWOOD

KIM HUSEMAN

LOGAN PETREY

KYLA SMITH

WOOD TURNER
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STAFF PRESENT

MICHELLE ARSENAULT, Advisory Committee 

Specialist, Standards Division

JARED CLARK, National List Manager, Standards 

Division

DAVID GLASGOW, Associate Deputy Administrator, 

National Organic Program

ERIN HEALY, Acting Director, Standards Division

DEVON PATTILLO, Agricultural Marketing 

Specialist, Standards Division

DR. JENNIFER TUCKER, Ph.D., Deputy 

Administrator, National Organic Program; 

Designated Federal Official
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CONTENTS

Crops Subcommittee

Topics: 

Proposal: Paper (Plant pots and other crop

 production aids) - petitioned ...... 8

Proposal: Biodegradable biobased mulch

 annotation change ................. 25

2023 Sunset substances review:

Copper sulfate ............................... 82

Ozone gas .................................... 84

Peracetic acid ............................... 88

EPA List 3 - Inerts of unknown toxicity ...... 91

Chlorine materials (Calcium hypochlorite,

Chlorine dioxide, hypochlorous acid, sodium

hypochlorite) ............................... 112

Magnesium oxide ............................. 124

Calcium chloride ............................ 128

Rotenone .................................... 133

Crops Subcommittee (Cont)

Discussion Document: Ammonia Extract -

 petitioned ......................... 135

Discussion Document: Kasugamycin -

petitioned............................. 191

Deferred Votes .............................. 207

NOSB work agendas/Materials update .......... 221

Other business and closing remarks .......... 227
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

12:01 p.m.

MS. ARSENAULT: Welcome to day three 

of the National Organic Standards Board. The 

audience attendees are in listen only mode, so you 

don't have a mic or camera to operate. The chat 

function is enabled though and you are welcome to 

chat amongst yourselves.

For whatever reason, we all can only 

either chat to all panelists or all panelists or 

attendees. And there is no feature to privately 

chat with a single person, it appears. For me 

either. But feel free to chat amongst yourselves.

I'm going to paste into the chat window 

as well the Zoom login information, the phone 

numbers. So if you have any audio issues, you can 

dial in on the phone.

And with that, Steve, I will turn it 

back over to you to take us out of recess.

MR. ELA: All right.

MR. D'AMORE: You going to record this?

MS. ARSENAULT: Thank you, Jerry. 
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Recording to the Cloud. Got it.

MR. ELA: Perfect. All right, welcome 

everybody to the last day of the spring NOSB 

meeting. It's been a great discussion so far, and 

we've got crops coming up with a variety of things, 

as well as our deferred vote on ion exchange and 

then our work agendas at the end of the day.

I have to apologize, publicly apologize 

to Jerry from yesterday. I did not put on my 

necklace of rubber gloves for handling, I neglected 

to do it. So I don't want handling to feel left 

out, but I do have the crops focus here with some 

fresh apple blooms. I, hopefully I don't look too 

much like a Star Wars character but --

MR. D'AMORE: Looks comfortable.

MR. ELA: Looks comfortable.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: I'll hold them up for right 

now so they'll probably disappear as they fall off. 

Just like petals in the spring, you know.

But I want to start off with roll call 

just real quickly just so for the record we know 
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who is on the call. So I'll start off with Sue. 

Are you there?

MS. BAIRD: Yes, I'm here.

MR. ELA: Okay. Then Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian? Brian, are you out 

there?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Okay. Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Good morning. Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Hello.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Hi. I'm here.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes, I'm here.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: I'm here.
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MR. ELA: Great. Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Hello, hello. I'm 

here.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Good afternoon. Hello, 

I'm here.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes, good morning. 

Hello, I'm here.

MR. ELA: All right. And I obviously 

am here. So it looks like we have the full Board 

of 14 to start things off.

And with that, Rick, I will turn it over 

to you as Chairperson of the Crop Subcommittee.

MR. GREENWOOD: Wow, thank you, Steve. 

First, a little note. A lot of the profit that 

you would have is on your head there. So I wouldn't 

do that anymore.

(Laughter.)

MR. GREENWOOD: Just a tip from one 

grower to another.

(Laughter.)
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MR. ELA: Okay.

MR. GREENWOOD: Well, hello everyone. 

And it is the Crops Subcommittee presentation.

And first of all, I'd like to thank my 

Committee Members. We've had, obviously when you 

look at the agenda, we have some tough things that 

we've worked on for months.

And I think what's always impressed me 

about the group is we've had really good 

discussion, honest discussion. People are very 

respectful of everyone's positions.

And these are hard issues. I mean, 

we've spent a lot of time talking about it, so I 

just want to thank everyone for the work that they 

have put in on it.

And with that, I'd like to turn it over 

to the first agenda item, which is the proposal 

for paper pots. Now, you might think that this 

will go on forever, but it's up to Steve to sort 

of close the loop on this. So, Steve, why don't 

you go ahead and talk about the paper pot petition.

MR. ELA: Sounds good. I was just 
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picking petals off my shirt here.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: But yes. And actually, 

Rick, I have to correct you, it is paper based 

planting aids at this point.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: We have moved beyond the 

paper pots.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Yes. I think this is the 

third iteration of the proposal for, it could be 

forth, I'm not sure, for paper based planting aids.

And the wording and everything is in 

your, either posted on the website or in your 

binders for the Board. So that's there.

And basically we've been around this 

merry go round before. And from my reading of the 

comments, most the people are in favor of us going 

ahead to pass this, but there were a number of 

little technical comments as well, and I just want 

to highlight those.

One of them was in the terms defined. 
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They would like the addition of the words, 

typically in paper, to help define those.

I know we have talked about that in the 

past and one of the problems is, typically in paper, 

is a very wide, wide definition since paper is now, 

there could be wholly synthetic papers on the 

market as well. But still appreciate that 

comment.

Another big reservation on a number of 

people is that there is, the listing is missing 

the requirement for continuous improvement. 

Which would also possibly include commercial 

availability if a higher biobased content material 

were on the market.

So those are good comments. I think 

we've talked about them a little bit before, and 

it's been difficult to get that wording in that 

was satisfactory to people.

But again, I do agree that, I think the 

Board as a whole really does want this to be a 

continuous improvement. And that is, some of 

these higher biobased materials come on the market, 
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that this will be reevaluated and the listing 

updated as some of those become available.

One of the people, one of the 

suggestions in that was to use something like the 

Seeds and Planting Stock Practice Standard. Which 

allows for the use of non-organically untreated 

seeds when the equivalent organically produced 

varieties not commercially available. So, yes, 

it is a possibility.

One of the difficulties, again, is that 

papers themselves are synthetic just based on the 

processing of them, so it's a little more difficult 

to separate out nonsynthetic and synthetic and 

biobased and not biobased since biobased there can 

be some very resilient non-biodegradable plastics 

made out of cellulose.

So it's a tough listing on some of those 

things of how we define. Because biobased doesn't 

necessarily indicated biodegrabability, oh, I got 

it this time. And likewise, non-biobased also 

doesn't indicate that, but it can go both ways.

Another comment is that they just urge 
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caution regarding the percentage allowance of 

synthetic fibers in the proposal.

And a related comment where we said the, 

or we suggested we had in some language from the 

last time that the other 40 percent beyond the 60 

percent cellulose based, and we said they can be 

comprised of nonsynthetic, other permitted 

synthetic ingredients or synthetic fibers 

adhesives and resins.

And they, you know, it was a question 

of, are these ors and ands and how are those 

percentages calculated, are they by weight or by 

some other method. And I think we've kind of 

determined that's by weight. But all these things 

can go in a cover page, assuming we pass this.

Another comment that's been brought up 

a number of times is that we should not allow virgin 

paper and that the adhesives should be limited. 

One of the difficulties is that using recycled 

paper is very difficult because of the variability 

in that recycled paper. And it's been brought up 

that there is really a tiny amount of virgin paper 
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used in these pots.

But again, very, you know, respect 

those comments and take them to heart.

On a bigger level, some people asked 

that we enumerate specific standards by which 

biobased content is to be verified by qualified 

personnel. We had originally just said it had to 

be verified by ASTM D6866, and some people really 

pushed back on that for a variety of reasons and 

so, we did add in the qualified personnel.

But in doing so we created another set 

of comments as to what those qualified personnel 

are. And so people would like that, that spelled 

out a little bit more. That's a tough one.

One person said in response to that 

they'd really like to see manufacturers become 

listed by a material review organization, such as 

OMRI or other material review organizations. That 

way there would be consistent product approval 

between certifiers.

One of them was, in terms of OMRI said, 

they would really like the biobased product to be 
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used, some of the definitions from USDA 

BioPreferred program, although some of those 

definitions may or may not be consistent with the 

OFPA definitions.

Finally I have to laugh a little bit. 

We start to chase our tail a little bit. In the 

original proposal we did not include any language 

about nutrients or fungicides or pesticides and 

was asked that we add in some specific language 

on nutrients and pesticides to note that they had 

to, if anything that was included, had to be on 

the national list if they were synthetic.

On the last go around there was quite 

a bit of push back on the pesticide inclusion just 

because pesticides have their own use category. 

It's partly based on EPA criteria, so we removed 

that.

And now in this go around we did have 

several commenters note that they would really like 

the nutrient language taken out because that's 

always spelled out in OFPA. So we're kind of on 

the, you know, we're kind of going in the circle 
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now of those on whether they should be in or out.

A number of people really wanted them 

in, now a few people want them out. So I'm kind 

of inclined to think that we're making people 

uncomfortable on both sides and that this were 

probably about the right spot and we can leave it 

up to the program as they write the regulatory 

language to make that determination.

I think the bottom line is we want to 

make sure that any nutrients used in these paper 

pots do comply with OFPA. And if they're synthetic 

they are on the national list. And so I think that, 

however that gets done, I think that's the bottom 

line.

Finally, a number of people suggested 

listing changes in terms of the paragraphs where 

they're listed, or some of the references listed 

in terms of the nutrients. And I -- those are good 

comments, I think they're appropriate.

But I don't think they precluded us 

passing this since ultimately the program as they 

write the rulemaking will insert those in the 
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proper place. It's really somewhat out of our 

purview to say where they're listed, that's the 

program's responsibility.

In our listing of these things we are 

really trying to help the program and dictate where 

we thought they should be, but I think some of the 

minor things of exactly where they're listed are 

probably not a reason, are not a reason to not 

accept this proposal.

That was a double negative. So, 

despite those comments we should accept the 

proposal and let the program decide exactly where 

those go.

Otherwise, most the comments were 

positive in favor of passing this. Let's say there 

were a few that really, just with regards to the 

virgin paper, some of these other things are not 

in favor of passing it.

There are, Asa has brought up the 

question of these synthetic products being 

approved in this case. I appreciate his thoughts 

and I think he's probably right.
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Although again, we're dealing with a 

very small component of organic agriculture and 

we would hope we would move to nonsynthetic and 

fully biodegradable materials in the future. And 

I really hope that if we pass this that a future 

board, as some of these products mature and change, 

we'll ask for a work agenda to update this 

verification.

So with that, I would open it up to 

questions and comments from the Board.

MR. GREENWOOD: Thanks, Steve.

MR. ELA: Sue has a question.

MS. BAIRD: I have a comment.

MR. ELA: All right.

MS. BAIRD: I really, truly, truly 

appreciate all the work you guys have done on this. 

It's gone back several times, you have, it has 

certainly been a work in progress and I really think 

that this needs to go forward.

Just a little ironic to see the word 

resins in there --

(Laughter.)
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MS. BAIRD: -- based on our ion 

exchange thing, but you know, life is never 100 

percent perfect. Thank you very much for the work.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Sue. Yes, there is 

always a little bit of irony in some of this, I 

very much agree.

Others? We have Logan and then Wood.

MS. PETREY: Hi. Thank you, Rick. 

Curious if any of this would apply to plant tape. 

Are you familiar with plant tape and the 

transplants with that?

MR. ELA: Yes.

MS. PETREY: Could this potentially 

bleed into that system there?

MR. ELA: The intent was for it to bleed 

into that system.

MS. PETREY: Okay.

MR. ELA: But beyond paper pots it 

would cover all planting aids. And we haven't 

heard much from the seed tape manufacturers but 

we presume that, and from what we understand, that 

this listing would be able to include those.
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My understanding is the paper pots 

essentially have to be more resilient than most 

other uses just because they have a lot of water 

added to them in the nurseries, greenhouses and 

that --

MS. PETREY: Right.

MR. ELA: -- other things are applied 

that essentially aren't intended to breakdown very 

quickly. So, yes, these, the paper planting aids 

are intended to cover seed tapes as well as others.

MS. PETREY: Okay, very cool. Thank 

you.

MR. ELA: Wood and then Amy.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Steve. And 

thanks again for all the work on this. This is 

going to be my earliest memory of time on the NOSB. 

I think, walking in the door and getting hit in 

the face with paper pots was a, has been an 

experience for me for the last year and a half, 

so thanks for all the work you've done on it.

I just want to, and I appreciate that 

you acknowledging the issue on virgin paper, I have 
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raised that several times before. And I just 

wanted to reiterate the point, I continue to 

believe, the idealist in me, continues to believe 

that the beauty of organic, or part of the beauty 

of organic, is that we're not contributing to other 

problems, other issues in the world in our quest 

to kind of make organic all that it can be.

And so I do get concerned that there 

is not enough innovation happening to sort of move 

away from virgin paper. It concerns me a little 

bit that we're not noting the source of that virgin 

paper, if it is indeed used.

But I think given the fact that you have 

communicated very clearly about, and I think we're 

quite clear about sort of the overall scope or scale 

of this material, I know it's very important to 

a lot of growers but it's still a fairly small part 

of the organic farming, sort of landscape.

I'm cool with it but I just wanted to 

acknowledge, again, that virgin paper issue is 

something that is nagging at me and I'm going to 

leave it at that.
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MR. ELA: Sure. I think it's great. 

I'm glad you brought that up. And certainly some 

of our stakeholders have.

I know at least one of the manufacturers 

of paper pots has testified in the past, or given 

us comments, that they are using paper source from 

certified, I can't remember the certification, but 

sustainable --

MR. TURNER: FSC or SFI is one of, one 

of those two?

MR. ELA: Yes. Yes, thanks.

MR. TURNER: Okay.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Wood. So they are, 

as a company, are taking that stance that it needs 

to be paid attention to.

I can't speak for other manufacturers, 

and I think, I agree with your comment, that, I 

mean, the scale does make a difference but I would 

hope many manufacturers would move to respect your 

thoughts and comments.

MR. TURNER: There has got to be some 

innovation out there down the road, Steve.
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MR. ELA: Yes, agreed. Agreed. And 

I think we've heard about the use of hemp and some 

of these other fibers linked, they may supplant 

some of this virgin paper as well as the technology 

improves.

But could figure out how to word that 

in, but again, I would hope that this could be 

reviewed five years down the road by a board, maybe 

when it does come up for Sunset. Before it does 

there could be a work agenda item to review whether 

it needs to be further annotated or the annotation 

needs to be up in terms of ingredients and biobased 

content.

We've got Amy and then Kyla.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thanks so much, 

Steve, for your communication on this subject 

matter.

And maybe, I have two questions. 

Actually, one is a little bit in conjunction with 

what Wood asked.

The next item that we're going to be 

discussing, that's also a proposal. Actually it 
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has that built in continuous improvement clause 

into this situation, so I didn't know if it makes 

sense to, for my opinion, and I'm still new to the 

Board, it almost seems like it's easier to do all 

of this all at once then try to, five years from 

now in the sunset renewal process, get a work agenda 

item to then start working on further annotations 

when hopefully in five years or maybe even in a 

year or two there will be some improvements in 

materials to try to hold people to a higher 

standard.

Is it worthwhile, I know you kind of 

touched on it in your intro to this, but is it 

worthwhile to include a continuous improvement 

clause right in this proposal right now?

MR. ELA: Yes. It's one we've kind of 

gone back and forth on in public comments. We 

initially did include about biodegradability 

clause that while most people want that noted, the 

definition and a verification of it was very 

difficult. And we had a number of stakeholders 

ask us to take it out.
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I mean, we recognize that, I think 

everybody recognizes that's the ultimate goal, but 

the wording became very difficult.

And we did also have something similar 

in it to go towards that 100 percent biobased. 

But again, the concern was that you can be 100 

percent biobased and completely nonbiodegradable.

Or cellulose based and completely 

nonbiodegradable because there are some plastics 

made out of cellulose that are very long lasting.

So the definition of the commercial 

availability in this case of what items changed, 

is it biobased, is it cellulose content, et cetera, 

was a little problematic of what we are defining. 

And that we didn't want to shoot ourselves in the 

foot of requiring some increase in something and 

actually having it be an increase, like I said, 

of biobased content but actually less 

biodegradable.

So that tension of how do we define 

those things, at least in this case, was difficult. 

I think we, I think on the biodegradable mulch 
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we're seeing some of those comments of, where we, 

and we'll cover that with Asa, but the 100 percent, 

well, what does that mean and how do you define 

that, and does that mean you have to use it if it's 

100 percent but there are better products that are 

99 percent.

So we get tangled up in that. And as 

much as I don't like leaving it to future boards 

without being written in, but the wording, the 

devil is in the details on this listing, and we 

have gone round and round in the wording, even of 

what we have, and the wording on commission, 

commercial availability was a tough one on that 

as well.

So, I hate to say we're kicking the can 

down the road but we are. Or that's my opinion. 

My humble opinion. And everybody can argue 

against me. Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Thanks, Steve. I just was 

going to just say thanks to the Crops Subcommittee 

for your perseverance on this. And to the rest 

of the stakeholders really for sticking with the 
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Board and the Committee as they took their time 

to get something that is workable for now, right.

And I know that certifiers were just 

grateful for the process to be able to, that the 

Board and the program went through to continue to 

allow these while we were able to get something 

that would be workable.

So I just wanted to sort of acknowledge 

your all's work on the Committee to stick with it. 

And also acknowledge the stakeholders as well for 

hanging, hanging with us and providing such great 

feedback so that we could get something that will 

be implementable and enforceable.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Kyla. And in the 

cover sheet we send to the program I'm certainly 

going to note some of these, assuming it passes, 

let's just start with that, assumes it passes, in 

the cover sheet I'll certainly note some of these 

concerns that were given to us on this go around. 

As well as some of the listing issues.

But I this, you know, Harriet Behar 

started this, I want to give her credit. And 
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unfortunately the program allowed the use of these 

pots while were deciding. I think that was, it 

really took the time pressure off us to try and 

get it right versus trying to just get something 

through to help these small growers.

But I, boy, this is one where I have 

to say, as on many things, the stakeholders really, 

I appreciate their thoughts in looking at this from 

different angles and how it might be used in ways 

we didn't intend, et cetera, et cetera. And the 

stakeholder input on the final product really 

shows.

And I think, I just want to thank them 

for all their thoughts of things we didn't think 

about. That really, it does show this amazing 

process.

Amy, I probably cut you off, on another 

comment you wanted to make. Do you have more you 

wanted to say?

MS. BRUCH: Yes, I had a very different 

question. No, completely find that Kyla jumped 

in there.
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One other question. This was just 

maybe for clarification as well. There was a 

commenter, actually, it was from the certifying 

group, and had concerns and questions about 

annotating this in the terms defined list, the 

205.2.

Since this specifically is more of a 

category and not a generic substance, like most 

of the listing of 205.2 has. I think overall it 

seems like there is consensus that adding it to 

205.601 was fine, it was just adding this broad 

based category to the terms defined list could 

generate confusion from a certifier perspective. 

So I just wanted to open that up for additional 

comments as well.

MR. ELA: Yes. Anytime any other 

Board Member wants to jump in on these, I certainly 

do not need to be the only responder.

I think the thought in talking with the 

program, as we do in the listing under 205.601 is 

paper based crop planting aids. That's the 

listing, but then we needed to define what paper 
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based crop planting aids are, and without that 

definition it's wide open.

So, we could try and put it all in the 

one listing, but for future use, having that 

definition to respond to seemed like a good way 

to go.

In terms of exactly where these things 

are, I mean, the program is really in charge of 

writing the regulatory language. The human 

capital things where some of the people said that 

helping the NRC with regulatory language would be 

very useful.

Ultimately the program has that 

jurisdiction, so some of these, where they go 

issues, I think can pretty easily be resolved. 

Or will either be kept or changed by the program 

in terms of how it makes sense in the regulations.

I don't know if that answers your 

question, but I would say the exact numbers that 

we're referring to, we're just trying to give, be 

fairly specific, but it's not, those aren't written 

in stone.
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MS. BRUCH: Okay. That helps 

providing further context. And, Kyla, are you 

jumping in to add to that? Okay.

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I was just going to 

say that there is some precedent for this type of 

framework with the definition, as well as a 

placement. So, biodegradable, biobased mulch 

films are the best agreeable since there's 

problematic.

But anyway, it exists as an example for 

placing a definition of a broader, sort of 

category, of item in the terms defined as well as 

the placement on the national list. And just feel 

like certifiers are familiar with that.

And I would just say that the Accredited 

Certifiers Association does have a continuous 

working group regarding materials and so I do think 

that if there is some questions or things along 

those lines that that work, or that group could 

take up getting collectively aligned with their 
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questions or interpretations of that.

MR. ELA: All right. I am not seeing 

any further questions. I know we need to move on.

So there's, and, Rick, I'll just jump 

in here. So there is a motion that has come out 

of Subcommittee. I realized yesterday when I 

called for a motion and a second on the floor that 

those were already done by Subcommittee, and we 

use those motion and seconds for the Board vote 

as they come out of Subcommittee.

So there is a motion to add the 205.2, 

terms defined, paper based crop planting aid, a 

material that is comprised of at least 60 percent 

cellulose based fiber by weight, including, but 

not limited to, pots, seed tape and colors that 

are placed in or on the soil and later incorporated 

into the soil, excluding biodegradable mulch film. 

Up to 40 percent of the ingredients can be 

nonsynthetic.

Other permitted synthetic ingredients 

at 205.601(j) or synthetic strengthening fibers, 

adhesives or resins, contains none or less than 
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80 percent biobased content as verified by a 

qualified third-party assessment. With some 

details on that. And added nutrients must comply 

with 205.105, 205.203 and 205.206.

And I apologize to our ASL interpreter 

for going really quickly through that, but they 

are listed on the website and on the slide in front 

of us.

So the motion was by myself, Steve, 

seconded by Rick. And we will --

MS. JEFFERY: Steve, do we need to vote 

on the motion about synthetic first?

MR. ELA: Did I miss that? Yes, we do. 

Let's go ahead, since I made the motion, let's 

go ahead and vote on this one.

And actually, Michelle, you've got a 

comment on that?

MS. ARSENAULT: I was going to say the 

same thing that Mindee did. Thank you, Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Michelle.

MR. TURNER: Mindee, procedurally, 

does the first one have to happen first for us to 
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have this vote? Do you know?

MR. ELA: I don't think so. I don't 

think there is a prescribed order. So since we've 

already put this motion on the floor, let's go ahead 

and vote on it and then we can come back.

So, we are starting --

MS. JEFFERY: Amy.

MR. ELA: Amy, okay. So, Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?
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MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Chair votes yes. Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: We are 14-0, the motion 

passes.

MR. ELA: Okay.

MS. JEFFERY: No abstentions or 

recusals or absences.

MR. ELA: Okay. Moving on to the 

classification motion. The motion is to 

classified paper based crop planting aids as a 

synthetic substance.

The motion was made by myself, Steve, 
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seconded by Jerry. We will start the vote with 

Brian this time. So, Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes. Yes.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Okay, Jerry is yes. 

Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: And Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: And Chair votes yes. 

Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Again, we are 14-0. No 

abstentions or recusals or absences. The motion 

passes.

MR. ELA: All right. Finally, there 

is a motion to add 205.601(p), production aids. 

Paper based crop planting aids, as defined in 

205.2, virgin or recycled paper without glossy 

paper or colored inks.

We will start the voting with Jerry.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Sue? Sue, you're on mute.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. Sorry.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: And, Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Chair votes yes. Did I get 
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everybody on that one, Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: You did.

MR. ELA: Okay.

MS. JEFFERY: 14-0. Again, no 

abstentions, recusals or absences. The motion 

passes.

MR. ELA: All right. Thank you very 

much, everybody. And I'll turn it back to you, 

Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Thank you, 

Steve. And again, this, the paper planting aids 

is always reminding me of one of those zombie movies 

where it keeps coming back from the dead, but I've 

guess you've put a wooden stake through its heart. 

At least this time. It will be back, obviously.

Anyhow, we'll go on to Asa, and Asa is 

going to discuss the proposal for biodegradable, 

biobased mulch film annotation change. So with 

that, Asa, you have the floor.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay, thank you. This 

is going to be a hard one. I think there is a lot 

of different views on this. And there is arguments 
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for and against that are all valid.

So the issue here is the use of 

biodegradable films. I think it's important to 

use the word plastic here, although some people 

don't like that. Just because we're talking about 

plastic films.

Whether they're 100 percent biobased 

or whether they contain petroleum or other derived 

material. We're talking about plastic films.

And plastic, of course, can be made from 

petroleum carbon sources but also biologically 

based carbon sources as well. And it doesn't mean, 

they're biobased doesn't mean they're less toxic 

or less concerning in terms of environmental 

impact.

So, just to kind of frame the issue 

here. We have a current listing for biodegradable 

mulch films. And there is, you know, two key 

requirements are, one, that they not be produced 

with excluded methods, and two, that they be 100 

percent biobased.

And there has been, I guess, tremendous 
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concern in many ways about the increase in use of 

traditional polyethylene films and other materials 

used in organic production. And there is a desire 

among many to have a biodegradable product.

And because there are no biodegradable 

films available that are 100 percent biobased, 

there has been growing support for some alternative 

that allows for kind of a mix of biobased. And 

by biobased we mean plant based, currently grown, 

plant based sources.

Carbon sources for the polymer content 

of the films versus kind of ancient plant based 

sources based on petroleum. And of course I think 

there is a real kind of philosophical concerns 

about the use of petroleum derived materials and 

fossil fuels to produce aids and inputs for organic 

agriculture.

There is a lot of support for a change 

to the annotation to allow some more flexibility 

on the 100 percent biobased requirement. I've 

gone through the comments, I may have missed some, 

but Oregon Tilth, OWPC, MOSA, Pennsylvania 
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Certified Organic Farmers, some certifiers like 

QCS, Vermont Organic Farmers, NOFA, large scale 

groups like Driscoll.

There's a lot of support across many 

sectors of organic to have some more flexibility 

and more, I think the desire for a biodegradable 

component.

Let's see, I have my notes here. I can 

get a slightly larger image here so I can read.

So, I think there is some real benefits 

to having an alternative to standard plastic. And 

one of the issues for me in developing in this, 

and in discussions with people is, is it reasonable 

to look at this as an alternative to plastic films 

and is that, is it reasonable to do kind of a 

comparative risk assessment for the, this material 

against standard plastic films.

And in a way I, I think actually the 

answer to that is yes, but I think that's debatable. 

And also, it's hard to know, if we're doing a real 

risk assessment we need standards. And in some 

ways I feel like we're kind of dealing a little 
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bit with kind of a gut feeling here.

But just to read some comments that have 

come up in public comment. I hate using plastic 

mulch so much but I have to think of every benefit 

it provides to justify using it. I need to plastic 

for some crops but would love to switch to 

biodegradable.

We use to take our used plastic mulch 

to the recycling area next to the landfill, but 

it was all sent to China and now they won't take 

it anymore, now it just goes right into the dump. 

The person who creates a truly biodegradable 

plastic mulch should get the Noble Prize.

Plastic, here is another comment of 

plastic film. It is absolutely necessary for 

organic Ag right now. Take it away and prices soar 

and yields plummet.

Northwest growers can be competitive 

with California growers if they use plastic mulch 

because harvest is six weeks earlier. Paper 

mulches will biodegrade but they never give the 

soil heat that you need to get crops to market early 
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for a good price.

Here is a farmer from Pennsylvania. 

I would love to be able to use this product on my 

organic operation, it would replace the plastic 

that we use that we put in the dumpster and send 

to the landfill. We would prefer not to use so 

much plastic that we have to send to the landfill.

So, there is a lot of depth of support 

for access to a biodegradable period. And there 

is a lot of depth of support for considering 

something that's less than 100 percent biobased.

There is also support for the idea of 

kind of an incremental approach. So we made kind 

of a aspirational change to allow potentially 20 

percent non-biobased and 80 percent biobased.

One of the questions out there was how 

did we come to that. And in some ways that's 

anecdotal. As far as I know right now there are 

not products out there that are 80 percent biobased 

and 20 percent petroleum based. And so, in some 

ways this change is aspirational. As the first 

listing was aspirational.
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I know some really reject to the current 

listing because we have something on the list that 

doesn't exist in terms of product.

But that, again, this, sorry, I'm 

getting a little tangled up in words here. Got 

all these thoughts flying around.

Let's go back to the 80 percent. 

Again, it's anecdotal. In some ways though we kind 

of borrowed that a little bit from the paper pot 

rule, or the paper production aid rule, where we 

required an 80 percent biobased and suddenly there 

is a certain logic to extent that to other 

materials.

And then some manufacturers have said 

they could potentially achieve an 80 percent 

biobased product. So we're not quite there yet. 

And maybe that's a problem if we have something 

that still is aspirational.

Other concerns about the language so 

far is that, I don't think we got some of the wording 

right and I don't think we got the notion of 

continuous improvement right. So I think there 
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is some, actually some work to still do on the 

language that's important.

And there has been some suggestions in 

comments on improvements and language, many of 

which I like. And I think perhaps we need more 

discussion on that.

And this might be something we consider 

sending back to the committee to try to get the 

wording quite right.

Other concerns in terms of language 

that verification is a challenge that, with the 

current language we also have too many levels that 

could require verification.

There was suggestion too that we look 

more carefully at the biopreferred products. And 

I have looked at those.

In some cases there could be issues 

there with having them produced by excluded 

methods, but I think that's, perhaps we need to 

look at that a little more carefully.

If you look at the write-up there is, 

right into the write-up we've included things that 
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can make arguments for and make arguments for 

against this product. And I appreciate all those 

who really feel that this material is not ready 

for prime time.

And that we need more research on the 

potential real world degradation process and the 

concern that we're going to be introducing a new 

source of microplastics directly into the soil. 

And this of course would be a petroleum based 

material. And I think there is kind of an 

objection to that.

I've made the point several times 

though that we already allow petroleum materials 

to be added directly to agricultural environments. 

And that's especially with the use of oil based 

mineral oils, with horticultural oils.

In that case we're allowing a component 

of petroleum to be used as a pest control. And 

God forbid if we try to take that off the list, 

it's really an essential tool.

In California, overall use both 

conventional and nonconventional. It's actually 
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one of the most heavily used pesticides in the 

state. And it's also heavily used in the organic 

sector.

So, we already do have the precedent. 

We're allowing petroleum products to go into the 

soil, into agricultural environments. And I think 

we have to think about that.

There is, was comment that this is kind 

of undoing the work of 2012 when the biobased 

standard was, I believe, first made. But I guess, 

and this gets back a comment I made yesterday about 

carrageenan and this idea of stare decisis relying 

on precedent and when do we make a change on the 

national list or regulation.

I don't think it should just be at the 

whim of a changing bore. Although in this case 

I feel like we're nine years later and 

circumstances have changed.

And one of those is that plastic use 

in agriculture has exploded. In organic 

agriculture. And I think that is a, something we 

should all be thinking about.
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When we talk about container growing, 

I've said this before and I'm sure some people might 

object to this, but I really feel like infecting 

some of the parties to the lawsuit, again, 

hydroponics are actually using container growing 

methods by, I like the term that came up in public 

comment, wrapping the soil in plastic.

And all those acres and acres of 

plastic, from organic agriculture, are going into 

a landfill. And they're also breaking down. In 

many cases, when plastics are removed there can 

be residues left in the soil.

And now here I'm talking about the 

polyethylene films. And there's also probably 

microplastics that are leeching from those 

materials and getting into the soil.

So, de facto, we're already allowing 

plastic material to be used in organic. And it's 

also going into the soil.

So, when we talk about plastic culture 

I think plastic culture is both in, potentially

a container setting, but also in a soil setting. 
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So the notion of plastic culture is much broader 

than just containers.

In fact, the term actually comes from, 

for example, our strawberry production systems 

where we're basically mounding the soil into 

plastic covered rows.

Let's see, I have a few more comments. 

So, I think actually that's the kind of the end 

of my comments. And again, just to emphasize. 

As laid out in the proposal, we cover both the range 

of reasons to allow this and a range of reasons 

not to allow this.

There is a depth of support for this 

material in many sectors and it's not simply, it's 

not like a, this is not a corporate initiative to 

change organic production, I think there is just 

real challenges.

Again, to summarize too the concerns 

about the current language that we haven't got it 

right, and I think we should, as a Board, consider 

sending it back to the Subcommittee to improve that 

language and then consider that.
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But I'm more interested first in having 

kind of a discussion on the substance before we 

think about what we might do about the language 

and what further discussion would be necessary.

MR. GREENWOOD: Thanks, Asa. Steve?

MR. ELA: Yes. Just getting myself 

unmuted here. Go ahead, Brian, and then Logan.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes. Thanks, Asa, for 

going through an incredible amount of work on this 

and putting something, I think, very useful 

together.

I'm really conflicted on this. I can 

see, like Asa, I can see really both sides, really 

strong arguments. But I think what is tipping me 

in favor of this right now is that two different 

research groups testified that these mulches, the 

ones that were commercially available now, some 

of them were 100 percent biodegradable in spite 

of the fact that they have a significant synthetic 

components.

They said, and I asked them 

specifically, and they said it was 100 percent 
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biodegradable. So that really makes a big 

difference for me.

And the other thing I wanted to mention 

was, that over the years I've spoken to several 

small scale vegetable growers who said that they 

were not organic specifically because they 

couldn't use a biodegradable mulch and they refused 

to use a polyethylene plastic mulch. And that's 

a significant number of folks who feel that way. 

So those are my thoughts.

MR. ELA: Logan.

MS. PETREY: Hi. Yes, thank you. 

Thank you, Asa. Just a comment also.

You know, you mentioned a lot of people 

talking about taking the plastic to the landfills 

and that gives a bad picture. And then I think 

you mentioned later on, there are some residues 

left.

And I actually grew up on a plastic 

farm, it was conventional, and had to rip up plastic 

and it does not come up like a bed sheet, it just 

comes a part after a long season. The weather will 
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tear it. And you live with that. And it's in the 

field a lot.

And I grow some crops that are for 

processing, and mechanically harvested, and that 

would be a foreign material. And so I can see where 

using the plastics, or your traditional plastics, 

can be limiting as far as crop rotation and getting, 

I don't know, full utilization out of a crop 

program.

And so, absolutely in favor. I'm 

excited. I've actually seen the biodegradable 

mulches before, excited. I mean, it was years ago 

on a conventional farm and I was impressed with 

how fast they went away.

And I'm sure growers will have to work 

around that. They have to make sure it lasts the 

length of their crop. But it was exciting to see. 

It was a very clean field from what I was used 

to and what I grew up on.

So excited about it. Thank you, Asa, 

for all the work you did.

MR. ELA: Okay. Next we have Wood.
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MR. TURNER: Great job, Asa. This one 

is like (audio interference) always mark my first 

stretch here on the Board.

I'm going to go somewhere that you, 

because you went there and I am curious because 

I just want to have you insights on how you would 

reconcile, how you reconcile kind of these parallel 

paths, if I dare say it, I mean, paper based 

planting aids and biodegradable mulch and the very 

real reality that paper pots also are going to have 

similar components to the paper pots, as approved, 

that will be contributing similar synthetics, if 

you will, to the soil in the same way that this 

proposal would, this annotation would do in the 

case of mulches.

And I'm just curious, how you reconcile 

the feedback we've heard from the community on 

those two different, those two different materials 

and sort of what that does in your brain if it's, 

are we, should we be thinking about these a little 

bit more in the same context or are they 

fundamentally two different things?
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I don't mean to put you on the spot, 

but I just would really benefit from your, the way 

you are reconciling this in your brain.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. No, I think that's 

a really good point. I mean, I think part of me 

feels like, if you support the paper pots rule as 

it's written, you kind of have to support this. 

Even though we're talking about different scale.

You know, paper pots are a relatively 

small amount of material on a small number of farms 

in a small area within the farms, whereas here we're 

talking about potentially thousands of acres of 

material.

The paper pot rule does leave open right 

now the 20 percent that's nonbiobased, could 

potentially be like nylon fibers, which are not 

biodegradable.

And once different here with the 

biodegradable mulches is that they have been 

designed that bacteria can munch on them and derive 

energy and a carbon source from them and that they 

should decompose. So this actually is a material 
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that is potentially less persistent and impactful 

than that 20 percent in the paper pots.

So, I didn't want to actually get into 

that, too much discussion about the paper pots 

because --

MR. TURNER: Sorry about that.

MR. BRADMAN: -- Steve, no. Well, 

Steve touched on that. And also, there is a real 

need in the community for this material in terms 

of labor and how, viability. And I'm kind of 

hearing the same message for this as well.

So it is hard to reconcile at moment. 

One thing also to touch on, which I agree with, 

there is comments, very thoughtful comments in the 

public comment about, do we want these plastic 

mulches at all.

I agree that mulching with plants and 

sawdust and other materials is, you know, that's 

what I do in my garden, which is obviously not an 

economic venture, but the notion of using plastic 

is not something I'm comfortable with. Whether 

it's biologically degradable or not.
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But the reality is, is that plastic has 

become entrenched in organic. And it seems to me 

this product could be an alternative. And I hope 

that they are really a hundred percent 

biodegradable and that we're not introducing a new 

source of microplastics into the environment.

But then again, I do also do this 

comparative risk assessment that we're already 

doing that. So given that we're already doing it, 

that helps to validate this choice for me.

MR. ELA: Next we have Kyla, then Amy, 

then Carolyn.

MS. SMITH: Thanks, Asa. As a 

certifier I think that I tend to hone in on how 

are we going to enforce this, right, and that words 

really matter. I'll say that like a bazillion 

times in my tenure on the Board, I'm sure.

And so, just in regards to the terms 

I know that a commenter was like talking about that 

so I just wanted to clarify that. And it's really 

just the consistency of how the terms are being 

used.
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So right now the term in 205.2 is 

biodegradable, biobased mulch film. And then we 

start to introduce a new term with the term plastic 

in there.

And it's not because plastic is in 

there, it's just because it's now used 

inconsistently throughout the definition. And 

then in the listing.

So my urge would be just to like pick 

a term and go with it. So if we, as a Board, want 

to replace biodegradable, biobased mulch film with 

biodegradable plastic mulch film, or whatever the 

term is, great. But then we just need to use that 

consistently throughout the thing, we just can't 

flip back and forth. One thing.

Second thing that I picked up on from 

like certifier comments, mostly about the 

percentage, is the aspirational approach. And I 

do understand trying to align that with the paper 

based planting aids.

And so I understand like the, yes, the 

consistency there with the 80 percent and know that 
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it's aspirational. I will say that when I was 

looking at like the background information and all 

the resources that we have to look at, that I have 

noticed an uptick in that percentage, right?

So in the, I think it was like the 2016 

TR they were talking about like a ten to 20 percent 

biobased, and now in some of the 2020 documents 

I saw 60 percent. Or 20 to 50 percent. So I do 

think that there is that increase.

But what several, at least certifier 

commenters were commenting on, is that it's still 

aspirational and will not be something that we can 

review products to and approve products to right 

now, which is what farmers are asking for. So we 

don't know when that 80 percent will be able to 

have a viable product on the market.

And so, there was just several things 

I saw about either put a percentage in the, that 

could be achievable with a product in the market 

today or delist it.

And then my last comment is just around 

that term, available. And again, just a call to 
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there is a term already defined about commercial 

availability and just a clarification of terms if 

that is what we're on about, making sure that we 

stick to the terms that, as they are defined. Or 

if that's not what we're on about, just making it 

clear so that certifiers are able to enforce the 

annotation.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I appreciate all 

those comments. And I think there is definitely 

some problems with the language here, and that 

might need some more fine tuning in the 

Subcommittee. I definitely see the complexity 

here and noted many of those comments too.

And in terms of the issue of 80 percent 

versus allowing current used materials, honestly 

I took my queue there from the paper pot discussion 

and felt like, well, we're reviewing this material 

and we kind of came up with a base that seemed 

acceptable to the Subcommittee.

And as we've seen now, unanimously to 

the Board, that that was kind of the threshold. 

So that might leave that frustration out there 
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that we're kind of notching it down a little bit 

but still not allowing the product to be used.

But I guess, as you noted, there has 

been an increase in the biobased content. And 

this, I guess, since it's a higher threshold, but 

I understand it's potentially achievable.

But I guess I wouldn't necessarily want 

someone to notch it down to 50 percent five years 

from now at some point without first there being 

a real attempt to increase the content of the 

product.

And of course we want 100 percent 

biobased project, or a 100 percent biobased project 

that may have the same microplastic and other 

concerns. But that's more acceptable, I think, 

to us as a community because of the idea of a 

petroleum derived carbon source.

But I definitely agree there is 

problems here with the language and how to actually 

implement this.

MR. ELA: Okay. We have Amy, then 

Carolyn.
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MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thanks, Steve. 

Asa, thank you so much for kind of laying out this 

situation in its entirety. The current situation, 

the PE film, as you know, it is definitely far from 

ideal.

But I guess my comment is, is the 

alternative to PE film, is it always just building 

a better film or is it addressing, in the 50,000 

foot view, how do we really improve this entire 

situation. So that, to me, can hopefully maybe 

be addressed through the research side of things.

But the volume of the amount of plastic 

that's being used, to me, is pretty concerning. 

And that's how I can differentiate, in my head, 

our last vote to this subject matter.

And the multi-use piece, consecutive 

year after year after year, I think needs to be 

studied. It's one thing to say, in two years they 

don't have any remaining plastic, but I'm concern, 

what does it look like after you have based loaded 

a system several years consecutively, what does 

this look like.
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So I personally think more research 

needs to be done. I mean, most of the microbial 

activity is in that top four inches of soil. I 

think 95 percent of it is.

So if you want these plastics to 

degrade, they're going to have to be in the top 

four inches. So if you have that year after year 

after year, I'm just really concerned that there 

is going to be a buildup.

So my thoughts are I think a lot more 

research needs to be done so we get this right and 

we do make this annotation change.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. And I totally see 

that. I think a lot of the comments that this is 

not ready for prime time reflect that. What 

information we have and what decisions get made 

where we have incomplete information is always a 

challenge.

One thing, I mean, we can look at the 

rule, if we're talking about at least 90 percent 

biodegradation in less than two years, you could 

actually, it wouldn't be too hard to actually 
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develop a little mathematical model using a pretty 

simple decay rate equations.

And we can actually try to model plastic 

buildup in different soil types. That actually 

would be an interesting effort. But that could 

be something to do just to, to at least inform some 

discussion about that.

MS. BRUCH: Yes. I think that's a good 

idea. Different soil types, different 

environments, climates, et cetera. So thank you, 

Asa, I appreciate it.

MR. ELA: We have next up Carolyn.

DR. DIMITRI: Asa, I really appreciate 

your thorough discussion of the pros and cons of 

this because it is really complicated.

I guess my question comes from my 

training as an economist. It's like, what 

actually triggers farmers to undertake specific 

behaviors.

So, do we really have any understanding 

that farmers using plastic now are actually going 

to switch to this, which you are kind of arguing 
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is a better system, or is this actually going to 

just like encourage people who are using something 

else to start using this so that you are adding, 

overall, more plastics to the soil in an aggregate?

So, I mean, I think in addition to 

wanting to better understand the science for what 

happens in the soil over the long term from this 

product, I guess I would also like to understand 

who this will change farming practices.

Does that mean we're going to like 

prohibit plastic, sheets of plastic, from being 

put on farms? So, just a different thing to think 

about.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, I think that's a 

really good point. And do I think this is a better 

system then polyethylene film, I don't know.

Honestly, I could vote either way on 

this. Yes or no. Or abstain. It's a hard issue.

I don't think it's actually worse than 

polyethylene, so that might be kind of a low bar. 

I think it might be better if you look at the 

support for it in the community across broad 
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sectors, there is support for it.

And in the absence of this we also will 

probably see continuing growth and use of 

polyethylene films. I mean, honestly if I were 

voting about polyethylene films right now, I might 

vote no in terms of re-listing it. And that would 

be a huge disruption to organic agriculture.

I wish plastics were not in use and that 

we had natural materials and, that we weren't using 

plasticized material. I think, honestly, I think 

it's kind of a stain, a little bit, on organic.

When it's used across all sectors, big 

and small, corporate and not corporate, real 

organic and not real organic. ROP, you know, it's 

everywhere.

So yes, I guess there's a real 

philosophical issues with this one.

MR. TURNER: Your muted, Steve. I 

guess you're calling on me.

MR. ELA: Sorry, Wood. I'm just going 

to do a time check as well. But let's go to Wood, 

Kyla and Carolyn and see if we can finish it up.
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MR. TURNER: Sorry for the additional 

question but I just wanted to reiterate the point 

that I made in the paper pot discussion that I 

fundamentally believe that organics should be a 

real contributor to a circular economy, a more 

circular economy. And for what it's worth, I just 

want to reiterate that point because I do think 

that's relevant here.

Asa, it occurs to me in listening to 

this conversation, as we talk about the films and 

the plastics in general, and in my role as the chair 

of the materials subcommittee, you know, we have 

pretty tightly defined the research priority 

related to this. As it currently reads, related 

to the examination of decomposition rates, the 

effects of resides on soil biologies and the 

factors that affect the breakdown of biodegradable 

biobased mulch film, as a research priority that 

we've articulated.

You know, it occurs to me that what 

we're really talking about here, we actually, it 

shouldn't be that narrow. And if I'm hearing the 
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NEPA presentation and the fact that we shouldn't 

keep it narrow, frankly we need to understand more 

clearly the lifecycle impacts of plastics on soil 

clearly to the end.

Like, it shouldn't be narrow around 

biobased mulch film it should be about PE film. 

It should be about the long-term implications if 

you do remove plastic PE film from fields and put 

it in the landfill.

I mean, what are the true lifecycle 

implications of that choice. And it does it go 

back to a more philosophical perspective that I 

share with you, Asa, where we should have less 

plastics in agriculture, or is it this is a true 

lifecycle view of sort of the implications are of 

soil, or our material handling and waste management 

system and so on and so forth.

So I'm going to argue that from a 

research and priorities perspective that we 

consider, through this next cycle, before we vote 

on it in the fall, expanding the view of what we're 

really researching there, what we're really asking 
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for in the way of research to go well beyond 

biobased mulch film because it's a much broader 

issue.

MR. BRADMAN: I think that's a great 

suggestion, and also kind of reflects your idea 

of an organic as a systems approach. And we have 

to think of the system, the whole system, and I 

think that's a great suggestion.

MR. ELA: All right. We've got Kyla 

and the Mindee. I know, Carolyn, you had your hand 

up so let me know if you just want to say it in 

the chat, whether you want to ask a question or 

not. So, Kyla.

MS. SMITH: Yes, I was just going to 

try to answer Carolyn too a little bit in that, 

more from a not sure about those that are currently 

using plastic mulch if they would make that switch. 

Probably some would, probably some wouldn't.

I do know that there has been mention 

about operations that currently choose not to go 

organic because of this one thing, so we would get 

more from those comments, I'm assuming. We get 
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more certified, or more operations that come 

certified organic.

Now that's a philosophical question I 

guess on whether or not one wants those operations 

under the tent that are using these types of 

materials that are adding more plastics into the 

soil.

So just wanted to comment that more 

operations would come in, from what I am 

understanding. But not sure about those that are 

currently using plastic mulches and whether or not 

they'd make the switch.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Mindee.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you. I'm 

emotional about this issue. And at Good Earth, 

about 15 years ago, we did a big push to try to 

educate consumers on how they could stop choosing 

plastic in the store.

And it was before everybody had a 

reusable water bottle. And we really succeeded 

at challenging people on their everyday decisions 

because that's what people want to be positive 
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contributors to climate change issues. And the 

plastic issue is really big in the minds of 

consumers.

And like, the organic saying yes to 

leaving microplastics in the soil, I can't get over 

it. And I realize that's a, you know.

And for me, if I see commenters and 

stakeholders disagreeing with me wholeheartedly 

on something, than I can get over my fundamentalism 

in a way. And I don't see that yet on this for 

me when I'm reading the comments. There is lots 

of different trajectories.

And trust me, I really don't like 

disagreeing with Asa. I love how your mind works 

and I love the level at which you pursue all the 

angles, and so thank you so much for how hard you're 

working on this issue.

And I think for me, I could be 

comfortable sending it back to subcommittee and 

working on some of the issues that the stakeholders 

are pointing out. And then if more consensus and 

more comfort level comes forth from the stakeholder 
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community than I can compromise on my 

fundamentalism around this issue, but I'm not there 

yet in that sense.

And I feel like part of the reason why 

that's true for me is that looking at the ethos 

of organic and everything that we've done to make 

this food system possible, and the scale at which 

we've succeeded, for me means that I don't have 

to compromise more towards industrialization in 

organic, that we can slow our progress on 

technological solutions, if we can slow them.

Because we're succeeding at industrial 

scale. We're a $55 billion industry that came from 

a movement of people by, for and about the soil.

And so, when I think about balancing 

that, for me this is a moment where I want to hold 

on and like really get it right and really get 

consensus because the plastic, us saying, yes, 

let's leave microplastics in the soil just hurts 

me in a way I can't get over.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes, and I totally 

appreciate that. For me it's also just the idea 
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of a petroleum product, but of course we already 

do that.

But again, there is also this kind of 

comparative risk assessment idea. You're 

discouraging people from using plastics in the 

store, but plastics in organic production, 

soil-based organic production, we don't even have 

to go there in terms of containers, is exploding 

and increasing.

I mean, just look at the strawberry 

industry in California, organic strawberries. 

Other berries, melons. I've seen it with 

tomatoes.

So, the plastic use is increasing. 

From my understanding this is increasing in the 

organic sector. So maybe it's not showing up at 

the supermarket but it's out there.

And those are introducing 

microplastics into the soil, but more generally 

into the environment. So that's already been 

happening. That industrialization is already 

there.
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So this, I think potentially, the 

question that got raised earlier, is this a better 

system. And if it fully decomposes, we're not 

introducing microplastics into the soil.

Having said all that, everything you 

said I share too. And those feelings are 

definitely, you know, I hold them as well.

MS. JEFFERY: Yes, I know you do. 

Thank you. I appreciate it.

And I think part of the reasons why I'm 

more comfortable staying where I'm at is you see 

at the store level customers are trying to choose 

it every time and I think what, is there a leverage 

point at which we help farmers in a different way 

succeed at not adding more plastic. And I don't 

know the answer to that.

I definitely, that's an imaginary realm 

in some ways in my mind. But I do feel like there 

is some way in which I'd rather be creative in 

thinking along those lines. And compromise here, 

when, if the community is 100 percent behind it. 

Or way more behind it.
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But when I'm reading the public 

comments, particularly, I think there is some more 

things to work out. So that's why I think, for 

me, I'd be more comfortable sending this back to 

subcommittee than anything else at this point.

MR. BRADMAN: Yes. I totally get that 

and agree in many ways. Including that maybe we 

need more discussion at the subcommittee.

MR. ELA: So, this is so important I 

let it run long. And we've got Carolyn and Nate, 

so let's go to them and wrap it up and we'll decide 

what we want to do. So, Carolyn.

DR. DIMITRI: Okay, I can be fast here. 

I guess just following Mindee's line of argument.

I think another important research 

question is to try to understand what are the 

implications for overall plastic usage by farmers 

if this particular product was allowed?

Which would mean, not a science-based 

research but more of a social science-based 

research. Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. And, Nate, did 
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you have something?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes, just a quick 

note. I think I really, I hear Mindee loud and 

clear that this idea, I think of Javier Zamora, 

who is a strawberry farmer in California, 

innovating clamshells with paper containers.

And I think that there is a lot of me 

that says everyone has said we can't do certain 

production technics in organic and we've just 

figured it out. And so, I think sending it back 

to Subcommittee really kind of resonates with me 

because I think this is important enough.

Enough of a potential kudos to organic 

consumers that we are not only addressing 

pesticides but we're addressing plastic in 

agriculture as well. In a more obtainable way.

So I would be supportive in sending it 

back to Subcommittee as well.

MR. ELA: Yes. And I have a quick 

comment myself.

I was the descending vote out of 

Subcommittee, not because I disagree with Asa at 
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all, in fact, I, this is a complete fence issue 

for me.

I am really against polyethylene mulch. 

It drives me crazy, just like other people said.

And I really struggle with what the next 

step is. I am not convinced, at this point, that 

biodegradable mulches are truly biodegradable in 

some systems.

And that's my hang up of, 

theoretically, certifiers can say polyethylene 

mulch has to be removed. Until they see evidence 

of it, they can write a noncompliance. Whereas 

with biodegradable mulch they won't be able to, 

if they see fragments, it's pretty hard to write 

a noncompliance on that one.

So, I struggle. Asa, I'm so glad you 

decided to bring a proposal to this meeting because 

I think it really, proposals frame things much 

better than discussion documents.

So I know you felt adamant about that. 

And I'm glad you did. I think it really helps 

people respond to things and try and narrow it down.
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I think, and, Mindee, I see you have 

your hand up but I am going to go ahead and move 

forward, with my apologies, just because we are 

over time at this point.

But I think we'll start off with a, 

Mindee, I'm going to go back to you just because 

I want to recognize everybody on this thing but 

can you --

MS. JEFFERY: No, I was just going to 

make the motion that we go back to Subcommittee.

MR. ELA: Okay. I kind of realized 

that you might be doing that and I was going to 

suggest the motion.

So there is a motion to go back to 

Subcommittee. Is there a --

MR. POWELL-PALM: I would second. 

Nate.

MR. BRADMAN: I'll second it too.

(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Well, Nate got in there first 

so motion by Mindee, second by Nate. We will go 

to a vote on this. And I believe we start with 
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Carolyn, is that correct, Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: That's correct.

MR. ELA: Okay. Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Back to Subcommittee.

MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, back to 

Subcommittee. It's just not ready for --

MR. ELA: Yes.

MR. GREENWOOD: -- for enough reasons.

MR. ELA: And I'll just be clear that 

a vote yes is for going back to Subcommittee --

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: -- just so people know. So, 

Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes. Echoing the 

thoughts of other Board Members, yes.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Chair votes yes. Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: 14-0. No abstentions, 

recusals or absences.

MR. ELA: Great.

MS. JEFFERY: We're going back to 

Subcommittee.

MR. ELA: Asa, thank you so much.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you, Asa.
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MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: I think the whole Board 

echoes your confliction on this and the difficulty 

of it, and thank you for being willing to take it 

on. You've taken on some tough issues.

And hopefully this discussion will give 

you some, I don't know if it clouds the water or 

makes it clear, but it's certainly good to hear 

everybody's thoughts, and hear stakeholders' 

thoughts.

So with that I am going to turn it back 

to Rick. So, Risk, I think we're up for sunsets.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, we are. So the 

first sunset is copper sulfate and Jerry will be 

presenting it. And that's reference 

205.601(a)(3) copper sulfate for uses in algicide 

and aquatic rice systems. It's limited to one 

application per field during any 24 month period.

Application rates are limited to those, 

which do not increase baseline soil test values 

for copper over a time frame agreed upon by the 

producer and the accredited certifying agent.
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And 205.601(e)(4), copper sulfate for 

use as tadpole, shrimp control in aquatic rice 

production, is limited to one application per field 

for a 24 month period.

MR. D'AMORE: Hello? Hello?

(Off record comments.)

MR. GREENWOOD: There was some 

background.

Application rates are limited to levels 

which do not increase baseline soil test values 

for copper over a time frame agreed upon by the

producer and accredited certifying agent. Okay, 

Jerry.

MR. ELA: Jerry, we aren't hearing you.

MS. SMITH: I think that that was Jerry 

who was saying hello --

MR. BRADMAN: I think it was.

MS. SMITH: -- and maybe it sounded 

like he was getting a call or something.

MR. ELA: I'll tell you what, Rick, 

since we will check back with Jerry here, let's 

go on to ozone gas and we'll circle back around.
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MR. GREENWOOD: Okay.

MR. ELA: And if we go to ozone, we'll 

assume you've read copper sulfate into the record.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, very good. 

Thanks. Okay, so ozone gas is the next sunset. 

It's mine. And that's reference 205.601(a)(5), 

ozone gas for uses in irrigation system cleaner 

only.

It's interesting. Ozone, and we've 

talked about a number of disinfectants, works by 

oxidizing plant tissues, similar to chlorine and 

other things. And it's been used for over 100 

years as an antimicrobial agent to clean irrigation 

lines.

In the comments by people with written 

comments, essentially overwhelming support, and 

also one of the reviewers mentioned, commenters, 

that the increase in their group of people that 

they certify has gone from three groups to up to 

50 now.

One of the advantages of ozone over 

chlorine is that when it degrades, it essentially 
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has no reside. It becomes oxygen.

So it's a useful group. It's used in 

municipal waters. I think the concept of ozone 

always worries people because of the increasing 

ozone in the atmosphere, but in fact, this is used 

within a closed system so it really isn't 

off-gassing.

There is a potential for injury for 

people using it, but that doesn't seem to be a 

problem because of the way it's used and the way 

it's generated onsite.

So, support, no one really had any 

comments against it. So, open that up for 

questions about ozone.

MR. ELA: Are there any questions?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes, Rick. Sorry, I 

don't know, Steve, if you saw my hand or not so 

--

MR. ELA: Go ahead.

MR. GREENWOOD: Go ahead, Kim.

MS. HUSEMAN: And it's more of a 

comment than a question. I -- reading through the 
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comments I did see that it's also used as an 

effective root sanitizer as well as in the 

irrigation lines. So I'm not sure if anyone on 

the Board can speak to the use of that or the 

effectiveness. But I did see that as a comment 

so I just wanted to make sure about that.

MR. GREENWOOD: I really can't speak 

to that. I wasn't part, I didn't see anything in 

the TR of that. I mean, it is used in a number 

of situations.

It's, I guess, a useful compound if used 

correctly. It can, you know, it's a strong 

irritant but in closed systems seems to be fairly 

effective.

MS. HUSEMAN: Right. And again, it 

was followed with, that it leaves no residue on 

food, food contact surfaces or water. So no 

negative impact to the consumer, worker, for soil 

or waste water.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MS. HUSEMAN: So, just found that very 

interesting from the group perspective. I didn't 
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think about that when listing the irrigation lines 

either, so, thank you, Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: I can't, I've heard of it used 

in irrigation lines, but I can't speak to my 

personal knowledge of it. Certainly FSMA and E. 

Coli and water and things that, I mean, we're seeing 

that ourselves.

And certainly if it were any crop where 

the water was directly applied, it might be a pretty 

important use. And might be better than, well, 

probably is better than some of the chlorine 

materials.

So that would be my two cents. I know 

it's used in dump tanks and packing sheds at times, 

so another, probably another good use for it. Go 

ahead, Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. So, is Jerry on 

the line now?

MR. ELA: I don't think we're seeing 

him yet so why don't you go on down.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. So we'll go on 
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to peracetic acid, which is Wood Turner.

That's reference 205.601(a)(6), 

peracetic acid for use in disinfecting equipment, 

seed and asexually propagated planting material. 

Also permitted in hydrogen peroxide formulations 

as allowed in 205.601(a) at concentrations of no 

more than six percent, as indicated on the 

pesticide product label.

And 205.601(i)(8) peracetic acid for 

use to control fire blight bacteria. Also 

permitted in hydrogen peroxide formulations as 

allowed in 205.601(i), at concentrations of no more 

than six percent as indicated on the pesticide 

product label. Wood.

MR. TURNER: Okay, thanks. Thanks, 

Rick. So I think the annotation on this from folks 

was pretty straightforward in terms of what we're 

talking about here in terms of the use of the 

material.

So, it tends to be a fairly 

straightforward listing. It's been a listing, 

obviously that's been, there's a lot of use of 
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peracetic acid in the community.

It's favored by many because it doesn't 

involve, it is one of the most effective materials 

in disinfectants. As a disinfectant that doesn't 

involve chlorine.

And so, it's in very widespread use. 

And I would say across the community there is just 

an extraordinary amount of support for it in sort 

of maintaining it.

And I think it falls into this continual 

conversation that we have about sanitizers and the 

need for effective rotation to sanitizers that are 

going to allow the most efficacy among the 

community.

It is worth noting, I would say, that 

with this, in my later presentation on chlorine 

materials, it's a, the use of this material in a 

crop setting is a little different than it would 

be in a facility because it's not, there is not 

as many, we're not talking about as sort of as many 

of these sort of difficult FSMA considerations 

related to kind of cleaning irrigation lines or 
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disinfecting equipment that's outdoors. So, just 

something to consider there. But I think there 

is widespread support for it.

Most of the international community 

also supports it and has listings for it that allow 

it to be used with some exceptions, I think. But 

in general, very widely used.

Does create some irritation, obviously 

if misused. But again, that's not, hasn't, by in 

large, been a concern by many folks in the 

community.

There's been much discussion in the 

past about the various forms of peracetic acid and 

kind of the source of the material and where it 

comes from. But ultimately the discussion has led 

to pretty emphatic support. In fact, overwhelming 

support for the material.

And I would say in this cycle it's just 

sort of a running list of stakeholders who continue 

to want to see it re-listed.

MR. GREENWOOD: Thank you.

MR. TURNER: That's what I have.
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MR. GREENWOOD: Questions?

MR. ELA: Are there, yes, comments, 

questions? I am not seeing any. Thanks, Wood.

Rick, I think we've got Jerry on the 

phone, so let's go back to him.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Jerry, are --

MR. ELA: I don't think you need to, 

yes, I don't think you need to read it all again.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Jerry?

MR. ELA: Well, we thought we had him 

on the phone.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Well, Steve, 

why don't we go to you then? The next sunset is 

EPA List 3, inerts of unknown toxicity. And this 

is reference 205.601(m)(2), EPA List 3 inerts of 

unknown toxicity for use only in passive pheromone 

dispensers. So, Steve.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Rick. I'm not sure 

how I ended up with all these this time. I've got 

to learn to say no or pay attention to the --

MR. GREENWOOD: But you do such a good 

job you should do it.
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(Laughter.)

MR. ELA: Thanks. The List 3, as Rick 

mentioned, the passive pheromones. And they play, 

they do play a critically important role in 

controlling pests that affect many crops.

They're widely used for lepidopteran 

pests. We use them for either mating disruption 

for, such as for codling moth, which is the worm 

in the apple, or also peach crown borer which 

really, it's the only way to control that 

organically.

Obviously List 3, List 4 is a defunct 

list. I think all the arguments that were made 

for List 4 can be made for List 3.

But I will say that these List 3 

ingredients are probably, they're not applied to 

the fruit, they are contained within the 

dispensers. Whether it be a dispenser for mating 

disruption or a capsule or a lure for trapping to 

monitor.

So they are a little less, more amounts 

are used. And they're also not directly applied 
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to the fruit, so that may make a difference to 

people.

I think the biggest thing though really 

is that they are on a defunct list, and so there 

is certainly lots of comments from stakeholders 

about, we need to do something about, in similar 

way to the List 3.

One of the interesting things about 

this is, yet again, was one that was recommended 

to be taken off the list. And there are a number, 

several stakeholders noted that really it was 

supposed to be changed by 2015. And they argued 

that this is actually an illegal, or not proper 

listing still on the list.

But I guess the biggest thing is we can 

encourage or ask or, in stronger language, I don't 

even know what the stronger language is, but these 

do have to be dealt with. And I think they can 

be dealt with, with the List 4 ingredients.

There were some questions about how, 

whether there were natural alternatives. At this 

point there are no natural alternatives. These 
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have a very, very specific use.

Another question on the percentage of 

ingredients in passive pheromones. While often 

they are relatively small, the materials we use, 

I believe it's below ten percent, there are some 

dispensers out there that use upwards of 90 percent 

of these synthetics. So it really varies on the 

dispenser used.

And then the final question, whether 

these List 3 ingredients in passive dispensers 

defuse into the environment or whether they remain 

in the dispenser. In personal conversations with 

one of the manufacturers, and then in some of the 

public comments, these materials are much heavier 

than the pheromones and so they do stay within the 

dispenser rather than diffusing out into the 

environment.

So they are very contained and 

controlled. And certainly if they were removed 

from the list they would cause significant 

disruption of the organic industry.

I think it's one of those really cool 
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organic products that started with organic growers 

because they were so disparate in terms of codling 

moth for some way of controlling it, and it's now 

very, very widely used in the conventional industry 

as well. So the organic growers piloted it and 

they have, you know, they changed the conventional 

industry as well.

I love that when organic growers can 

move research into the conventional industry.

So I think the biggest thing is that 

we move them to some other system of classifying 

them. Whether it's having them individually 

petitioned.

There are only a handful of these versus 

the List 4s where there are significant numbers. 

And a couple stakeholders think they would 

probably pass muster if they were petitioned, so 

that may be one route with these. Or just wrapping 

them up in the List 4 review.

So with that, I will quite talking and 

open it up for questions. I am not seeing any, 

Rick, so, oh wait, Asa has a question. Sorry.
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MR. BRADMAN: Just, I guess this is a 

comment, but just, I guess a little frustration 

that we haven't dealt with the List 3 and List 4 

issues and that it's still kind of on our plate 

when we could have dealt with this a long time ago. 

And we would be talking about individual 

ingredients and inerts rather than these, this 

whole issue.

So, just a shout out to, I hope we can 

solve that problem and avoid kind of the drama. 

Especially that we have with List 4.

MR. ELA: Yes. I think that that 

comment is shared widely by, well, I can't speak 

for the Board, but certainly stakeholders.

And I think Jenny said that they have 

released the notice of advance rulemaking to get 

comments of how to solve this problem. So I think 

there is movement.

But I just will reiterate to 

stakeholders that with this notice of advanced 

rulemaking I really hope that solutions are put 

into those comments and not just a concern that 
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this isn't fixed.

So, I mean, I think at this point it 

is up to the stakeholders to give ideas to the 

program about which way to go. And if you don't, 

this is going to be a, continue to be a real 

quandary.

And I see Jenny popping on. And, 

Jenny, go ahead and give you thoughts.

DR. TUCKER: I just wanted to clarify 

that I have committed to moving this forward. We 

are in the process of writing an advanced notice 

for proposed rulemaking. It has not yet been 

published.

So for folks who right now are out there 

trying to frantically search the federal register 

for this, this has not been published, it is in 

the writing phase right now.

I would go back to the theme I shared 

on Wednesday of this is, again, a process that 

worked where the community came together and was 

able to express why this is important and that 

everybody agrees that it's important in a really 
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compelling way. And that has allowed it to be on 

the list of priorities that Mae Wu shared was 

important in her welcoming remarks.

So, again, the system works for these 

priorities. And we really appreciate the work of 

the Board on this topic.

MR. ELA: Thanks for that 

clarification, Jenny, I really appreciate it. And 

I appreciate you letting us know it's not up there 

yet but it is in process. So I guess I'll just 

say to stakeholders, watch for it, comment on it, 

and give constructive ideas of how to solve this 

problem.

We've had a lot of control on this 

process through this advance rulemaking and make 

use of it. And that will be the best way to help 

the Board and use move forward through this issue.

So, Kyla has a question, and then, Rick, 

we'll go back to you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, okay.

MS. SMITH: It was more a question for 

Jenny based on her comments and what Mae Wu shared, 
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and I just wondered, based on that, am I 

understanding you correctly that it is on the 

unified agenda or not?

DR. TUCKER: I don't think it's going 

to make it onto the spring regulatory agenda, but 

I've lost the bubble on whether that's been 

released or not. So somebody can chat an answer 

to me on that.

It would definitely be on the fall 

agenda. Once we write it, it has to go through 

clearance. And so, everybody knows it's coming.

We have written what's called a work 

plan, which signals kind of the OMB universe that 

we are planning on working on this. So it is, it 

is way further in the pipeline than it was at the 

April meeting of when I promised that I would commit 

to moving this forward. We have moved it forward.

I just got an answer. It is on a list 

called the critical priorities list. The spring 

agenda has not yet been published, but it is on 

a critical priority list. But no specified, exact 

deadline.
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However, I mean, I hope that we're 

pointing to what has happened through to spring, 

since the spring, and when I said I was committed 

to moving it forward. We've made progress, even 

though it has not been published in the register 

yet.

MR. ELA: Does that answer your 

question, Kyla? Okay.

All right, Rick, we'll send it back to 

you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Yes, just one 

comment. I think the part that bothers me the most

is where we have the term inerts of unknown 

toxicity.

We have all these sunsets, and everyone 

that we go through has the toxicity and all the 

human exposures. And even though I know these are 

contained, just hate to have that title, unknown 

toxicity, in the inerts.

And we know that. You know, I'm sure 

Asa will shake his head for the List 4 groups too. 

I mean, we're so specific on some things and then 
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others we say, hey, it's unknown.

But anyhow, I think Jerry is back on 

the line. So, Jerry, can you do copper sulfate? 

And I've already read that into the record.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, sir, thank you. 

And I apologize to all of you, my California, rural 

California Wi-Fi is always weak, but it totally 

went out on me.

Well, thank you for the introduction. 

Copper sulfate is made by treating copper metal 

with high concentrated sulfuric acid.

In terms of international acceptance, 

copper sulfate is not allowed for use in organic 

rice production in Canada, Europe or Japan. The 

European chemical agency makes a point of saying 

that it is very toxic to aquatic life.

We have a little under 25 stakeholders 

commenting. Most were in favor of re-listing the 

sunset. Several were strongly opposed to 

re-listing giving lengthy and thoughtful comments.

To be fair, most of the comments for 

re-listing came from organic rice producers, which 
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it should not amaze any of us.

Further, those in opposition to 

re-listing were mostly focused on the current 

annotation and our process. Saying that 

annotation needs to be more specific regarding 

applications. And further saying that we need to 

move on with continuous improvement.

Specifically to our stakeholder 

comments, which were two. First one, what are the 

roadblocks to transitioning to dry-seeding or 

transplanting of rice seedlings into the rice 

production.

Not many responses directly to our 

questions. The one that resonates to me, 

encapsulates a few of them, education about 

alternatives to wet seeding and proper timing of 

water management.

Our second question. Are there 

variable practices that can be used to offset the 

toxic buildup of copper sulfate in the soil and 

water, i.e. crop rotation, phytoremediation with 

plants that draw out the copper from the soil?
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There was not much helpful response to

this question indicating to me that it is a heavy 

lift.

I do feel that the environment concerns 

are justified. That copper sulfate can be deadly 

to fish and other aquatic organisms at certain 

concentration.

With that said, my conclusion at this 

point may be a bit surprising, as I also do believe 

that not re-listing copper sulfate would do great 

damage to our organic rice farmers and it would 

be very hard for them to adjust practices within 

two years.

So I, at the moment, recommend 

re-listing the sunset with a hard look at the 

annotation process and a clear message that we, 

collectively as a community, need to find a better 

solution. Be it cultural practices, softer 

materials or a combination of both.

I'd like to conclude by saying, and 

emphasizing, that I, through this process, was very 

heartened by the tenor of the stakeholders. 
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Neither side appears to be entrenched in their 

position.

I believe that the naysayers want to 

be heard regarding our forward progress in 

continuous improvement. And I believe the farmers 

are already seeking more environmentally friendly 

alternatives. Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right, we have questions, 

comments, discussion from Brian, and then Nate.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, thanks, Jerry. I 

was a little surprised. The previous slide on, 

that I saw on my computer screen was a little bit 

different than what I have in my notebook. Yes, 

great. Thank you.

There is this 3(e) listing in there that 

isn't, I don't think it's in my notebook. And I'm 

just wondering, I actually have a bunch of 

questions.

The first one is about that. Is that 

sort of separate than the use in rice production 

and then --

MR. D'AMORE: No.
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MR. CALDWELL: Okay. So yes, there is 

a bunch of questions.

And another one is, since the copper 

sulfate can be used for both, as an algicide and 

a tadpole, shrimp, could that be two applications 

within 24 months rather than just one?

MR. D'AMORE: Do your questions at one 

of a time if you would please there, Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Oh, sure.

MR. D'AMORE: Yes, I'd like to answer 

that. That's part of the feedback we're getting 

from our stakeholders that questions like that have 

not been addressed.

It may conceivable give the opportunity 

for two applications in two years. And in my 

looking, they appear to be right. So we have 

addressed the issue broadly, but they would like 

more specificity to the applications.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay. Yes.

MR. D'AMORE: And to the buildup in the 

soil. But I'm sorry, go ahead.

MR. CALDWELL: Yes, that makes a lot 
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of sense. So, I'm sorry. Just, if you could go 

back to the E, insecticide listing there. 3(e).

MR. D'AMORE: The algicide?

MR. CALDWELL: Well, on 3 --

MR. D'AMORE: Okay, no I --

(Simultaneous speaking.)

MR. D'AMORE: Yes. I'm seeing that on 

this screen for the first time quite frankly. And 

I'm really not prepared to address that.

MR. CALDWELL: Okay. Yes, I'm with 

you on that one. I guess probably most of us known 

that copper sulfate was part of a bordeaux mixture, 

which is a really old miticide from way back.

But anyways, my last question is, I 

don't know so much about how rice is grown in 

California, which seems to be the main state where 

this is an issue, but I assume that the field has 

to be dry for the rice to be harvested. And is 

that process just something where the water that's 

in there just seeps into the soil or is it something 

where actually like a gate is opened and the water 

runs off?
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And the reason I ask that is, because 

if it's the second, if the gate is, if it's just 

run into a ditch, than a lot of copper sulfate could 

be just like, you know, runoff the field into some 

waterway somewhere.

MR. D'AMORE: Right. Well, you 

actually asked or indicated something. Now, there 

is significant rice production in the United 

States. And to a limited extent, in Canada with 

the high volume producers in Thailand, the 

Philippines and Italy.

To your specific question you're going 

to, I don't know. My assumption has been that it, 

there is no sluice gate, but I will not go on record 

as saying that that's true.

MR. ELA: Can I just jump in here real 

quick? There is a little misunderstanding. So, 

in this listing, so it's, unfortunately it's not 

listed with indents, so the first one, for uses 

in algicide, it's listed under 205.601(a) --

MR. D'AMORE: Correct.

MR. ELA: -- as an algicide 
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disinfectant. And the second one is listed under 

205.601(e) with the indent of Number 4.

So, it's listed as an insecticide but 

with a subset for use as tadpole, shrimp control. 

So it's not, as --

MR. D'AMORE: All right.

MR. ELA: -- it's not, it's a separate 

category. For use as tadpole, shrimp is a subset 

of that one.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you. And I 

appreciate that, Steve. The mite control was 

completely new to me. And that, maybe it shouldn't 

be but it was. Thank you.

MR. ELA: So you don't have to address 

--

MR. CALDWELL: Thank you.

MR. ELA: -- it just includes those, 

but as insecticides it's specifically for tadpole, 

shrimp control.

MR. D'AMORE: Correct. Thank you.

MR. CALDWELL: Great, thank you.

MR. ELA: Go ahead, Jerry. Or Brian.
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MR. CALDWELL: No, thanks a lot, Steve, 

that was excellent clarification. I'm just 

thinking that this issue of how the water in the 

rice fields are managed might be something that 

when this goes back out for input from the community 

they could comment on that.

MR. D'AMORE: Brian, excellent. 

Thank you very much.

And, Kyla, I saw you raise your hand. 

I'm not sure you still want to get on?

MS. SMITH: I was going to clarify the 

way the listings work, just as Steve just did. 

But I'm good.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: And Nate has something to 

say.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes. I was just 

hoping, Jerry, could you speak a little bit to kind 

of the state of continuous improvement for rice 

farmers.

It seems, from what I've read, that this 

material is being used somewhat sparingly but it 
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is also that they're on the hunt for less toxic 

and kind of dealing with a double threat of the 

toxins in rice and kind of an arsenic aggregation.

And so, can you speak a little bit to 

how you think, what do you think the state of the 

industry is and do you think that in the next five 

years we'd be able to work towards a reasonable 

path to de-listing?

MR. D'AMORE: Well, that one I'm very 

happy for as a question. And I had hoped to 

indicate that in my closing.

I see a community in rice farmers that 

has been and is looking for alternative solutions. 

With that said, since, you know, we have given 

them this tool since 2011. And I, once a tool is 

given, it becomes a part of the toolbox that 

eventually becomes essential.

And I would say that today it is an 

essential tool for their well-being. Their 

ability to be in the organic world.

But I'll further say that universally, 

on both sides of a debate, that the notion that 
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we need to show forward progress on finding a way 

to take that substance out of the toolbox is where 

we're all headed.

And I guess what I would say is, running 

around in five years I would be disappointed to 

see us asking ourselves the same questions. And 

I think the mood is right, now, to be more specific 

about where we'd like to see ourselves going and 

have the community support that and go forward.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Thank you. I 

appreciate that.

MR. D'AMORE: Thank you.

MR. ELA: Yes, and I agree. This is 

one coming out of the Subcommittee I thought we 

would be able to de-list, and the public comment 

was more than compelling. So it shows the value 

of public comment process.

So with that, I think it goes back to 

you, Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, thank you. Now 

we're going back, again, to chlorine materials 

under the crops. And, Wood, I think I'll go ahead 
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and read all of these and you can take them as a 

bunch.

So, the first one is calcium 

hypochlorite, reference 205.601(a), as algicide 

disinfectants and sanitizers. Including 

irrigation system, cleaning systems to chlorine 

materials for pre-harvest use, residual chlorine 

levels in the water and direct crop contact or as 

a water from cleaning irrigation systems applied 

to soil, must not exceed the maximum residual 

disinfectant limit under the Safe Drinking Water 

Act, except that chlorine products may be used in 

edible sprout production according to EPA label 

directions.

The next one is chlorine materials, 

chlorine dioxide, reference 205.601(a) as algicide 

disinfectants and sanitizers. Including 

irrigation system, cleaning systems to chlorine 

materials for pre-harvest use, residual chlorine 

levels in the water and direct crop contact or as 

a water from cleaning irrigation systems applied 

to soil, must not exceed the maximum residual 
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disinfectant limit under the Safe Drinking Water 

Act, except that chlorine products may be used in 

edible sprout production according to EPA label 

directions.

Next hypochlorous acid --

MR. ELA: Hey, Rick, can I just 

interrupt real quickly?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: We're getting some comments 

that you are still pretty hard to read so our 

interpreter, or to hear, sorry, not read.

MR. GREENWOOD: Oh.

MR. ELA: So our interpreter is having 

problems, as well as some of our stakeholders. 

So I don't know if there is a way you can shout 

or somehow give us a little more.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay.

MR. ELA: It's probably the avocados 

in the back muffling you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes. How is this now?

MR. ELA: About the same.

MR. GREENWOOD: What? Good?
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MR. ELA: No, still need a little bit 

more.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. How about here?

MR. ELA: Similar.

MR. GREENWOOD: Similar.

MR. TURNER: For what it's worth, Rick, 

I can hear you up the coast.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. How is this?

MR. ELA: Can our interpreter say, I 

don't know if you can hear him or not. So, so.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay.

MR. ELA: Is that better? I think that 

might be better.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Shall I go 

again?

MR. ELA: I think we can start from 

where you were.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: But I'll defer to the 

interpreter as to whether she can hear you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. So, I'm doing 

--
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MR. ELA: Yes, go ahead.

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes, hypochlorous 

acid, 205.601(a) as algicide disinfectants and 

sanitizer. Including irrigation system, cleaning 

systems to chlorine materials for pre-harvest use, 

residual chlorine levels in the water and direct 

crop contact or as a water from cleaning irrigation 

systems applied to soil, must not exceed the 

maximum residual disinfectant limit under the Safe 

Drinking Water Act, except that chlorine products 

may be used in edible sprout production according 

to EPA label directions.

How was that?

MR. ELA: Better, Rick. Thanks.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. And so, let me 

try this one more time.

Chlorine materials sodium 

hypochlorite, reference 205.601(a) as algicide 

disinfectants and sanitizer. Including 

irrigation system, cleaning systems to chlorine 

materials for pre-harvest use, residual chlorine 

levels in the water and direct crop contact or as 
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a water from cleaning irrigation systems applied 

to soil, must not exceed the maximum residual 

disinfectant limit under the Safe Drinking Water 

Act, except that chlorine products may be used in 

edible sprout production according to EPA label 

directions.

And with that, Wood, it's yours.

MR. TURNER: Thanks, Rick. And I am 

going to do them altogether for the sake of the 

ASL interpreter and my own sanity. I'm going to 

just keep it all with one bunch because we have 

talked about these materials already in livestock 

and in handling. And so, obviously the use, as 

we're talking about here, are different.

I think the fundamental need from the 

community for kind of a, not only an effective suite 

of sanitizers and disinfectants to be able to meet 

food safety needs and expectations remains and 

persists. As does, I would say, the communities 

very strongly worded and strongly communicated 

belief that comprehensive approach to how we look 

at sanitizers and disinfectants needs to be 
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contemplated here as we move forward.

So, there is not much more I would say 

about these materials. I think we've talked them 

through fairly completely in the previous two 

sunset presentations, so I don't want to belabor 

them.

But I think they, we all know that 

chlorine materials have some human health 

considerations and concerns. Concerns about 

impacts to aquatic systems and aquatic habitats.

So there are issues that we all in the 

community know and yet are trying to sort of 

navigate relative to kind of the need to maintain 

a clean and health food supply.

I guess the lingering issue for me, 

Rick, on this is that simply, and again, one of 

the things I don't necessarily feel like I see in 

the community, in the feedback from stakeholders 

to date, is whether or not the use of chlorine 

materials, in crop systems, for cleaning equipment 

or irrigation lines or the like, is fundamentally 

the same FSMA consideration that cleaning surfaces 
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in a facility, in sort of a handling livestock 

context, if it's really fundamentally the same 

thing and whether or not there is another pathway 

in this particular category of uses.

And so, I would ask that question again 

of the stakeholders and the community to sort of, 

I guess help inform a further discussion on this 

at the Subcommittee level in a review for the fall. 

I just think that's something to consider.

I also think it's interesting to think 

about, we had this very robust conversation about 

plastics and organic and I just, the reason I asked 

that question about crops in particular, and 

chlorine materials, is because we all share this 

concern that petroleum based products or plastics, 

the proliferation of these materials in organics 

is sub-optimal.

And one might argue the same thing about 

chlorine materials and whether we want to be, 

whether we can, you know, whether we want to simply 

look at chlorine materials as being something that 

are just going to proliferate because we need the 
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suite of materials and we need the food safety 

security and risk management to maintain the 

strength of the industry. Or if there is other 

pathways in the way we think about these materials.

I will also acknowledge, Rick, that, 

and I'm going to say this with an acknowledgment 

to a former board member that I respected a lot, 

and respect a lot, Emily Oakley, who helped suggest 

some of this draft framework for considering how 

we look at chlorine materials. How we look at 

sanitizers in general.

And it was in a nod to Emily, from my 

perspective, to include that in the discussion 

documents. In the proposals that went to the 

community.

You know, chiding is the wrong word, 

I don't think the community chide us for include 

-- chided us for including those graph, that graph 

framework in the documents, in the FSMA documents, 

but didn't like it, let's put it that way.

And I just want to say, I totally 

understand that. Totally get that using a draft 
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framework that way was perhaps premature, but I 

did want to sort of use it as a way to kind of, 

create come continuity between the sanitizer panel 

that we had in the fall and beginning to start 

thinking about what we're all looking for, which 

is a more comprehensive way of thinking about these 

materials. So, I just want to acknowledge that 

feedback.

And I think that pretty much covers, 

there is a lot of support for the re-listing of 

these materials. I think that's pretty much 

across the board.

But also a lot of support for this one, 

this comprehensive sanitizers review and sort of 

a clearer way, if not even a compartmentalized way 

of looking at sanitizers for the Board moving 

forward. So with that, I'll turn it back to you, 

Rick.

MR. ELA: All right. Are there 

questions or comments, discussion from the Board? 

I am not seeing any.

Wood, I think as you noted, this has 
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been -- oh, yes, there is always one. That's why 

I pause. Asa actually has a thought to share.

MR. BRADMAN: I just want to thank Wood 

for your work on this and the discussions that we've 

had about chlorine materials. I know we talked 

a lot yesterday, and maybe we, a lot of the 

discussion yesterday applied today. I just want 

to thank you for your thoughts on this in also going 

forward as we think about sanitizers.

MR. TURNER: Right back at you.

MR. ELA: Yes, echo. Echo that. Any 

other things for Wood? Wood, I'm just going to 

say your question about crops use, while we 

personally don't use it because we pick dry.

I know those folks that have to 

hydro-cool things that are very, very perishable, 

that chlorine probably is a very important use. 

And that would be different from handling. So 

just to answer that question a little.

And I think also, we've had these 

comments before, but there is a scale issue with 

some of these sanitizers in a sense that large 
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growers with larger facilities, or whatever, may 

be able to use a more set of diverse sanitizers 

than a small grower where it would be very expensive 

to have as many things on the plate, equipment and 

such, to use some of the alternatives.

That's not to say that I don't think 

they should, but I am worried about resistance. 

But I think we do need to acknowledge that.

That different size growers may have 

access to different, or lack of access, to 

different things. I just want to put that in your 

bonnet, I guess.

MR. TURNER: Thank you, Steve.

MR. ELA: Sue has one last comment.

MS. BAIRD: Yes, I just want to echo 

that, Steve. I appreciate you bringing that same 

comment up. We do have to remember that we have 

a lot of diversity and scale of operations.

MR. TURNER: A hundred percent.

(Laughter.)

MR. TURNER: Yes. Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. I know we're 
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bearing in on the lunch hour here, I at least, well, 

let's take a few more minutes here and see how far 

we get with the next three sunsets. We may take 

a break before the end of them, but we'll see how 

fast we cycle through them here. So back to you, 

Rick.

Rick, you're on mute. We really can't 

hear you now.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, how is this?

MR. ELA: That's better.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. And you can 

hear me okay?

MR. ELA: So, so.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay.

MR. ELA: Okay, interpreter gives a 

thumbs up so go ahead.

MR. GREENWOOD: Thumbs up is 

international. Okay, this is Amy's and it's 

magnesium oxide, reference 205.601(j)(5), 

magnesium oxide. And the CAS Number is 1309-48-4, 

for use only to control the viscosity of a clay 

suspension agent for humates. Amy?
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MS. BRUCH: Okay, thank you, Rick, 

appreciate it. I guess I'll follow Wood's lead 

and use an abbreviation for the benefit of our 

interpreter, so we'll call this MGO going forward.

The purpose, MGO is allowed for single 

use only to control the viscosity of clay 

suspension agent for humates because the major 

portion of nonsynthetic liquid humic substances 

are insoluble in water.

MGO is neither a strong acid or a strong 

base, but it acts as a buffering agent when in 

aqueous solutions. It's fairly benign and has a 

wide use of uses outside of this particular use.

So for antacids, milk of magnesia. And 

in industrial process, such as producing cement 

and furnace linings.

So, this is actually the first sunset 

review for this product since it was added to the 

national list. In terms of international 

acceptances, there are currently no references to 

synthetic MGO for use in crop production.

Just to summarize some of the 
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stakeholder comments, I do appreciate the ones that 

we received. We received a handful of them. And 

primarily they were in favor of having the 

substance for this particular use.

There was one comment in favor of 

including an expiration time frame on which this 

material will be reviewed in the future, but that 

would have to be handled through annotation outside 

of the sunset process.

In relation to the questions, there 

were five. The first question, has magnesium 

oxide been used for this purpose as described? 

It currently is.

Question two. Are there any 

commercially available nonsynthetic alternatives? 

The original petition actually states there are 

a few alternatives, dolomitic limestone, wood ash, 

et cetera, but they're right now commercially 

available or they don't meet the chemical, physical 

specs for suspending humates in solution.

Question three. Is there still a need 

for liquid humates in organic agriculture? So, 
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one commenter noted that natural humate substances 

stimulate biological activity fostering cycling 

of minerals, conserve water and improve soils in 

multiple ways.

And then another commenter states, 

humates can support biological life in the soil, 

which is fundamental for mineralizing nitrogen.

The question four, can nonsynthetic 

acids be used in place of sulfuric acid in the 

manufacturing process of MGO? This question 

actually wasn't specifically addressed through 

comments.

One commenter mentioned the 

possibility of using nonsynthetic acids in place 

of synthetic sulfuric acid, but it will have to 

be reevaluated. Maybe perhaps the TR will address 

this.

And actually, I forgot to mentioned, 

a TR has been requested and we're hoping to get 

it here in the near future.

The question five, are there 

environmental human health issues that should be 
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noted? So, just in regards to this, it's mainly 

with the manufacturing process of MGO, just due 

to the fact that sulfuric acid or hydrochloric acid 

is leveraged.

Carbon dioxide is also released in the 

manufacturing process. So those are the two 

directly related components.

On the flip side, if MGO wasn't 

available, humates in the dry form would probably 

have to be applied. And those are in a micronized 

powder form. So concerns about exposure to dust 

is the flip side of things.

MR. ELA: All right, are there 

questions, comments, discussion for Amy? Amy, the 

Board is being nice to you. You're off the hook.

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Good job. Your first sunset 

review.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you. Appreciate it.

MR. ELA: Rick, back to you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, thank you. The 

next one is calcium chloride, and that's Logan. 
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Reference 205.602(c), calcium chloride brine 

process is natural and prohibited for use, accept 

as a foliar spray to treat physiological disorder 

associated with calcium uptake. Logan?

MS. PETREY: All right, thank you, 

Rick. Okay, so calcium chloride, it's pretty 

straightforward. I'm glad I got this one as my 

first one under these situations I'm in.

Okay. So, we've had a lot of support 

from the commenters. It's used for, in fruits, 

it's used in, I mean, we have it in vegetable 

problems we calcium deficiencies that come up.

So, under the questions we have, what 

physiological disorders associated with calcium 

uptake is calcium chloride used by producers? 

Now, blossom-end rot in tomatoes and pepper, bitter 

pit in apples, fruit split in cherries, tobacco 

leaf in cabbage.

And there are others as some of these 

issues we don't see, or grower, producers do not 

see until post-harvest issues and so, that can lead 

to rejection. Very costly rejections.
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And sometimes it's hard to see early 

in the field so they will be, that fruit will be 

harvested. So signs can show up later. So they 

can be very significant losses.

A second question is about 

alternatives. Whether limestone, gypsum and rock 

phosphate, which all have calcium, can be used as 

sole additives, whether they can amend that 

problem.

No matter how much calcium you can have 

in the soil, that does not prevent calciums 

deficiency. I, myself, have high calcium levels 

in the soil and still battle with calcium 

deficiencies.

Calcium is a nutrient that is actually 

taken up through a transpiration rate in plants. 

So, if you ever have a reduction in transpiration, 

in humid climates or really cloudy, foggy times, 

you can have lack of transpiration and you may still 

have development of fruit or, those organs in the 

plants, and calcium is not being taken up.

And so, no matter how much you add to 
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the soil, it does not always amend the problem. 

So it's important to have calcium, and calcium 

chloride, so that it can be fully applied.

And once, also, once calcium is in the 

plant, it is considered immobile. And so, it 

actually does not leave the place where it's being 

used to go to the needed area.

So calcium is kind of tricky in that 

area, it's not like nitrogen or potassium in those 

sorts.

And we've had a lot of support from the 

commenters, it's widely used. Certifiers can have 

hundreds of growers that do use the product.

Do not see any negatives on it. It is 

prohibited because of the chlorine component and 

the concern of buildup in the soil, so people do 

support the re-listing with the annotation. Thank 

you.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, thank you, 

Logan.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Logan.

MR. GREENWOOD: Steve.
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MR. ELA: Are there any comments, 

questions, discussion from the Board on this one?

I will just echo Logan's presentation 

on the use of calcium. We also have very high 

calcium soils and still can see bitter pit in 

apples. And she explained it very well about 

calcium moving in the water through the plant and 

that being, depending on the water flow of the plant 

is where calcium will go.

So, actually, in apple trees it is 

mobile. The newly growing branches will suck 

calcium out of the fruit. So if you have a vigorous 

tree you can also see bitter pit.

And likewise, for the opposite reasons, 

as she mentioned, humidity and such, we have 

problems with calcium because it gets to hot and 

dry here. When it gets hot, the tree can't keep 

up with transpiration and so it actually shuts down 

in the afternoon, which also limits water flow. 

So, for exactly the opposite reason, we have 

issues.

So Sue has something to say.
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MS. BAIRD: Also, just a comment. 

That in Missouri Midwest, our climate, we're having 

a whole lot more spring rains than we used to have 

and it gets very hot quickly. And it can cause 

almost steamy conditions for a while.

Blossom-end rot in tomatoes is 

significant. And if we didn't have this product 

we probably wouldn't be producing tomatoes. It's 

become that bad with our climate change.

MR. ELA: So, with that, if there are 

no further questions, Rick, we will move on to the 

last sunset and then we will break for lunch and 

come back for the discussion documents.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay, thank you, 

Steve. Last sunset is rotenone, which is mine. 

And that's reference 205.602(f), rotenone. And 

that's CSA Number 83-79-4.

And this is actually referenced as a 

prohibited substance. It's a potent nonsynthetic 

botanical. And in the U.S. it's registered only 

now as a piscicidal, if I said it correctly, fish 

killing purposes.
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It's no longer registered by the EPA 

as a pesticide. And it's not available for 

purchase in the U.S. It's banned in Europe and 

United Kingdom.

We had a few comments on it and the 

comments were, keep it as a prohibited substance. 

So I don't think there's much else to day about 

it.

Apparently it is for sale in some of 

the places around the world, so there's the 

potential we want to keep it on the list as 

prohibited so it doesn't end up coming into the 

country.

So, outside of that, there were no 

questions. And the only people that commented say 

keep it prohibited.

MR. ELA: All right. Any discussion 

on that? I don't see any.

So, I just want to say, for all our new 

Board Members, great job on your sunsets. You are 

all inaugurated now, and we expect we'll start 

dumping more stuff on your plate. So your feet 
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in the water and that's a heavy go.

But we're going to break for lunch 

before we come back to the discussion documents 

on ammonia extract and kasugamycin. I know we're 

running late, but we also have some time built in 

at the end of the day, so I'm not too, well, I 

shouldn't say I'm not too worried, but I think we're 

good.

But nonetheless, let's come back at, 

let's take 40 minutes for lunch and come back at 

2 o'clock. Is that, no, 3 o'clock. Help me out 

here, Michelle.

MS. ARSENAULT: It's 3:00 Eastern.

MS. PETREY: The top of the hour.

MR. ELA: Top of the hour. Thanks, 

Logan. All right. Somehow on times I cannot get 

the conversion right, so at the top of the hour. 

Well said. So, we'll see you after about 35 

minutes, 40 minutes or so.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 2:20 p.m. and resumed at 

3:02 p.m.)
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MR. ELA: Well, we're going to call 

things back to order after lunch here. Michelle, 

are you ready to go?

MS. ARSENAULT: All set, Steve. We 

are recording.

MR. ELA: I figured maybe you had, 

like, stepped out, you know, for the next two hours 

just to see if we could handle this one our own, 

which I know we can't.

So all right, Rick, it is back to you 

after lunch here.

MR. GREENWOOD: Well, actually, it's 

back to you, Steve. So we're back on the crops, 

and we have two discussion documents. The first 

one, and Steve was really lucky to do this one, 

ammonia extract. And it's a petitioned substance. 

So, Steve, take it away.

MR. ELA: Yes. Let me get to my notes 

here. I knew I should have left some things after 

lunch before this. So, yes, ammonia extract is 

a Petition that we received. I think it's been 

about a year ago at this point. Dave Mortensen had 
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taken it on. But with his resigning from the 

Board, I think I raised my hand to take this on.

And then partly, well, it's a huge 

topic. I have to say it is a personal interest. 

As a grower, certainly, nitrogen is one of the 

things that, you know, is constantly in my mind 

of, you know, how we take care of our trees. And 

I know it's an issue for many other growers. So 

I think I partly raised my hand just because I had 

hoped it would give me insight into some of our 

fertility processes.

It's obviously a complicated topic. 

You know, I hope every Board member thanks me for 

putting out this discussion document and giving 

them more reading to do. I can't remember how many 

pages in our public comment were devoted to ammonia 

extracts, but I know it was a few. But also I 

really thought the number of comments and the 

thoughtfulness of them were greatly appreciated.

I originally had not thought about 

putting a discussion document out because we had 

one last fall. But I'm very glad we did, and I 
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asked for references and such. And our 

stakeholders came through in spades on it.

So I will say I have not read all of 

the scientific references. I hope to make a good 

cut at them after this meeting. But I do 

appreciate the people responding to that request.

I'm going to break down my presentation 

on this, I hope, the steps that Asa in his dealing 

with a very complicated topic so well. But I want 

to cover, I guess it looks like six things. I like 

to do everything in threes, but we're going to do 

six.

The first one is professionalism and 

then I want to really talk about the definition 

and then look at kind of soil health and 

biodiversity, quickly on yields and then 

international recognition and finally on highly 

soluble fertilizer sources.

So just starting off with 

professionalism. I know in the oral comments, we 

had some issues with this as well. Most 

stakeholders do so well in keeping this on a high 
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level, but it's one of the few topics I have seen 

not as much professionalism.

You know, I'm just going to list one 

thing. I mean, there's a comment that this is 

written overly broad and inappropriate due to its 

obvious commercial bias. You know, it's an 

attempt to increase the focus of the Board based 

on certain companies' production methods and 

pandering to certain company's request may raise 

questions about the neutrality of the NOSB.

And another one was there is no reason 

for the NOSB to give credence to this vague, 

political and commercially motivated Petition.

I just want to say to our stakeholders 

that I find this offensive and irresponsible to 

get comments like this, and some of the comments 

that we've had on oral testimony. The NOSB looks 

at each Petition as it's written, and we take all 

of them very seriously.

And I find with this kind of comments 

that they're just not appropriate. So I hope as 

we move to proposal that the stakeholders that did 
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stoop to this level will rise to a higher level 

and, you know, that we are doing our best to look 

at things as an independent Board and as each of 

them in their own right.

And I just had to say that because it 

irritates me, and I just don't think it's 

appropriate for this Board.

So moving on to the more pertinent 

items, I kind of want to start with the definition. 

And this is one of the things we asked in the 

discussion document prior to this. Does the 

Petition definition fit?

And, you know, this question, really, 

I think, is part of the crux of the matter and it's 

very difficult. And I think we're going to have 

some, you know, struggle in trying to come up with 

a definition.

The Petition notes that the ammonia 

extract is described in the Petition as a 

fertilizer produced using a range of methods where 

the output contains ammonia and/or ammonium that 

has been produced through a biological physical 
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process, captured in liquid form and concentrated 

or extracted and packaged for application in a crop 

system.

This raised some concerns from a number 

of stakeholders that this definition may be overly 

broad and may encompass some material -- well, 

essentially any material that contains certain 

amounts of ammonia.

And so I think that probably is a valid 

criticism. And the suggestion that, you know, 

there are a number of products that have been on 

the market for a number of years or many years or 

have been widely accepted and that we don't want 

to include those in the definition of what might 

be prohibited.

So then that brings us to, you know, 

what would a definition be. And, you know, I 

guess, you know, the Petition raises concerns about 

uncertainty and inconsistent determinations by 

material review organizations regarding the 

classification of these ammonia extract 

technologies.
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The TR and some stakeholders have noted 

two different processes for making these ammonia 

extracts. For lack of any better words from the 

TR and also some comments, ammonia stripping or 

ammonia concentration is two methods although 

another stakeholder did not that they utilized a 

very different still non-synthetic process on 

either of these two.

In essence the ammonia concentration 

method is taking the original material and removing 

water so that you are making that much more of a 

concentrated substance. And that would still 

include the nutrients and organic matter in the 

original substance.

And I suspect when we had oral 

commenters talking about that their products still 

included soluble organic compounds that this was 

the type of method that they were referring to, 

or I should say, carbon compounds.

On the other hand, the ammonia 

stripping is where the ammonia is actually taken 

out of the product and concentrated as pretty much 
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pure ammonia.

So each of these processes are both 

being considered under the umbrella of the 

petitioned ammonia extract category and in some 

ways they are very different because one does 

include these other materials such as carbon and 

one does not.

And so I think we will have to consider 

how widely we cast the net in the definition and 

whether we want to restrict it to just the stripping 

method or make some stab at saying that even though 

it's concentrated, maybe above a certain level of 

ammonia would fall under this Petition for 

prohibition.

I want to note that AMRI has noted that 

they have seen an increase in queries and product 

review applications over the past three years for 

these types of fertilizers that have elevated 

levels of ammonia nitrogen and that they're 

sometimes produced through these non-synthetic 

classifications.

There are some that already appear on 
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the AMRI list. And so far AMRI has encountered 

methods that involve extraction, isolation and 

concentration but that some of them may be 

generically described as more of the ammonia 

stripping variations. So AMRI has seen fairly, 

you know, a diverse range of things, but some of 

these are the stripping.

Another note that is that non-synthetic 

fertilizers that test above 3 percent ammoniacal 

nitrogen are considered at a higher risk for 

violating the soil fertility and crop nutrient 

management practices at 205.203. And AMRI and 

others have noted that any product that contains 

this highly soluble nitrogen must be applied in 

a manner that does not contribute to the 

contamination of crop, soil, water as per OFPA.

Its use must be part of an organic 

system plan that maintains or improves the natural 

resources of the operation, including soil and 

water quality and comply with crop and nutrient 

soil for requirements. And that was noted by any 

number of oral comments as well as written that 
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included those for the Petition to Prohibit and 

those against the Petition to Prohibit.

It does come back that these should not 

be used in isolation and that certifiers should, 

whether they're used or not, make sure that the 

requirements for soil building and such and 

improved natural resources are complied with.

I guess so that really kind of covers 

the definition where, again, the scope of the 

Petition, whether it impacts the valuation of other 

common nitrogen non-synthetic fertility inputs 

such as compost teas, manure teas, process manures 

and liquid fish products that contain some ammonia 

but are produced through biological processes and 

may undergo some form of concentration or 

extraction but that retain the organic matter 

versus the purified ammonia from the stripping 

process.

So we need to think of, you know, 

through the black and white versus the gray areas 

there of how we deal with those.

So moving on to the next area that I 
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think we can kind of categorize beyond definitions 

and that comes down to biodiversity and soil 

health. Obviously, a lot of the comments address 

this issue. We had pages and pages and pages and 

pages of comments. Like Sue, I don't know how many 

pages of notes I took from this one.

And ultimately, you know, as we always 

have to go back to OFPA, which identifies the seven 

criteria that we must consider an evaluation of 

substances and, of course, those include 

environmental effects, you know, soil effects, 

human effects, et cetera.

As I noted in the analysis, greater than 

3 percent must comply with additional 

recordkeeping inspection requirements. They must 

comply with soil fertility and crop nutrient 

management practices and such. So, you know, harm 

to human health and environment and, you know, the 

Petition noted that they thought that if we did 

not prohibit these substances, we would not be 

supporting the importance of organic farming and 

handling that is listed in OFPA.
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Moving on, you know, we certainly 

received comments that plants already take up 

nitrogen in the form of ammonia and nitrate, that 

no matter in what firm, you know, even if we apply 

manure, it does go through the ammonia and nitrate 

forms and that manure-based nitrogen is subject 

to the same environmental losses as ammonia 

extracts.

I think we are familiar with those 

arguments often, but I do want to make note of that. 

And also that, you know, biological, if we apply 

manures, that process of mineralization happens 

throughout the year, and it doesn't start and stop 

only when there are growing crops in the field. 

So the argument is that there is some potential 

for loss of nitrogen and leaching even in organic 

systems that are manure based.

Another note was that nitrogen 

application, when that is below the optimal rate, 

as it often is in organic agriculture, the addition 

of more end fertilizers does enhance soil carbon 

micro biomass, and there were citations based with 
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that and that the effect of these biobased 

fertilizers was more evident in soils with low 

biological activity than compared to soils of high 

biological activity.

Again, I don't think any great surprise 

on that. You know, we know that if we have a soil 

that is not operating well the addition of 

nutrients does make it operate better.

So, you know, and so in one of the 

comments, you know, promoting these ammonia 

extracts, it was noted that the capture of organic 

ammonia from these manure byproducts allows 

precision in applying it to the fields and does 

reduce the volatilization of ammonia into the 

atmosphere.

And it also, by applying just straight 

nitrogen, it reduces the chances as from manures 

that we would get a significant buildup of 

phosphorous in the soil profile, which can create 

an MPK balance issue, again, in reference to 

manures that may be higher in phosphorous and 

potassium and is needed by the crop.
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The final thing is they did note that, 

you know, there's potential groundwater 

contamination if manures and some of these other 

organic nitrogen products are applied at the wrong 

time where the crop is not demanding them.

Ultimately, you know, I'll throw out 

there that I think a lot of this comes down to issues 

of carbon to nitrogen ratios that if lower rates 

of carbon are being applied rather than in we will 

get reduction of soil carbon. And that, you know, 

if we apply materials that are higher in carbon 

that, you know, it will increase characteristics 

related to soil health such as organic matter, soil 

aggregates, biological activity and increased 

nutrient cycling.

So finally just, you know, kind of on 

the bigger concepts that the stakeholders gave to 

us, and I'll quote some comments here, that the 

prohibition of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers 

manufactured through Haber-Bosch process is a 

longstanding fundamental prohibition in organic 

agriculture.
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The proliferation of these fossil 

fuel-based synthetic fertilizers in conventional 

agriculture was a primary motivator of the modern 

organic agricultural movement.

The principles listed in the original 

2001 NOSB recommendation seek to achieve 

agriculture and environmental goals through the 

use of cultural, biological and mechanical methods 

as opposed to using synthetic materials to fulfill 

specific functions within the system.

Therefore, substances that mimic the 

chemistry and functionality of synthetic nitrogen 

fertilizers can be understandably considered as 

equally incompatible with traditional organic 

principles.

Purified natural ammonia and ammonium 

compounds mimic conventional synthetic nitrogen. 

So I think that's a fundamental argument within 

this Petition that these ammonia fertilizers are 

very close to synthetic fertilizers and that they 

are inherently incompatible with organic 

principles based on that.
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When we get into those that contain --

that may be just simply concentrated, then that 

becomes a little more cloudy as to whether the 

carbon and other micronutrients included in that 

fall within or outside of organic principles.

I think, you know, it does pay to note 

that some of these are of higher solubility, that 

provide nutrients directly to the plant and that 

they also may be because of that, rather than 

working with the soil on a primary basis, that they 

are countered to the fundamental organic 

principles.

Another commenter did note about the 

law of return where residues are returned to the 

soil by tillage, composting or mulching. While 

most organic growers depend on some offsite 

infants, most of the fertility in a soil-based 

system comes from practices that recycle organic 

matter produced onsite in one form or another.

So for the sake of agricultural 

productivity and ecosystem stability, special 

attention must be given to soil organic matter 
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because of its key role in maintaining soil 

aggregation and other soil health issues.

You know, this is really, I think, you 

know, comes down to the crux of the problem is the 

soil health issues, contamination issues and 

really the cycling of nutrients in organic systems.

I guess, you know, the manufacturers 

of some of these ammonia extracts do indicate these 

products are meant to facilitate precise and 

responsible application of nutrients and are not 

intended to be the sole nutrient fertility system. 

And I think most of them restated a number of times 

that they should be added, but the basis of cropping 

fertility systems should be the things that organic 

growers recognize of building a healthy soil and 

that these are just extra things to try and address 

the needs at specific times of the crop in terms 

of nitrogen.

I would just like to finish this soil 

health biodiversity section by noting that there 

was a comment that really tried to do some metaanalysis of the data from these types of 
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fertilizers. And what they found was that crop 

rotation, inclusion of legumes in the rotation 

along with organic inputs were all significant 

factors affecting the soil microbial size and 

activity. The point being that crop rotation 

legumes and other organic inputs all have their 

own issues that affect the soil health and that 

it's also very difficult to make an overarching 

statement on this sort of thing.

They noted that effective sampling 

position, soil texture characteristics, initial 

soil organic matter, additions of carbon from other 

management techniques, ammonia extracts and 

previous management history all affect soil health 

properties. So it's just not a black and white 

issue.

So that's a very high level summary of 

the biodiversity soil health issues. There were 

pages and pages of comments on that. I've done 

my best to distill that down to a longer CliffsNote 

section. I know it's not short, but I think that 

hits kind of the arguments on both sides of the 
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coin about whether these extracts are beneficial 

or not.

I would just like to move on to yields. 

I think it was noted that these extracts -- organic 

farmers are under pressure financially. They need 

to increase yields in order to be able to compete 

in the market and such. We did have a couple 

comments on that both in the public oral comments 

and the written comments noting that these may be 

important for yield increases. 

Conversely, in the public comments, we 

did have a citation to the organic system farming 

trials that Rodale has done. And, you know, they 

noted that over the 40 years on average, there's 

no statistical difference in yield between 

conventional organic and climate change scenarios 

like years of drought. Organic keeps performing 

better than conventional.

We have found 30 percent higher yields 

in organic and conventional than in years of 

drought. So that to me kind of counters the need 

for -- the ability to give increased yields through 
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the need for ammonium extracts. But that there 

are two sides of the coin on that.

And ultimately, you know, the comment 

that the long-term consequences of continued 

reliance on conventional practices will be a 

decline in soil productivity that increases the 

need for synthetic fertilization, threatens food's 

security and exacerbates environmental 

degradation.

Now I know that is referring to 

conventional practices, not organic. And if it 

is a mix of ammonia extracts and organic practices, 

that statement may or may not apply.

So, again, that, you know, yields, it 

seems like there are two sides of that coin. But 

that certainly in some long-term trials, organic 

yields have kept up with the conventional yields. 

And I know in a conversation with Amy Bruch on 

our Board that, you know, her goal as an organic 

grower is to be right up there or above the yields 

in her area of conventional growers.

I know in my organic peaches, we 
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certainly are very similar to or better than 

conventional growers as well. So yields can be 

done at least in certain crops.

Just to kind of -- the last two topics 

here, international consumer issues. It has been 

brought up that sodium nitrate is an issue with 

Canada. That they do not accept organic materials 

or crops that have been treated with sodium nitrate 

whereas it is approved in the U.S. 

So certainly while we always make a nod 

to international acceptance of some of these 

products, that is certainly one that has been 

identified and is an issue with other countries 

that they do take objection to and specifically 

don't approve them in materials going across the 

border.

So, you know, that is a critical 

variance in the U.S.-Canadian organic equivalency 

arrangement. And I think it probably in this case 

really needs to be paid attention to because it 

could be a big factor. I know one of the growers 

that grows organic tomato transplants for us, he 
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specifically asked me if we exported anything 

because of material he was using as a side, as kind 

of a kicker for his transplants, it did include 

a small amount of sodium nitrate. He primarily 

grows the transplants with soil-based items, but 

he was using it as a little kicker.

So that's a note on international 

acceptance. And I'd just like to finish up with 

some more general comments on highly soluble 

sources, and people did submit a number of comments 

on this.

They note that non-synthetic materials 

mimic synthetic nitrogen fertilizers and have been 

prohibited in the past. That sodium nitrate was 

prohibited in part for the same rationale and is 

limited. One past Board voted to completely 

prohibit it. But even before that it was limited 

as to 20 percent of the nitrogen applied.

So there is some precedence on limiting 

these things and that, you know, the previous 

Boards have set precedent on that.

I'm just looking through my notes. 
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Material source from agricultural waste products 

have been prohibited by NOSB in the past when the 

carbon value of the original source material was 

not retained in the final product.

There are several examples. Ash from 

manure burning was prohibited in part for the same 

rationale as an inappropriate method to recycle 

organic waste. And that has been reiterated, and 

I guess ultimately actually kind of affects part 

of the biochar in the Petition we had before us 

and that, you know, the substance of ammonia 

extracts could fail to align with the 2004 NOSB 

recommendations.

Also in terms of alternatives, while 

there may have been a shortage of liquid fertility 

inputs in the 1990s, there are now many liquid 

formulations that have allowed fertilizers with 

over 10 percent nitrogen, which, of course, 

including Chilean nitrate, which are allowed. So 

there are alternatives. This is not the only 

source. So that may or may not make a difference.

Several commenters noted that they 
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believed there will be more highly soluble 

fertilizers brought to the market, but this is not 

the end of it. And that it is time to regulate 

fertilizers that bypass the benefits from soil 

fertility and limit the number of highly soluble 

fertilizers or at least limit their use in organic 

systems.

And one such agreed that such 

fertilizers do need to be regulated. They pointed 

out that ammonia extracts are not unique. There 

are other highly available natural materials 

commonly used as fertilizers, as soybean 

hydrolysates, Chilean nitrate, in some cases, 

fish, that allow growers to feed their crops 

without feeding the soil. They urged us to address 

this issue and regulate the use of all highly 

available fertilizers that bypass feeding the 

soil.

And another that limits may be prudent 

on excessively high nitrogen levels, 15 percent 

or higher end products and that farmers should be 

accountable to add carbon back to the soil as part 
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of an organic program and that any limits set by 

the NOSB should weigh the unintended consequences 

of excess and duplicate regulation on organic 

farmers.

So finally I think that pretty well 

makes the point and certainly one commentator just 

kind of referred that they would hate to create 

a situation where a grower could use 20 percent 

Chilean nitrate, 20 percent fish, 20 percent 

soybean hydrolysate and something else and get most 

of their fertility from these highly soluble 

sources while maybe still adding some carbon soil 

back to the ground and put the certifier in the 

difficult position of trying to write them a 

non-compliance.

But as we know from some certifiers it's 

very clear in OFPA that the definition of soil 

health and such makes it very difficult to write 

a non-compliance and support that non-compliance 

because, you know, it's one person's idea of soil 

health versus another's.

So with that, I probably talked too fast 
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and included too many things. But I think those 

are the big issues that I see out of all the public 

comments.

I don't want to put anybody on the spot, 

but I would be very curious to hear from Amy and/or 

Logan as other growers, what their programs are. 

I know on our own farm, we really work to get most 

of our nitrogen from vegetative sources, legumes 

and organic matter that we grow on the farm.

Manures are a small addition. And I 

guess I kind of want to address that because it 

seemed like many responses to the Petition really 

said, you know, manures were the main source of 

nitrogen and that we needed to avoid the build-up 

of phosphorous and potassium in things and that's 

why these extracts would be useful.

So, I don't know, Amy would you be 

willing to kind of share how you're approaching 

this nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium approach?

MS. BRUCH: Sure, Steve. Well, thank 

you. That was such a thorough review of the 

situation in front of us. And it kind of is a 
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common theme for the day, I think, these complex 

situations that we have to unwind.

But just to answer your question, you 

know, on my farm, again, we're row crops, small 

grains, pulses and oilseeds. So how we manage our 

fertility, you know, we really have to look at it 

on a three to five year basis.

Otherwise, you know, we do understand 

we will get ourselves into trouble for some of the 

things that some of the commenters pointed out if 

you rely on just a manure based system there will 

be accumulation of phosphorous, potassium and also 

calcium. Those are really nutrients that 

accumulate and aren't that visible within the soil.

So a three to five year plan is what 

we look at. Complementary rotations, we're 

putting -- and this is a common thread kind of in 

the Midwest as well, these robust crop rotations. 

They both help with our fertility in which they 

are complementary in generating some nitrogen that 

can complement a corn crop that needs a little bit 

more nitrogen.
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And they also are strategic from a weed 

management perspective, too, of breaking up the 

weed cycle. So really, you know, when we look at 

putting these programs together and rotations 

together, they're multifaceted both for fertility 

and also weed management, which is another 

challenge that we face.

Also with margin management on our farm 

and using that total systems approach, growing our 

nitrogen kind of like you mentioned is really 

important as well. It helps with increasing 

biodiversity. We're growing cover crops in the 

off season.

It increases our organic matter in our 

soil, which also helps contribute to nitrogen needs 

in the future. And if we're strategic in our 

deployment, leveraging some of those legumes, 

clover, vetch, et cetera, can really generate some 

nitrogen to our crops as well.

We do use some broiler liver. That's 

a little bit lower in calcium and also phosphorous. 

And we deploy feather meal. We also use just a 
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little bit of biological activators and high humic 

acid as well. So it's a real comprehensive 

approach just so we are cognizant of soil nutrient 

balance.

We take annual soil samples. But we 

are part of a water district in Nebraska. We're 

all irrigated so we have to report our nitrate 

levels annually to the Water Board. And there's 

some great university materials out there that we 

leverage for annual soil samples as well just to 

know what do our soils contain and what are we going 

to need both short-term and long-term because 

manure application is kind of like you said, it's 

not a one term generation of fertility for our 

soils. There are multiyear benefits with manure 

so we want to make sure we have a comprehensive 

approach to that.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Amy. I know 

different cropping systems are, you know, 

different. I was just kind of like the use of 

sanitizers are different in each system. Here's 

another theme that goes throughout this meeting. 
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But, Logan, can I put you on the spot? And I see 

you have your hand up anyhow? But I don't if you 

can make comments but --

MS. PETREY: Yes. I put it up. 

Absolutely. Okay. Thank you, Steve. Great job. 

I thought you hit both of those sides very, very 

well.

And, okay, so I am in the Southeast. 

If you haven't visited the beautiful Southeast, 

it is not always beautiful. We have lots of rain. 

So we average about 55 inches a year. And where 

we are in North Florida we have sandy soil. So 

we do run into leaching issues, not just leaching 

of nitrogen, leaching of soil foliar, leaching of 

potassium. And so that runs into hard issues when 

managing fertility in organics.

And because of the pest pressures in 

the summers, we typically grow in the winter. So 

what you can run into is high leaching rates. You 

run into a two or three inch rain in the winter 

and then it gets cold. And that typically follows 

a -- cold trend will follow rainfall. And when 
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you get cold, you get into the 40s, 50s and 

fortunately most of the manure-based fertilizers 

will not start breaking down and making more 

available nitrogen.

And so you can have a lag time for weeks 

without having that product available. And so 

where those soluble nitrogens are not necessarily 

desired in the organic system, we can have a 

dependence on it just to make sure we don't have 

crop failure, you know, with some of the things 

that we're working with.

And really fertility, in my experience 

fertility is the number one tool to fight against 

pests or insects and foliar pests. And so, you 

know, if the plant is looking healthy, I'm less 

worried about, you know, things jumping on it. 

But at the moment, fertility is a draw, especially 

nitrogen. We definitely see onsets of stuff, 

which increases your pesticide use and things.

And so although the program is not 

built, our fertilizer programs are not built with 

soluble nitrogens in them, when we can use them 
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we do and when need an immediate fix after the 

rains.

It does not, our use of like sodium 

nitrate with fish or the corn steep liquor does 

not reduce our use of crop rotation. We grow 20 

different things. I want to say six or seven crop 

families. Our crop rotation is extensive. And it 

helps, and it does, you know, make those yield 

breakers like Steve was mentioning of the organics 

versus conventional. We've seen it. 

And it's neat, you know. All the 

farmers around, because we don't have very many 

organic farmers in this area but, you know, are 

watching and experiencing, you know, things that 

we get to use or that organics do use to complement 

the system.

So it doesn't limit our crop rotation. 

It doesn't limit the use of the manure base or 

the natural fertilizers. It still uses it a lot. 

Believe me, it's over 50 percent of our crop 

budget. So it is used.

We do use mostly the manure. We use 
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a lot of chicken litter. It's in the area. We 

try to stay on broiler side. We do have the results 

of an egg litter sometimes, which increases our 

calcium. And we do run into a higher pH issue of 

phosphorous buildups. And our potassium leaches, 

I guess, as much as the nitrogen.

But as far as cover crops and what we 

used in the off seasons, which would be in the 

summer and some during the winter, we have the sunn 

hemp, which is a scavenger for starting things. 

It has an incredible root system. It's a nitrogen 

fixer. So we do use cover crops to try and combat 

any of those fertility issues.

We're not able to rely on -- and nobody 

is. No grower, no conventional grower in the area 

is able to rely on cover crops as a sole use. Not 

saying that anybody else can, but it's not a 

significant nitrogen source because of the amount 

of leaching we get, especially during planting 

season.

I mean, most of our planting seasons 

are in September and October. And that's 
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hurricane season in our time. So we do have to 

side dress often. I know a lot of growers mention 

they prefer that -- or they think that's best to 

do all pre-plants.

Well, it doesn't work in every 

geographical area. We do a pre-plant application, 

and we do two or three side dresses depending on 

the link to the crop.

And one thing about, you know, the 

manures, they have a very low nitrogen percentage. 

And so your rates are really high. And it makes 

it very difficult sometimes to get out the amount 

of nitrogen needed.

But we start using the feather mills 

and other products that have a higher, like, a 10 

or 13 percent nitrogen. And they may have a lesser 

phosphorous or potassium amount. But still most 

of these things are looking at a two to three week 

release curve onset and so they are great for the 

soil.

And where, you know, you kind of cringe 

when you have to apply it is at the tail end of 
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the season when you do get a rain. But you've got 

to finish the crop or at least keep the tops green, 

whatever the case is, and you've got to maintain 

that health, but you only have two or three weeks 

of the crop left.

And so you make the application, 

knowing you're only going to get a week out of it 

or two weeks out of it. And it has a, you know, 

six week release curve on it. So you're losing 

that other three weeks.

And we have to, you know, plant the 

fields to get a new crop in and to avoid any ceiling, 

like damping off issues, you've got to have a 

relatively clean field to go back into. And so 

that time is in land preparation, and it is lost. 

So there's loss with, like Steve mentioned, 

there's loss with natural fertilizers also.

And so I am in complete agreeance that 

limitations are fine. That wouldn't scare me at 

all because I prefer to use natural fertilizers 

and to farm that way. But I will say that it does 

help growers in this area to maintain that crop 
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and to maintain that yield.

And when you do have yield, it helps 

you bring return to the farm, which you put into 

the farm. I mean, you make investments. You make 

better cover crops. You make, you know, better

decisions that way.

So thank you, Steve, for letting me 

answer. And it was long. But that's a lifetime 

of the Florida experience there. So thank you.

MR. ELA: This is why we have multiple 

growers on the Board and from multiple areas. 

That's really, really valuable.

So I'd like to open it up to the rest 

of the Board for discussions and comments. 

Obviously, this Petition created quite a bit of 

interest. So I would like to try and come to a 

proposal next fall. But, you know, certainly it's 

going to be a bit of challenge to capture 

everything. So this is our chance for the full 

Board to comment on this before I try and write 

this up in the summer. So please give me feedback 

from the rest of the Board if you will.
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I'm not seeing -- oh, there's Mindee. 

Well, first Wood and then Mindee.

MR. TURNER: I don't even have a 

follow-up to that incredible primer from Amy and 

Logan. I'm just sitting here with my jaw on the 

floor. I'm so thrilled that they're on the Board.

So for what it's worth, this is such 

a softball question, Steve. I'm still trying to 

get my head around all this time. And I mean it 

literally has made my brain hurt just trying to 

sift through it.

One question that I'm having though is 

are we comfortable that there is a clear enough 

definition of what the material is? I don't know 

that I have that -- I feel like this is sort of 

a blanket petition that I'm not sure I'm 100 percent 

clear that we're capturing sort of the nuance that 

I feel like I'm hearing in the comments and hearing 

from my colleagues on the Board about the nuances 

here.

So I'm just curious. I feel like 

there's something lacking in this for me that maybe 
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could benefit from some more definition.

MR. ELA: Yes. I think you raise a 

great point, Wood. And, you know, in our original 

discussion document last fall, we didn't get a ton 

of response on the definition issue. We certainly 

got a lot more this time. And I think probably 

stakeholders dove into it a little bit more.

I think this will be, you know, just 

like with biodegradable mulch and paper pots and 

some of these other things that, you know, the 

nuances are really important. At this point, my 

bias would be to probably write a definition that 

is fairly conservative.

You know, we don't want to take out --

I don't believe we want to take out, you know, 

products like fish oils and some of these others 

that have long been a staple of organic growers. 

I think, you know, there is a danger in that. 

So maybe the wording of the definition in the 

Petition might be overly broad.

So I guess I would favor a little more 

conservative one that maybe doesn't go far enough 
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in terms of what it covers but at least does 

something. And so I kind of come back to those 

two definitions of concentration versus stripping.

Obviously, I'm sure, there's gray areas 

between there. But I would tend to lean toward, 

you know, the stripping that really produces a pure 

ammonia pretty much might, like I said, be a very 

conservative definition that might not go far 

enough, but at least I think that one is arguably 

much more similar to synthetic ammonia that's 

supplied because it doesn't include carbon and some 

of these other materials.

Like I said, I don't think it probably 

goes far enough, but that would be a black and 

white, you know, proposal. You know, somebody 

strips ammonia and adds back some soluble organic 

carbon, do we -- you know, how do we deal with that? 

How does a certifier deal with that? I don't 

know. But that's maybe where I would start. But 

I certainly want to talk to more people this summer 

to try and flush that out a little bit more.

MR. TURNER: That would be great. 
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Thanks.

MR. ELA: Mindee and then Kyla.

MS. JEFFERY: I think you guys got me 

on that. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Kyla then.

MS. SMITH: That was mostly going to 

be my comment. It was just really, like, honing 

in on the definition and, yes. And I think you 

pretty much covered it.

MR. ELA: We'll just ask, Kyla, I mean, 

again, this is a great time for the Chair to put 

people on the spot. I squirmed on this thing so 

I'll make everybody else squirm.

As a certifier, and certainly I know 

you've worked with AMRI and such, at this point, 

if somebody is using a highly soluble fertilizer 

and you're looking at a farm system plan and knowing 

the criteria, you know, the necessity for soil 

health in the applications, how would you assess 

out, you know, the use of a highly soluble 

fertilizer versus something else that is required 

in a soil system plan?
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MS. SMITH: I always look like, oh, 

thank God, that's not me up there when people would 

ask Scott these questions.

Believe it or not, I don't have the 

regulations memorized. I, like, know them. But 

if you give me a minute, I may be able to, like, 

get you an answer.

MR. ELA: We'll stall for a minute 

here.

MS. JEFFERY: Well, I guess I could add 

then in the -- to support the stalling -- I can't 

pretend to be an ammonia expert, but I'm really, 

like, mulling over this notion around the highly 

soluble liquid fertilizers and like the organic 

ethos has a high emphasis there.

And I think my first reactions were, 

yes, we have to prohibit this. And then I really 

listened to a lot of what people said. And I feel 

like if we can get a really clear definition and 

a really, like, narrow annotation, I would really 

like to support innovation and support the need 

for the specificity of the use of this in times, 
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you know, like Logan was describing of, like, how 

and when it can become important for unforeseen 

circumstances.

So I guess I just philosophically see 

myself being capable of compromise if we have great 

definitions and narrow annotation. And is that 

within the elasticity of the scope of the Petition 

rewrite?

MR. ELA: Sure. I mean, we often take 

a petitioned item and then it's within our realm 

to annotate in some form that, you know, we feel 

appropriate to limit or whatever. We've done that 

with a number of other things. But, yes, we agree 

with the Petition except here's how we're going 

to narrow it or whatever.

We've got Amy and then Carolyn and then 

I'm going to put Nate on the spot, too, as a 

certifier after that just so the pain is shared 

by Kyla. So go ahead, Amy.

MS. BRUCH: Thank you, Steve. No. 

This is a good topic, for sure. I can't help but 

kind of look back at our conversation on the 
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biodegradable, biobased mulch in a way.

And as I look at some of the comments, 

I see there seems to be a large need of the ammonia 

extracts with those folks that are actually using 

these plastic mulches. And so, you know, when we 

think of this comprehensive systems approach, it's 

kind of hard to do that when you have plastic laying 

on your soil.

So, you know, I just think sometimes 

with this whole organic approach, we need to step 

back and also look at the domino effects of, you 

know, what we are doing because that does concern 

me a little bit not having the access to the soil.

We are able to, as Logan kind of 

mentioned, she does split applications. We do 

that as well because when you have small crops, 

just like small people, they don't eat as much as 

food as larger people do.

And so, you know, that's kind of what 

I think about with this covering of the soil that, 

you know, it's really hard to get those 

multinutritional sources to your plants.
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So I just wanted to make one comment 

on that.

MR. ELA: When I give farm tours, I 

always ask people, you know, how often they eat 

in a month or in a day, you know, it's three to 

five times or whatever. And in our orchards, you 

know, what our trees want to eat and when. And 

so if we had a healthy soil they get to browse on 

the smorgasbord and if we just are trying to apply 

materials two times a year or so, we're really 

trying to guess what the tree wants. And it's not 

very good at telling us. So I think that's a great 

point. But, Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes. So kind of 

following-up on the last two comments. You know, 

again as a -- I am an economist. I'm not an 

agronomist. And I'm not a farmer.

So, like, a lot of this language is 

really difficult for me to follow. And kind of 

like Mindee, my default is always like to the 

organic ethos.

So one thing that I would find really 
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helpful, you know, over the next, you know, period 

of time as we think about this, is there a way, 

like, at the end whatever the recommendation is, 

to have, like, three sentences in English that 

could be used to help consumers understand, you 

know, wherever we end up on this.

Because it's kind of like when we were 

talking about the resins and the ion exchange, it's 

just like how do you distill that to something that 

someone can feel comfortable with rather than 

feeling like these external forces are coming and 

taking something that they highly value and, like, 

pushing it away from, you know, where people think 

it should be. So that's just my request. I don't 

have an opinion on this yet, but I'm sure I will 

by the fall meeting.

MR. ELA: Gosh, you want something in 

final --

DR. DIMITRI: Thank you.

MR. ELA: -- how strange. No, I think 

that's a great point and certainly something we 

need to be aware of, and I shouldn't make fun of 
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it. We do have to -- it's just like Jenny saying 

about pet foods. If you frame it in the language 

of supporting organic livestock growers, it may 

put it in a very different frame. So thank you 

for that thought.

Nate, what do you think in terms as a 

certifier that's out in the field, how do you deal 

with soil building and criteria with OFPA versus 

the use of maybe some highly soluble fertilizer?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes. I think that 

when -- so I will say I don't have a lot of 

experience with the Southeast and lots of rain. 

But I have done a lot of inspections kind of, you 

know, California over to Pennsylvania.

And I think that the coolest thing that 

I have found as far as when we discussed --

agriculture's contribution to climate change is 

our ability to say that we don't use ammonia. We 

have a much more robust and integrated soil 

building program that is not super input heavy. 

And I think that can apply to a lot of 

different types of crops even if you have plastic, 
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you know, when the plastic comes off and it's not 

a cash crop. Your cover crops aren't going to be 

grown in plastic, and there's going to be a lot 

of opportunity to feed that soil.

And so I think partly I would really 

hesitate -- so if I purchase as a farmer, I know 

we've been looking at prices for different grains 

fluctuate a bunch from, like, 2013, I started doing 

inspections and traveling a bunch and corn prices 

were great. But partly that market stability is 

due to needing to rotate your crops. Everyone 

can't grow corn every single year.

And so my worst nightmare is that some 

certifier shops has a certifier that doesn't look 

real closely at crop rotation, and they're throwing 

some clover seed out there but raising really corn 

on corn on corn on corn because it's doable.

And I think that is something that from 

a when we talked about organics' impact on rural 

communities, organics' impact on climate change, 

there's so much to that that I think that for me 

the ammonia extract sort of flies in the face of 
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everyone who sort of said the organic ethos and 

for just an approach from the organic ethos.

I also think that regulating it, and 

I know this has been talked about a lot so I won't 

belabor the point, but as an inspector who is trying 

to audit a farm that has ammonia extract, I feel 

like it's going to be really, really hopeful that 

we're going to be doing things like isotope testing 

and we're going to be doing things -- I mean, we're 

auditing practices. You know, the amount of 

testing that we've done on fertilizers is probably 

not sufficient to actually make sure people aren't 

just using conventional ammonia.

And so when a -- yes, when I think about 

also the conventional -- the organic place in 

absorbing the newer, protecting waterways, acting 

as that sponge in a community, I think there's study 

after study that says we should be looking at how

do we integrate livestock? How do we ultimately 

make it so that we don't have livestock and crops 

divorced, livestock and feedlots sending manure 

into waterways and, you know, crops ultimately 
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having a deficit of soil microbial activity?

And so I think that this kind of 

directly speeds along that organic divorce. I 

mean, organic crops in a big way need to have 

livestock nearby or they need to be figuring out 

how to get manure onto their ground.

I've also recently interviewed some 

farmers who don't have livestock nearby. They are 

corn farmers in Southern Illinois, and they were 

saying that they ultimately just do as much crop 

rotation as is necessary to get a good crop of corn.

Rather than speeding and pushing the 

system, they're going to grow other value-added 

crops like rye for seed and hay and these other 

crops that will ultimately be contributing to the 

soil health but not be pushing the system just to 

maximize corn, which I think is really kind of 

awesome. And I think it's a lot easier to 

communicate to the world why organics is the 

solution to agriculture's contribution to climate 

change.

MR. ELA: Great. Thanks, Nate. I 
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appreciate that perspective. And I look at Logan, 

55 inches of rain a year, we get 10.

MR. POWELL-PALM: Same here. And I 

don't mean to speak for Logan at all. Just it is 

a whole different world.

MS. PETREY: No, it's okay.

MR. ELA: Kyla, have we given you some 

time?

MS. SMITH: You've given me some time 

to think on it. Yes, thanks for that.

So I would just add to say that 2 up 

by 203 is the soil fertility and crop nutrient 

management practice standard. And so while there 

isn't -- anyway, so we would look at input use and 

that practice standard as well. And so unless the 

material has a specific annotation, like, you know, 

we've been talking about Chilean nitrate, we don't 

necessarily look at inputs -- well, we look at them 

in the context of that. But unless there's 

something that specifically -- you know, one that 

we're looking at in an annotation, it wouldn't 

restrict the use, I guess, is what I'm saying. 
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But we would look at it in the wider context of 

the use.

And there is the citation in there that 

does direct us to look at materials and ensure that 

they don't contribute to the contamination. So, 

anyway, we would look at that. But, again, it's 

not like a hierarchical regulation as there are 

in other places in the regulation, I guess.

MR. ELA: Great. Thank you so much.

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Well, we've had a great 

discussion. I don't want to use too much more 

time. But I will say the one thing I did not cover 

was fraud. There were a few comments on that.

I know in conversations with the 

California Department of Agriculture, they really 

felt that they had that covered as well as AMRI 

with some of the isotopic analysis.

You know, their point was if you take 

-- even though there's the variability of isotope 

ratios, if you take that sample at the manufacture 

of a lot and if you take it at the farm, those ratios 
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have to be consistent. And if they're not, it 

raises a red flag.

Like anything, if you're trying to look 

at what was applied to the soil and go backwards, 

you really can't verify that. So, you know, it's 

tough. But that would be the same if somebody 

wanted to cheat with ammonium nitrate or something 

else, you're not going to -- once it's in the 

ground, it's going to be really hard to verify or 

double-check.

And, you know, that's where the 

processes of organics -- I know around here, 

several violators have been identified by the other 

growers because things were just strange. And I 

think that grower oversight of red flags is really 

important.

So I did mention fraud a lot because 

I think I've been somewhat convinced that that may 

not be as big of an issue as overall fraud is. 

But with this product, it may be able to be 

delimited.

Kim, one last comment?
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MS. HUSEMAN: Yes. I'll make it 

quick. On that same tangent, I was going to 

mention -- and I was actually reviewing the AMRI 

written comments as you were prior to speaking, 

and on that same note, you know, they did mention 

that isotope ratio testing as they had previously 

commented that they no longer request isotope ratio 

testing due to the unreliability of test results 

to complex funded simulations.

So just something to note there. And 

to your point, the organic space is always having 

debates around fraud in one context or another. 

And that was what I was trying to, I think, 

understand a little bit better from the public 

comments was, you know, how do you manage other 

than a mass balance from that perspective?

And, you know, there's -- that, I think, 

is just one thing as a consideration too as we look 

at this more going forward.

MR. ELA: Great. Thanks. Thanks. 

And I should have probably spent more time on the 

fraud issue and with future write-ups, I will.
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All right. Well, that was a robust 

discussion. Thank you, everybody, as we move on 

to writing a proposal. But the subcommittee 

certainly will reach out for thoughts to other 

people beyond the Board and such. It makes my 

brain hurt, too. But I think it's so key. And, 

you know, the scientific literature is fascinating 

to be honest. So it kind of makes me wish I was 

a grad student again. Maybe not. I don't know. 

So I'm glad I don't have to take classes.

But, Rick, we'll turn it back to you. 

I know we're going to run long here. We were 

supposed to adjourn at 4:15, but we already 

scheduled to 5:00 so I feel like we're probably 

okay on this. So back to you, Rick.

MR. GREENWOOD: Okay. Thank you, 

Steve. Good discussion. And just one comment, 

Logan. This year we have 4.5 inches of rain. So 

we're really in a desert.

MS. PETREY: Bless your hearts, as I 

saying stop raining.

MR. GREENWOOD: It makes things very 
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difficult. So I'm going to talk about 

kasugamycin. We've been petitioned for its use 

as an approved active ingredient in crop 

production. I'm going to take, and Steve actually 

mentioned, used a human analogy of feeding trees.

I'm going to use my human experience. 

As a long time clinical microbiologist and lab 

director, the thing that I have seen in 

microbiology is anti-microbial resistance. And 

nothing is really sadder than isolating a person 

that has tuberculosis and finding that they have 

a multiple resistant M. tuberculosis. It makes 

treatment very difficult if not impossible 

sometimes.

The other is, as I'm sure all of you 

have heard is MRSA, M-R-S-A, also incredibly 

resistant microorganisms. And the reason that 

they're around is because of overuse of 

antibiotics. And people have been talking about 

this for literally decades or as long as I've been 

in that. And in particular they use it not only 

in humans where people get antibiotics when they 
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go into the physician. You know, they have a viral 

infection and it's not necessary but also in the 

whole animal industry.

And microbiologists have recognized 

it, the bacteria and microbes have recognized it 

even earlier. I mean, they're incredibly 

adaptive. And whatever happens is you put 

something in the environment and eventually they 

get around it.

So that's sort of my preamble to 

kasugamycin. It's another aminoglycoside that 

they want to use for fire blight. The comments 

that we got, some from the growers. And I 

understand that as a grower myself, they want, and 

they keep saying, another tool in the toolbox. 

The public and many of the other groups, I got a 

count of probably 250 comments saying keep 

antibiotics out of organic.

I mean, I think it's a pretty clear 

message that people don't want them there. And 

I think some of the concerns that we have, and it 

came up in the TR, is that resistance gets built 
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to these things very quickly. And there's some 

literature about microorganisms becoming 

resistant in soil samples after one use of 

kasugamycin.

There's the other issue that when 

they're sprayed on trees, it drips onto the ground, 

and you can get animals foraging in the ground and 

you have the potential for building resistance.

There are methods to control it. And 

I think one of the things -- I'll get to call on 

Steve as an apple grower. I'll turn the tables 

on him. There are methods, cultural methods, to 

make it more difficult. I won't say impossible 

but more difficult for fire blight, which is a 

bacterial disease. It's an Erwinia amylovora. 

You can control it. It's much more 

difficult. I think that's clear. And there are 

regional differences. And we've talked about 

that. Some areas, it's not much of a problem and 

we had some of the apple and pear growers even 

mention that. You know, in our area, it's not a 

big deal.
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But when it's in use, and it's developed 

even in Japan starting in 1965 and this was in the 

TR, rice blast developed resistance very quickly. 

It couldn't be used. And it's also in Florida, 

rapid fuel resistance to bacterial spot on tomatoes 

caused by xanthomonas.

So there is history for these things. 

And I'm happy to talk about them. But I would 

say our stakeholders really don't want us to have 

something else come into the production area as 

an antibiotic.

And the NOSB and NOP actually 

identified several reasons to stop the use of 

streptomycin, which is a very similar microbial 

agent, antimicrobial agent and in 2014 stated that 

the expectation is that antibiotics are not used 

in organic production.

So I'm happy to discuss this. I have 

feelings for the growers since I'm there. But I 

think it would be the wrong message to send to our 

stakeholders. And I think even though there might 

not be resistance now, California has allowed 
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kasugamycin with an application plan. I think 

it's only going to be time before we develop 

resistance.

So, Steve, I'll stop it there. You may 

want to be one of the first commenters since you're 

an apple guy.

MR. ELA: You know, I'll let a couple 

other people go first and then I am willing to chime 

in on that, yes, apples and pears. So, but, yes, 

let's go to Brian and see and then I'll say 

something about it.

MR. CALDWELL: Great. Thanks, Rick. 

Thanks, Steve. I was actually hoping that Steve 

would go first being a large scale apple grower.

But I think I'd like to speak, of 

course, with my dual role. But I'm going to start 

as an apple grower. And I think we farmers have 

to realize that without our customers, our crops 

are pretty worthless. And there is just 

overwhelming, as Rick said, sentiment against 

adding antibiotics into organic production 

systems.
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And there was quite a fight in 2014, 

I believe it was, to take antibiotics out of apple 

and pear production, which is actually my only 

previous involvement with the NOSB as I did give 

some verbal testimony against it -- well, in favor 

of taking that out.

I've been an organic apple grower for 

over 40 years. And we do see fire blight 

occasionally in our orchards. We don't have any 

spray program targeted against fire blight. But 

we do use cultural practices. Most of our 

varieties, not all of them, are pretty tolerant, 

pretty low susceptibility to fire blight compared 

to the worst. We grow root stocks that are not 

susceptible. And we don't push our trees. And 

that's a big one.

There's a mentality of like really 

rushing even in an organic production, rushing the 

yield in the fruit production. And that's a big 

part of the problem is combining a sensitive 

variety, a sensitive root stock and high 

fertilization is just a total recipe for fire 
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blight.

So that's the cultural practices that 

I think, you know, if you turn it the other way, 

less susceptible varieties, and I know their market 

is strong. But, you know, the market can be strong 

for other varieties as well. That's a tough one.

But less intensive planting systems 

with root stocks that have resistance again, 

farmers don't want to do that. They feel it's old 

fashioned or something. But it can be done. And 

then again, just taking it easy on the fertility.

So I think that's pretty much my message 

there. And I'll appreciate hearing what Steve has 

to say as well. But we really have to keep in mind 

the consumer is the one who buys our products, pays 

the premium and supports us. And we really need 

to listen to them so.

MR. ELA: Let's go to Sue and then I'll 

say something and then Logan.

MS. BAIRD: Yes. I guess I was just 

echoing Rick and Brian. My background, of course, 

is in poultry science but with a minor in 
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microbiology. And in poultry, you have to rotate 

antibiotics because they build up resistance.

And I think that's echoing what Rick 

says. If we allow antibiotics back into organic

production, we're going to build resistance, and 

they're going to have to add something else.

But most of all I'm thinking about the 

perception that people are being bombarded with 

now that we are diluting the organic standard by 

whatever reason they want to say it is, hydroponics 

or whatever, whatever.

And if we as the Board approve adding 

antibiotics back into our National List, I think 

we're going to really get slammed hard. I'm 

totally against this one.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Sue. I'll say 

something and then Logan and then Mindee.

Oh, gosh, this is -- you know, as an 

organic grower, fire blight is a big issue for us 

on pears and susceptible varieties.

I've told people my sister went to the 

International Science Fair in 1960 something with 
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fire blight as her theme. You know, researchers 

have spent their careers, you could call it a career 

breaker, looking for a solution to this and 

failing. If it's around, it's tough. It's fine. 

It's not a big deal until it becomes systemic at 

which point your choices are civil war, surgery 

or amputation.

So we deal with it. I think climate 

change has made it worse where we see -- it's really 

a combination of water and temperature because it's 

a bacteria. So if water moves it into the nectary 

of the flower, which is where it enters the tree 

and it's warm enough temperature, you have 

problems. So if there's water and it's cool, the 

bacteria won't expand. If you have warm 

temperatures and it's dry, the bacteria don't get 

moved into the nectary of the tree.

So we really watch for, you know, at 

bloom time the weather events and really track with 

models the susceptibility issue.

In fact, this week we had a 40 percent 

chance of rain and our blossoms were just starting 
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to open, and I was flooding.

Once, we used streptomycin when it was 

still on the list. It's really useful because you 

can put it on after an infection event if you get 

it on within 24 hours after you've had an infection 

event. It would kick back and help you solve 

problems. It was always better to put it on ahead. 

But I would prefer to put it on after because then 

you weren't using it preventatively, and it would 

really minimize your use of it.

In Colorado, we tended not to use it 

very much. We still had susceptibility to 

streptomycin but in other areas where they've used 

it a lot, there was resistance, and they had to 

tetramycin.

So once those were taken off the list, 

fortunately that next year there were a couple 

products released that are more effective. 

Fortunately, because otherwise we would have been 

really hanging in the wind with no effective 

method.

But the method now is a systems 
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approach, which is in one way good, but it involves 

copper and lime sulfurs early in the season so it 

does increase our copper use on apples and pears 

significantly. We rarely applied coppers to them 

before this and now we routinely apply them because 

we're trying to reduce the inoculum in the orchard 

before we even get started.

And then a lot of organic growers use 

lime sulfur at bloom time for thinning. 

Unfortunately, the product that is now used for 

prevention is a yeast product that you spray on 

when the flowers are open so it colonizes those 

nectaries and excludes the bacteria.

But if you're using lime sulfur for 

thinning, it would kill the yeast so you have to 

really use a sequential lime sulfur and then the 

yeast so you don't shoot yourself in the foot. 

And we've often been in the situation 

where you see a storm coming in. The flowers are 

open. You need to thin. And then you literally 

have to turn back around and apply the yeast. And 

the timing may literally be half a day or a day 
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or we ran into a situation a couple years ago where 

it was hours.

The blossoms didn't open up that 

morning, until that morning. It rained that 

night. And so we had to thin and protect the 

flowers almost one on top of the other except we 

can't do one on top of the other.

So it's a gray hair moment. Most of 

our varieties are somewhat resistant. But we grow 

several varieties that are really -- you know, 

consumers demand them that are not resistant.

And I've got a block of trees we haven't 

lost a Jonathan. We haven't lost that many trees, 

maybe 10 percent. But I bet we've reduced our 

canopy volume by 60 percent because we've had to 

cut off so many limbs. So that's a real economic 

hit.

But all that being said, the Board has 

set a clear precedent over the years of not wanting 

antibiotics. I think consumers, based on the 

response rate, expect that at this point. I argued 

against the removal of streptomycin, tetramycin 
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from the National List.

But I think -- I can't remember who at 

the start of this meeting said we need to respect 

Board precedents unless we have an overarching 

reason to change it. And so I think with this 

material, I would hate to change those precedents. 

I think the resistance issue is real. It is the 

only antibiotic that we could use at this point.

So it's, you know -- we all vote for 

our stakeholders. My stakeholders would say 

absolutely approve this. But I also think as Board 

members we represent stakeholders, but we also have 

to vote our conscience and our gut feeling.

And I've certainly gone against my 

stakeholders on some things and voted them with 

them on other things. So I'm going to have a tough 

time with this one that I am, you know, I've never 

abstained on a vote. This might be one. But I'm 

leaning that it probably isn't acceptable. So, 

Mindee, go ahead.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you. I'm not in 

favor of allowing antibiotics in organic. And 
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thinking about how much we heard, especially on 

Tuesday last week about consumer perceptions being 

destabilized, and I think it really behooves us 

as a community to provide more context to the 

consumer. And my experience with my many long 

years of direct interactions with consumers, 

putting pressure on why organic is doing what it's 

doing is that they're really available for the 

context.

And what I mean is that this is a really 

beautiful form of democracy. The level of 

stakeholder engagement and consensus building that 

we do, that really inspires the consumer. And if 

we can just take a little bit more time when we're 

asking for support to help them understand that 

we examine all Petitions equally and then ask them 

for support in prohibiting things like antibiotics 

if that's what we're asking.

And that really matures our consumer 

audience, which then can help us make exceptions 

in the future if we need to in such a way that we're 

not knee jerk reacting on black and white issues, 
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but we're looking at them from the perspective of 

the beauty of this democracy and everything that 

we've accomplished in organic and that we're still 

going to evaluate everything neutrally against our 

criteria. And we need their support to say no in 

this particular issue if that's what we're asking 

them for.

But I think the context in our messaging 

to help the consumer understand the depths of what 

we're doing and then ask them to support us is 

really important, especially in this kind of 

context.

MR. ELA: Thanks, Mindee. Other 

comments from Board members? All right. Rick, 

I think you're off the hook.

MR. GREENWOOD: Thanks, Steven. And 

I appreciate your comments because I know the bind 

that you're in. And in fact I think that's how 

I ended up with kasugamycin.

I mean, these are all tough decisions 

and especially more so for some of us that are 

actually doing some of the farming, and we have 
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good representation. But it's interesting. But 

I still want more rain, Logan.

MR. ELA: Yes. Our snowpack is at 50 

percent. So it's going to be an ugly year at this 

point. But thanks, Rick, so much for that great 

job on chairing crops.

And, again, I just want to recognize 

all the new chairs. You guys did a great job. 

And as I said, congratulations to the new Board 

members.

You each essentially had one sunset so 

I know we didn't overload you. But you got to 

figure out what a previous Board member was trying 

to say and you all did great. And like I said, 

you're all professionals at this point.

So congratulations, and I much 

appreciated everybody's taking over items.

So with that, I think we're going to 

move on. We have a couple things, deferred votes 

and the work agenda update. I think we'll come 

in just fine on our timing before 5:00.

I do want to say one thing that the Board 
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has been talking about in the background. And I'm 

particularly excited, but I know the Board is as 

well about a bill that was introduced this morning, 

bipartisan, about the resolution on the continuous 

Improvement and Accountability in Organic 

Standards Act.

And basically that bill is noting that 

the USDA has failed to implement and has run into 

issues with implementing key NOSB recommendations 

to clarify and update standards such as animal 

welfare, origin livestock, organic seed use and 

greenhouse production.

And in the spirit of continuous 

improvement there is foundational in organic 

systems a legislative solution for repairing the 

public-private partnership and advancing organic 

standards was introduced in the Congress today.

This Act, again, the Continuous 

Improvement and Accountability in Organic 

Standards Act will require the Secretary of 

Agriculture to initiate and complete notice and 

comment rulemaking to implement recommendations 
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approved by the National Standards Board and 

specifically the bill will require the USDA to 

develop an action plan for clearing the backlog 

of NOSB recommendations that have not been 

implemented, creates a system of accountability 

for advancing future recommendations under the 

transparent and shortened time frame and requires 

the USDA to report to Congress on the results of 

accreditation audits of third-party certifiers and 

their implementation of new regulations and agency 

guidance to ensure consistent application of 

organic standards.

I know the Board is very much in support 

of this. We polled the Board, and nobody is 

against this. So I just want to say thank you to 

all the groups that signed on to that. There's

an extensive number of groups that are in favor 

of this.

The Board didn't have enough time to 

pass the resolution, but we want to stress that 

we are highly in favor of this. And we're very 

excited.
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Jenny, I know this may put you in a bind. 

We know you get caught between us and Congress 

at times, so we sympathize with your position. 

But I think this really respects the work of the 

NOSB as has been talked about often today. And 

I just want to give a shout out to those that worked 

to get -- all the groups that worked to get this 

bill introduced.

So, again, I want to stress that it is 

-- the Board is unanimous in their support for this 

even though we didn't pass the resolution and such. 

But the Board is very excited. So I hope that 

will be taken into account by the higher ups.

With that, we will move on to the 

deferred vote, which is on ion exchange filtration. 

All right. We talked about it extensively 

yesterday. But before we vote, I would like to 

just open it back up for a brief comment period 

from the Board and see if there's anything else 

that needs to be said before we move to this vote. 

So I see Brian with his hand up.

MR. CALDWELL: Thanks, Steven. I 
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think I do have some information at least that was 

new to me. I did a little research. I was 

concerned yesterday in our discussion that styrene 

is considered a probably carcinogen. But 

polystyrene, which is the actual resin, one of the 

very common resin materials, is not. It's highly 

stable. It's not listed as a carcinogen at least 

what I could find in an admittedly kind of quick 

online search. But it didn't come up.

And polystyrene sulfonate, which is, 

and again, a common resin material, is actually 

used as a medicine, a human medicine, and it is 

considered in the write-up of that. It's 

considered that it's 100 percent excreted. So 

even if some polystyrene through leakage or 

whatever did get into some products, it sounds like 

it's not harmful.

So that actually put my mind to rest 

on that issue. However, I still would like to see 

this go back to the committee. I think we can vote 

separately on whether recharged materials and 

resin materials need to be on the national list.
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And also I would like us to hear 

clarifications -- for the groups on the 

clarifications as to what the implication is that 

the process causes a chemical change in the treated 

product and what that means in terms of its organic 

status and that sort of thing so.

I just wanted to put that out there. 

If the vote -- if we do vote and it's decided not 

to send it back to committee, I will vote in favor 

because I think it's more important that the NOP 

gets some guidance from the NOSB than not. So 

that's the last point.

MR. ELA: Thank you, Brian. Other 

comments from the Board? All right. I am not 

seeing any. So I know yesterday we discussed the 

options that we had. We did defer the vote, which 

was one of the options. The other option is to 

take a vote on returning it to subcommittee and 

then the final option if it does not go back to 

subcommittee is to move forward on the vote.

So I will pause. I do not want to cut 

anybody off if they do want to make a motion to 
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return to subcommittee. But if that motion does 

not occur, we will move on to the vote.

Asa, we recognize you.

MR. BRADMAN: Thank you. Just based 

on the discussion yesterday and the interest in, 

you know, those kind of representing consumers, 

I'm going to make a motion that we send it back 

to the subcommittee.

MR. ELA: Okay. Asa has made a motion. 

Is there a second?

DR. DIMITRI: I'll second it. This is 

Carolyn.

MR. ELA: Carolyn, okay. So there is 

a motion and a second on the floor. We will start 

with the voting. We lead with Rick, is that 

correct, Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Indeed.

MR. ELA: Okay. So this is the vote 

to move back to committee. A yes vote would move 

it back to the subcommittee. A no vote would not. 

This is a simple majority vote. We will start 

with Rick. Rick, are you there?
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MR. GREENWOOD: I am here, and I vote 

no.

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: No.

MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: No.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: No.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: No.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: No.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: No.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: No.

MR. ELA: I believe -- oh, Carolyn, I'm 

sorry.

DR. DIMITRI: No.

MR. ELA: And the Chair votes no. 

Mindee? We'll make you do your work.

MS. JEFFERY: I have 4 yes and 10 no. 

Is that what you have, Michelle?

MS. ARSENAULT: Yes. That's what I 

have as well.

MS. JEFFERY: Great so -- I'm sorry. 

I said it wrong. I have --

MR. ELA: You were correct, I think.

MS. JEFFERY: Four yes to 

subcommittee, ten no to subcommittee. The motion 

fails.

MR. ELA: And just for the record, no 

absences or abstentions.

MS. JEFFERY: Thank you.

MR. ELA: All right. Asa, I don't know 

if I failed to lower your hand or you still have 
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it raised. With that, we will move on to the vote 

on the proposal and the motion to accept the 

proposal on ion exchange materials as written. 

The motion was made by myself, Steve, and seconded 

by Jerry D'Amore. So we will start the voting with 

--

MR. BRADMAN: I guess maybe this is a 

point of order. But are we allowed to say 

something at this stage before the vote, not a 

discussion item but a question?

MR. ELA: Sure. I'll entertain a 

question.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay. For some reason 

I remember that's allowed at some point. But just 

that there would be a cover letter with this. And 

I talked about the cover letter asking for some 

specific information. I just want to --

MR. ELA: Did you --

MR. BRADMAN: -- on board with that.

MR. ELA: Yes. Would anybody like to 

speak to that?

MS. JEFFERY: Do you mean in the sense 
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of establishing our requests for the cover letter 

going into the vote?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: The cover would cover so as 

I think about it, it is proper to open up the 

discussion after a motion and a second. So, Kyla, 

would you like to say something?

MS. SMITH: Yes. I mean, I guess that 

I would be in favor of putting in the cover letter 

that we're looking for specific answers on the 

legal interpretations, you know, on whether or not 

the ion exchange resins, like, how they are 

definitioned within FDA, you know, in regards to 

food contact surfaces or subsurfaces or direct food 

additives aligned with, like, our definition of 

processing aid.

MR. ELA: It sounds like you're willing 

to help me with that cover letter.

MS. SMITH: Yes. I already committed 

to that, Steve.

MR. ELA: I just wanted to make sure. 

But all right. Any other discussion before we 
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move on. Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Just a quick question with 

that. So after this cover letter and that question 

gets answered, does it return back to subcommittee 

for finalization? Is that the intent?

MR. ELA: I think the intent is for the 

program to give some information back to the Board.

MS. BRUCH: Okay.

MR. ELA: And after that, then, I think 

it depends what the NOSB and the program would like 

beyond that. So I'm not going to guaranty it comes 

back to the Board. It may not. But I think that 

bridge is crossed down the road.

MS. BRUCH: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Anything else before we move 

to the vote? All right. We will start with Kim. 

And just to be clear, a yes vote is to pass the 

proposal. A no vote is to not pass it. And this 

requires a super majority. So with 14, it requires 

10 votes to pass. Kim?

MR. ELA: Kim?

MS. HUSEMAN: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Logan?

MS. PETREY: Yes.

MR. ELA: Nate?

MR. POWELL-PALM: Yes.

MR. ELA: Kyla?

MS. SMITH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Wood?

MR. TURNER: Yes.

MR. ELA: Sue?

MS. BAIRD: Yes.

MR. ELA: Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: Yes.

MR. ELA: Amy?

MS. BRUCH: Yes.

MR. ELA: Brian?

MR. CALDWELL: Yes.

MR. ELA: Jerry?

MR. D'AMORE: Yes.

MR. ELA: Carolyn?

DR. DIMITRI: Yes.
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MR. ELA: Rick?

MR. GREENWOOD: Yes.

MR. ELA: And the Board votes yes. 

Mindee?

MS. JEFFERY: Fourteen to zero, no 

abstentions, recusals or absence. The motion 

passes.

MR. ELA: The motion passes.

MS. JEFFERY: I really miss Jesse Buie 

right there, though, I'm not going to lie.

MR. ELA: Yes, we put Jesse on the spot 

a few times on the vote, too. I know we'll have 

a ton of votes next fall with all the sunsets. 

And often what we'll do is put Nate on the spot, 

the Vice Chair, as well as the Secretary. And 

we'll tally the votes just to double-check and that 

way we don't put Michelle on the spot. So, Nate, 

be forewarned.

MS. POWELL-PALM: I'm all about it. 

Ready to work.

MR. ELA: Sharpen that pencil. So 

that will conclude our deliberations and such. 
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We would like to move on to the preview of the next 

NOSB work agendas and materials update so that our 

stakeholders know what is coming up and where the 

Board is thinking.

Obviously, these sometimes change. We 

do our best to put what -- if we think we might 

at all go to the vote, we put up the vote so we 

don't surprise anybody. Sometimes things we have 

up for a vote get moved back to a discussion item 

or get moved back some if we run out of time or 

have issues or such.

So we'll move down the list here. I 

don't think that I'll necessarily read all of them. 

But we certainly have the second part of the human 

capital, the supporting the work of the NOSB, going 

to a vote.

Let's see here. I'll tell you. You 

just moved it on me, Michelle. We have chitosan 

as a plant disease control and a coagulant for 

fertilizer, which is a Petition going to a vote. 

Biochar is to vote. Ammonia extract 

is a vote. Kasugamycin is a vote. Hydronium, 
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which is a new one that we haven't reviewed -- that 

we haven't had a discussion document that is in 

review going to a vote.

Carbon dioxide, which is a newer 

petition, is probably going to discussion.

Lithothamnion, which again we haven't 

had a discussion document on going to a vote. And 

then, of course, all the sunsets going through 

crops as would be expected. We'll just keep going 

down through those. Those are required to have 

votes in the fall.

Then moving on to handling, 

cetylpyridinium -- oh gosh, cetylpyridinium, there 

we go, chloride. The Chair always has to show 

humbleness by mispronouncing people's names as 

well as product names or material names. That will 

go to a vote.

Phosphoric acid with an annotation 

change would go to a vote. Zein would go to a vote. 

Peroxylactic acid, PLA, will be a discussion 

document.

Fish oil annotation, which we discussed 
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at this meeting, will go to a vote. L malic acid 

reclassification we have as a vote. But I will 

be honest. I don't know if that will end up there. 

It may or may not.

Then the various sunsets for handling. 

And livestock, also a chitosan product for the 

processing aid in the production of livestock feed 

will go to a vote. And then the sunsets for 

livestock as well.

Finally in materials, we'll have the 

research priorities which we discussed at this 

meeting. Wood will dress those up, and we'll go 

to a vote.

Excluded methods, depending on timing, 

we will hopefully go to a vote on that. Tall oil, 

which is actually materials because it covers a 

number of different committees. So Jerry will 

stick that on. We'll go to a vote.

And then as always, our review of the 

Policy and Procedures manual will be a discussion 

if we need changes to that.

So are there any questions from the 
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Board on that work agenda list? Asa?

MR. BRADMAN: I don't think we've had 

a discussion document on CPC. And we're still 

waiting on the TR. So I don't know, would we still 

want to go for a vote in the fall or a discussion?

MR. ELA: I think that can be decided 

as we move forward when we get the TR back. I guess 

we put it up as a vote because it possibly might 

go for a vote.

And we wanted to be optimistic so that 

the stakeholders would be ready if we did go for 

a vote. If it gets pulled back to a discussion, 

we will note that as soon as we know that in the 

subcommittee notes or executive notes.

MR. BRADMAN: Okay. Thank you.

MR. ELA: Good point. And just to 

point out, we do not have to go to a discussion 

document. We can go straight to proposal if we 

feel so inclined. Discussion documents are 

optional, not required.

Michelle, you have a point.

MS. ARSENAULT: I was just going to add 
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that we didn't -- on this list we didn't add in 

biodegradable biobased mulch going back in that 

was sent back. Just so you know it.

MR. ELA: Good point. Yes. Thank you 

for that catch. So that will be updated. So 

whether, well, in the crop subcommittee. I don't 

need to put it all on Asa's shoulder as to whether 

that comes back for a vote or something else. So 

we'll put it down as a vote and then we'll see where 

that one goes.

Anything else? All right. Well, I 

want to thank the whole Board. You all have been 

wonderful. I would ask you to reach out to anybody 

you know. Encourage them to nominate themselves 

or others for the Board. I think those close June 

1st-ish.

I want to remind people of the Coffee 

with the Board. That is next Tuesday. And 

anybody that is interested in nominating 

themselves or others for the Board, Michelle just 

flashed up organic farmer, experienced in 

environmental protection resource conservation, 
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public interest or consumer interest and the 

science position, which Dave Mortensen was in, and 

expertise in the fields of toxicology, ecology or 

biochemistry. Fortunately, Asa has also been 

great on that as well.

So please attend that coffee if you 

want. Get a little more information. I think the 

Board members will be very candid. And we have 

some current Board members that are now off the 

Board as well to participate in that.

I'm trying to -- I just lost a thought 

in all of that. I guess one thing that I have 

really appreciated about the Board members in 

general and certainly on this Board is how many 

people actually could fill two seats. I know I'm 

both a crops person and handler. Nate fits 

certification as well as a grower. Kim is a 

handler and has been a grower. So just to name 

a few Board members.

But many of us really have experience 

across several categories. And I think that makes 

the Board ever so much richer because we can comment 
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on things bigger than just where our seat is so 

I really appreciate that from the Board.

So please, yes, the Coffee with the 

Board, get nominations out. We'd love to have more 

diversity and, like I said, push the limits on what 

the organic community can do, whether it's by color 

or region, gender, gender identification, all 

those things are very important to us.

With that, I get to have the enjoyment 

of letting this meeting go and calling it to a 

close. And we will have our next meeting starting 

with public comments the week before. But the next 

meeting with fingers crossed will be in Sacramento, 

California, and hopefully we can see each other 

in person and let new and old Board members 

commingle.

So with that, Jenny, do you want to say 

anything before we call this meeting closed?

DR. TUCKER: Thank you so much, Steve. 

I mainly want to say thank you to the Board. Thank 

you to our interpreters and thank you to the 

community. This was our third virtual meeting, 
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and it was done beautifully. And I just want to 

thank you all. So a big round of applause if you 

are still on with us.

We're still at about 100 folks. So go 

ahead and applaud the Board and all of you for all 

the work that you do during this meeting and all 

around the year to protect organic integrity. So 

thank you. Be well. Stay safe. And we look 

forward to seeing you soon.

And I think the meeting is officially 

closed.

MR. ELA: Thank you so much, everyone.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter 

went off the record at 4:45 p.m.)