Idea 276 of 500. Cluster 14: Farm to shelf
Organic certification services for smallholder groups, shared so the cost is bearable
The mechanism, from the book
The smallholder sells raw to a collector at the gate and the collector sells to a packer who puts his own name on it. Denmark's farmers got rich the day they owned the creamery.
Every idea in cluster 14 uses this mechanism.
A first step
Ask a certification body for the cost and paperwork of certifying a group of smallholders rather than one farm, and get the answer in writing. Then take that figure, divided by 20 farms, to a village farmers' society and ask how many members would pay their share. A list of farmers ready to pay, and the certifier's quote, show whether a shared service works.
- Who pays first
- A group of smallholders already farming without chemicals, who lose the organic premium because one certificate costs more than a single farm earns.
- What leaves today
- Produce grown organically is sold as ordinary because the paperwork is out of reach, so the organic premium is earned by certified growers elsewhere.
The idea and the mechanism are from the book. The first step was written for this site as a suggestion; if you know a better one, say so.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
The only test any idea on this site has to pass. The four rules that go with it are here.
In the book
- Ch. ElevenThe Mechanisms
Denmark's co-operative dairies and the binding contract that held them
More from cluster 14
- 271A farmers' co-operative dairy in the hill country selling cheese and yoghurt under its own brand
- 272Buffalo-milk mozzarella and ghee for the hotels and for export
- 273Fruit and vegetable drying: mango, pineapple, papaya, jackfruit and okra as premium snacks and soup mixes for Europe and the Gulf
- 274Frozen tropical fruit pulp for the smoothie chains of the world
- 275Heritage rice varieties grown under contract and sold at ten times the commodity price
- 277Mushroom farms supplying the hotels, since most are still imported
Idea 276 of the 500 in the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? Every one can be started by one person, one family or one small firm.