First-Of-Its-Kind Online Organic Materials Search To Debut
January 21, 2014 California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF) continues to streamline organic certification through its materials revolution and will demo a new online Materials Search service Jan. 22-25 in Pacific Grove, CA, at the CCOF exhibitor booth at the EcoFarm Conference.
The new service, which is available to CCOF members, combines CCOF internally-reviewed materials, Organic Materials Review Institute (OMRI) Products List© materials, and Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA) Brand Name List materials in one place. The comprehensive list found in MyCCOF allows members to check the status of any reviewed material and request its inclusion in their Organic System Plan (OSP).
“CCOF members will never need to guess if a material has been reviewed and can request OSP changes online day or night, even with a smart phone,” explains CCOF Certification Services, LLC President Jake Lewin. This is also the first time that CCOF’s internal material review information has been available to its members, and it includes all reviews so clients know what has and has not been approved in the past. This provides full transparency to all members while saving them time and making certification more efficient.
The new Materials Search allows operations of all types to check to see if their brand name processing aid, additive, fertilizer, etc. is allowed for use in their organic operation. The operation can then request immediate addition of the material to their OSP through an interactive OSP update process. This will be especially beneficial to certified livestock and processing operations, who typically do not use many OMRI- or WSDA-listed materials. CCOF has internally reviewed a wide range of materials for use in livestock and processing operations.
In addition to Materials Search, CCOF provides members with access to certification information via MyCCOF, an online certification management tool. The tool includes MyCCOF: Supplier Management, which allows members to track the real-time status of supplier certifications.
CCOF strives to keep certification costs low while still innovating certification processes that give new benefits to all members. “We are deeply committed to amazing and delighting our members with new ways to streamline certification processes so that we can focus on ensuring organic standards and not paperwork,” said Lewin. “In the last several months, we implemented new inspection reporting tools to speed up and improve the quality of the reporting and review processes.”
Demonstrations of the new Materials Search will be available at the CCOF exhibitor booth during upcoming conferences and trade shows: EcoFarm, Jan. 22-25; World Ag Expo, Feb. 11-13; and Natural Product Expo West, March 6-9.
CCOF would like to express sincere gratitude to the Organic Materials Review Institute and the Washington State Department of Agriculture materials review program for their support and assistance in bringing this service to its members.
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