Starter Kit. Idea 276 of 500. Cluster 14
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.
The 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.
Ask first
- Department of Agriculture. Ask whether group certification for smallholders is recognised, and which bodies certify it.
- Sri Lanka Export Development Board. Ask which buyers abroad pay more for certified organic produce.
Check before you spend
Whether a group certificate covers every member's farm, who inspects each one, and what happens to the group if one member breaks the rules.
Find out these three numbers
- What does certifying one farm cost compared with a group?
- How many smallholders would join and share the cost?
- What extra do buyers pay for certified produce?
A comparison from the book
New Zealand. Chapter Eleven
"makes it worth spending on brand and quality, because nobody who did not pay can take the benefit"
When only members carry the certificate, each member gains from paying their share.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.