Blog posts by advocacy
Node UUID: 143ccd8b-e0dc-40d2-beb0-8b8b14c5d6a9
Written by Guest Blogger
on Tuesday, May 21, 2013
on advocacy
This post was written by Eric Steenstra, President, Vote Hemp.
On Monday night, Senator Wyden introduced Farm Bill Amendment 952 to define industrial hemp and allow states to regulate it along with bipartisan cosponsorship from Senators Paul, McConnell, and Merkley. We have never been closer to seeing legal hemp farming in the United States and need your calls and emails to Senate offices today. Please visit and share this link: http://www.votehemp.com/farmbill.
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Node UUID: bdf4ab35-8191-41c9-b4e5-7c208bb5cca9
Written by Zea Sonnabend
on Wednesday, May 1, 2013
on advocacy, grower, handler, materials and inputs, NOSB, standards
The National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) met April 9-11 in Portland, Oregon. NOP Deputy Administrator Miles McEvoy reported on the many activities of the National Organic Program (NOP) in the six months since the last meeting. Recent activities include work on the previous NOSB nanotechnology recommendations, international agreements, and aquaculture standards. Proposed rules in progress include origin of livestock, final rule on sodium nitrate, and apiculture standards. Guidance documents still to come this year include grower groups, inspector qualifications, responding to results from...
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Node UUID: bc062c53-ccbe-44d2-b8f9-f515df14b4e8
Written by Brise Tencer
on Tuesday, April 30, 2013
on advocacy, food safety, grower, handler, standards
Update 04/30/13:
The FDA has extended the comment period on the proposed food safety regulations until September 16. This change was made as a result of numerous requests for more time to review the proposals, which are complex. The additional time offers CCOF members an opportunity to provide more feedback about the proposals, areas for concerns, or suggested changes. We encourage you to continue sending us your feedback to policy@ccof.org.
Original Post 03/13/13:
I wanted to take this opportunity to update CCOF members on the FDA proposed rules for implementation of the Food Safety...
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Node UUID: 5cdb2b41-71a8-49c4-b33e-9cb8080fc3bd
Written by Tina Cosentino
on Monday, April 15, 2013
on advocacy, policy
This article appeared in the Spring 2013 edition of Certified Organic magazine.
Consumers are increasingly turning to farmers’ markets to buy healthy, fresh produce. As of mid-2012 there were 7,864 farmers’ markets operating nationwide. This is a 9.6 percent increase from 2011. Today, there are over 800 certified (by the state of California) farmers’ markets in California alone, representing approximately 2,200 producers. These markets provide a welcomed higher-margin return to farm producers and reduce costs by eliminating the need for standard pack on fresh fruits and vegetables....
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Node UUID: 5095ca57-bc41-4a9a-82f1-5c8a156b4208
Written by Guest Blogger
on Thursday, March 7, 2013
on advocacy, farming: materials and inputs, grower, NOP, NOSB, policy, standards
This post was written by Zea Sonnabend, CCOF inspector and policy specialist.
CCOF is committed to ending the use of antibiotics in organic fruit production. We believe that a longer time period is necessary for oxytetracycline than the current 2014 expiration date because of the continuing research in varying locations and seasons that would ensure success, the need for registration of new materials, and enough time for grower education and outreach. We would like to see an extension in the range of 2017 to 2020 for phase out; however, we support the majority position to extend the...
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Node UUID: 68671579-564b-49d4-9e60-02c4583ff060
Written by Brise Tencer
on Monday, January 14, 2013
on advocacy, farm bill, funding, policy
In the last days of December and the beginning of January, Congress and the White House passed legislation to avoid the “fiscal cliff.” They attached language to the legislation that extends provisions of the 2008 Farm Bill for nine months, giving themselves until September 2013 to write a new farm bill. Unfortunately for farmers across the nation, this farm bill does not actually extend all programs and leaves many growers high and dry. Organic farmers were hit particularly hard by this move as no funding was provided for the Organic Data Initiative (which provides for price reporting and...
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Node UUID: 1f2cad77-a292-43a7-be32-576d4384807f
Written by Cathy Calfo
on Thursday, January 10, 2013
on advocacy, genetic engineering, services
It's a New Year!
Our first CCOF staff meeting of the new year began with sharing personal resolutions and words of wisdom with each other. Our vows to get in better shape, be more present, and take on new challenges match well with CCOF’s organizational goals:
Provide more personalized certification services (faster, less paper).
Talk directly to local congressional offices for action on a new U.S. farm bill and investment in organic. While averting the fiscal cliff, Congress eliminated nearly all farm bill support for organic agriculture.
Remind our friends and neighbors to say “No” to GMOs...
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Node UUID: ee251207-51de-4b8d-af59-9f5de57fd9ad
Written by Brise Tencer
on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
on advocacy, food safety, policy, standards
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released two proposed rules for implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), signed into law on January 4, 2011. One of the rules is about produce safety and other is about processing. Both rules have 120-day comment periods. Additional rules related to implementation of FSMA are expected.
The proposed Produce Safety Rule would establish standards for growing, harvesting, packing, and holding produce on domestic and foreign farms in light of identified routes of microbial contamination of produce, including agricultural water;...
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Node UUID: 17d7c1b3-29cf-439a-b525-6ea6be1ef0df
Written by Guest Blogger
on Monday, December 10, 2012
on advocacy, CalCAN, policy
This article was written by Renata Brillinger, California Climate & Agriculture Network.
This is a good news and a bad news story. First, the bad news…
In June 2012, an international team of researchers released a report in the journal Nature warning that climate change, population growth, and environmental destruction are leading to a “tipping point” that will cause disastrous and irreversible biological changes across the globe. The authors say that we are poised at the point in history when uncontrollable ecological events are beginning to take place and without bold and immediate...
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Node UUID: e2f247bc-5b59-491f-a7c2-24f678e8de70
Written by Brise Tencer
on Friday, May 11, 2012
on
After much uncertainty about the timing of the 2012 Farm Bill, the legislation is finally moving forward. On April 26, the Senate Agriculture Committee passed a farm bill that included $23 billion in cuts. Although the farm bill still has a long way to go before becoming law (the House has not yet acted), things are happening fast, with the full Senate expected to consider the bill in May and the House Agriculture Committee suggesting they will likely consider the bill in June or July.
The Senate Committee’s version of the 2012 Farm Bill is a revolutionary piece of legislation in that...
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Node UUID: d66aa99c-ecc8-4c2a-bf40-612c1543ed92
Written by Brise Tencer
on Friday, April 27, 2012
on
This past week I joined fellow CCOF staff and board members in traveling to Washington D.C. to advocate for organic farm bill programs and participate in the OTA Policy Conference. This year, the whirlwind trip coincided with the Senate Agriculture Committee consideration of the 2012 Farm Bill.
The OTA Policy Conference & Hill Visit Days had a great lineup of high profile speakers and addressed a range of topics from food safety and GMO labeling to research needs and the OTA organic marketing order proposal. It was a fantastic time for all of us to reconnect with the broad spectrum of...
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