This is taken from Kelly Damewood 's comments at the EcoFarm session. She first addressed the issue of grain fraud. Then she said the following:

"Hydroponics. So I just want to first say that this has been an incredibly challenging conversation for me personally, for our board members personally, for our staff members. We do have 4000 certified CCOF members who have a range of opinions on the issue. And I obviously don’t have time or the opportunity to give a full picture perspective of how we made decisions, of how we got to the place we are now. 

"But I also want to acknowledge; I don’t think I have ever acknowledged publicly to you, Dave, of how much I appreciate your passion and commitment to protecting organic integrity and the farmers and activists that you are working with. I have a lot of appreciation and admiration for the work that you have put into the Real Organic Project and your efforts at the NOSB."

Dave Chapman: "Thank you."

Kelly: "Yeah, I do. 

"CCOF. You know, I also want to say that I agree with you that putting another label on the marketplace is a potential solution. I think there is a proliferation of labels in the marketplace, and consumers, for better or worse, HAVE to be more educated than ever before. We’re being approached at CCOF whether to offer Regenerative Organic Certification. We just started offering Grass-Fed Organic Certification. That is one avenue that people are pursuing. 

"I think on our end as a certifier we are also doing everything we can to make sure we’re upholding the standards, processes in place, upholding the integrity. 

"We’ve also been a strong proponent of requiring hydroponic labeling. We believe in transparency. I just want to make sure that I acknowledge that we would support having transparency by acknowledging hydroponic systems.

"I welcome you to our event on the 18th. I think it would be wonderful to have a strong showing of CCOF members. I think it would be interesting if you attended the board meeting on Feb 18 and I know I could make space for a conversation. That might be more impactful.

"And if you DO rally I would suggest the 19th because that is when we have an advocacy day in Sacramento where we are trying to get California to actually invest in funds to help organic farmers to develop organic system plans and to help schools purchase more organic food. So that’s actually generating some publicity and media at the State Capital. 

"But the 18th is our board meeting. I will make space if you want to come and have a conversation."

 

These are excerpts from Gerry Davis' testimony to the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) at Jacksonville in 2017:

MR. DAVIS:  "Gerald Davis, Grimmway Farms. I represent Grimmway Farms; I'm also an ex-NOSB member. I actually worked on the 2010 greenhouse and container-growing hydroponic recommendation, and my comments today are on that subject."
            
"Grimmway Cal-Organic is the largest organic vegetable grower in the U.S., topping $500 million in sales in organic vegetables."
 
"This land did not magically turn around through simple input substitution of organically-approved materials, but took years of compost applications, green manure, cover cropping, and proper crop rotation to be nurtured to healthy soils.

"It takes time and commitment to organic principles, which includes financial commitment to not take shortcuts.  Outdoor container production is one such shortcut that bypasses land stewardship and soil ecology development altogether.

"This production system does not follow many sections of the organic regulations, and virtually ignores the intent of organic principles of land stewardship."

 "Such outdoor operations that have sprung up in California have been wrongly certified since no statutory standards exist to exempt them from adhering to land sections of the law."

 "It is our opinion that containerized production is merely a shortcut to bypass the expensive and time-consuming process of organic certification. We say, let the hydroponics production method develop its own marketing label, based on the merits of their system; not ride the coattails of a successful label that doesn't match their methods or goals."

"You can't feed a crop in a container on only 20 percent of the total nitrogen need of the crop.  It becomes a hydroponic system after a few months, even if it's super well-constructed; lots more compost. Eventually, in a nine-month tomato crop, it runs out, and for at least the second half of the crop, you have a 100 percent hydroponic system."

"And the reason I say that is sort of like what Dave Chapman just said in a simpler way.  If you withhold the nutrient feed, the crop stops, and it will not harvest anymore within just a week or two.

"When I helped craft that recommendation, I had no clue that seven years down the road, there would be vast acreages of containerized blueberries and raspberries and so on and so forth, proliferating through California, basically doing what I was suggesting we should allow for greenhouses; to construct a good soil and make it as much like real soil as possible, biodynamically and everything.

"So the unintended consequences of what I helped craft, I'm sad to say, I'm sad to see it come to what it has."

“I was so fired up after hearing you at EcoFarm, that I plan to go to Sacramento to the CCOF board meeting and speak during the hour that they have given to this topic.”

"CCOF should uphold and represent the full intent of the OFPA by suspending certification of hydroponic farming operations. Hydroponic growing is not consistent with the intent or the actual letter of the OFPA enabling legislation. The practice of instant organic certification for hydroponic farms cuts the legs out from under the long term committed organic farmers, and shifts the advantage to those highly capitalized operations."

Jesse Buie speaking at the Jacksonville NOSB meeting:

"You know, I feel the same way I did about protecting that organic seal as I did when I was a soldier protecting the American flag.

"We live in a competitive -- we live in a capitalistic society where competition is good. The market will determine the continued success of hydro, aero, and aquaponics, and certified organic, if the consumer has full disclosure as to how these different operations work.

"And I want to say it again. Notice I  mention each one of them separate, and certified organic, and not attaching organic to a different method for survival reasons, which is what I constantly hear.

"I believe that soil is the foundation of organic, and this subcommittee has really worked tirelessly to come up with a compromise.
 

"Good or bad, I have seen much work done in trying to get some consensus. And as everybody has mentioned, we don't have it yet.  But fellow board members, I kind of want to ask you something, and correct me if need be. The elephant in this room is the fact that we are trying to solve a problem that kind of was created above us -- above the chain of command, and I hope I don't get in trouble. And I'm honest about that because I do want to serve on the board.
 
(Laughter.)

"But the ultimate solution to the problem that we are talking about, the ultimate solution is for the NOP to enforce the regulations. It's just that simple. But that hasn't happened."

"When I joined California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF) in 1984, I became Certification Chair for our chapter – this meant that I was automatically on the state certification board. At that time, we were writing a lot of the rules and the regulations for organic agriculture in California. Every week, we just hammered on one point, and wrote, and rewrote, and finally came up with things that we thought had to do with the integrity of working with the soil and creating healthy soil.