Secretary Vilsack has explicitly said the U.S. will not take any cues from the European Union’s plan for a more sustainable food system, which includes cutting farmers’ use of pesticides in half, reducing synthetic fertilizer use by 20 percent, and transitioning at least 25 percent of the E.U.’s farmland to organic production by 2030. The AIM for Climate initiative Vilsack launched at COP26 is so far primarily supporting industrial agriculture projects, none of which mention organic farming and at least one of which is in partnership with the pesticide industry’s trade group.
In an interview, NOP Deputy Administrator Jennifer Tucker and Senior Advisor for Organic and Emerging Markets Marni Karlin said the overall agency is committed to climate action and that “support for organic” is one of the many ways it is achieving that commitment. They also referenced additional cost-share payments for certification as an example of the kinds of support USDA is providing to organic farmers.
Karlin said one of her biggest priorities is “making sure that organic has a seat at the table in the big discussions that are happening throughout the department,” on issues like climate, equity, loan programs, and market development. At the same time, Tucker said she’s focused on both moving forward rules that are important to organic farmers and groups as well as putting “tremendous thought and resources” into improving compliance and enforcement alongside certifiers.
But neither Tucker nor Karlin could directly specify why organic had been left out of the climate initiatives outlined by Secretary Vilsack.
Way beyond the Beltway, out in the fields, some farmers are forging ahead to claim regenerative and its climate promises for organic farmers. Based in Boulder, Colorado, Mad Agriculture was created in 2018 to eliminate barriers that prevent farmers from adopting regenerative systems. The founders were on a clear climate mission, and after identifying financing as one of those barriers, they created the aforementioned Perennial Fund. Yet while their ultimate goal is to build diversified, regenerative farms, they identified organic certification as their baseline, and they’re using the bulk of the initial capital to help farmers finance the three-year organic transition period, explained Brandon Welch, the Director of Capital at Mad Agriculture. During this window, farms have to stop using synthetic chemicals but don’t yet receive higher prices for their crops.
Since such a large percentage of agriculture’s emissions come from nitrous oxide, “We wanted to focus on a form of agriculture that doesn’t use any synthetic nitrogen,” he said. Many of the farmers the group is working with, such as Matthew Fitzgerald in Minnesota, are thinking far beyond eliminating synthetics. “Our farmers are also cover cropping, they’re using a four-year [crop] rotation,” Welch said. “They also want to move away from the industrial corn and soybean system. They want to be growing other crops, they want to be growing food for people, and they want to do it in a way that’s improving soil health.”
So far, the 10 farms transitioning 5,700 acres represent half of the fund’s allocations, and Welch said he plans to distribute the other $5 million to farmers by the end of March. Eventually, Mad Agriculture’s ambition is to help transition half of the total land they’re working on to Regenerative Organic Certified (ROC), another add-on label to USDA organic (like the Real Organic Project certification) which includes stricter soil health, animal welfare, and worker rights provisions.
Buzz about ROC was bubbling up in 2019 and then seemed to quiet down for a while. But Elizabeth Whitlow, the executive director of the Regenerative Organic Alliance, which administers the certification, said the team has been making quiet progress over the last few years, just at a slightly slower pace than expected due to the pandemic. As of now, Whitlow said they have issued 45 ROC certifications to cooperatives that represent 27,000 farmers on 152,000 acres, largely in the global South.
However, Whitlow is convinced this spring is going to mark a turning point for the ROC label on farms in the U.S. Her team is bringing on five new certifiers, including CCOF, the industry leader. “We’re going to hit the ground running with them this year,” she said, explaining that many farms and wineries are waiting in the wings. Last year, Alexandre Family Farm became the first dairy in the U.S. to achieve ROC certification.
“Now it’s time to start looking outward and working on the consumer education part, and this is a really key moment for us, because there’s so much buzz about regenerative, but nobody really fully agrees on what it means,” Whitlow said. “For the Regenerative Organic Alliance, it means organic is the baseline, and you can’t be regenerative if you’re . . . still using chemicals, no matter how judiciously.”