Standards, Certification And Sustainability

A panel of growers and retailers discusses the ins and outs of making sustainability a part of doing business in 2008.

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Jones: John Holmes from OFA is here, and I know he has a lot of background on certification. John, do you have something to add here?

Holmes: There are several concepts that are being thrown around and I think that’s good. The debate and the dialogue about the whole issue of sustainability is very good. But there’s also that need for clarity.

How do you define sustainability? I think the broad definition that was mentioned is an excellent way to conceptualize the process. The problem is, where does it go from there? The devil’s always in the details. The certification options that are out there are helping refine what some of the details are. The best thing about the certifications, in my mind, is that they’re competing in the marketplace of ideas. And that’s how this is all going to shake out in the long run. There are these certifications, they do have some consistent certification criteria, and they have some inconsistent certification criteria between them. But the important thing is the marketplace, individual operations, look at what those certifications mean, look at what they mean for them and what do they mean for their ability to meet that broader definition of sustainability?

I think it’s important that, because this is not a trend, this is going to be a way of life and business from this point forward, that the industry have these conversations and we be very much engaged in the definition of sustainability so we have some practicality as a part of the conversation.

The other concept that’s involved here are standards. And the term certification and certification criteria get commingled with standards, and they’re different things. When you’re talking about an ANSI- [American National Standard Institute] adopted standard, that takes it to a whole different level. ANSI is a U.S. government-created organization. They are the U.S. representative to the International Standards Organization [ISO]. When they adopt something it takes on a whole different flavor.

And here’s where the editorial comes in on my part. I’ve taken a very active interest in understanding what’s going on in this standards development process that SCS is pushing. SCS is the for-profit company that is behind Veriflora. SCS is trying to basically turn their Veriflora certification process into the standard. Well that takes it, in my opinion, out of competing in the marketplace of ideas and automatically forces the dust to settle, and I have a problem with that.

My major problem is they did not involve those impacted, the stakeholders, in the development of those certification criteria and now they’re claiming that this is what the industry standard needs to be. I have a huge problem with that. That’s why OFA is trying to get information out to the stakeholders so they understand what’s going on here, and hopefully provide some clarity between this concept of certification and standards, because they are two different things.

If you’re confused, join the club, but I think it’s important that we all be a little proactive in educating ourselves on what’s happening. If you want some easy tools and this is not a plug, go to OFA.org. There’s a lot of information about the standards development process that is occurring. You’ll see about meetings that have occurred, and one that’s occurring in Washington D.C. on Feb. 29th, encouraging stakeholders to show up. And those stakeholders with these draft standards go beyond just floriculture or horticulture. They’re trying to apply sustainable standards to all of agriculture.

But there are multiple concepts being discussed here, and I think it’s important that we really work to have that clarity so we’re not commingling or confusing ideas. Because the confusion is what’s leading to some of the frustration that you’re hearing and I think that frustration is going to force people to shut it out and then shut it down and we’re not going to get where we need to go.

Jones: John, do you see value in having one standard or is there value in having both an MPS and a Veriflora?

Holmes: My honest answer is I don’t know right now. But I think the dialogue is good as long as it’s engaging those it’s impacting. I’m a free market guy and I think competing in the marketplace of ideas is very important. I think that could probably do more for driving what the eventual standard is than anything else. But that’s going to take some time and participation from the people in this room.

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