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Uncertified processors, traders cannot claim to resell Indian organic products, says APEDA.
Sep 19, 2022

India’s National Programme for Organic Products (NPOP) has a unique feature that prevents the resale of products sold to uncertified processors or traders as organic, says Agriculture and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) Chairman M Angamuthu.

'In order to identify the handler involved at each stage of a transaction, it is mandatory that the buyer of an organic product also need to be certified. Adequate provisions have been made in the product flow of multi-ingredient products too, as several suppliers certified by multiple certification bodies may be involved in the supply chain,' said the Chairman of APEDA, which is the nodal body for organic produce production, certification and exports.

APEDA has developed a web-based traceability system that ensures the traceability of the product and conformity to standards during production, processing and handling.

Certification’s mandate

This helps in identifying the movement of a product at each stage right from the harvest, to procurement, transport, processing and dispatch. This enables the verification of the period during which the produce is held and ensures compliance at each level. It also ensures that the quantity is in accordance with the input and processing methodology, he said.

'The NPOP certification mandates that products which are exported from the country have been produced and handled by certified operators. This also includes farmers who are the producers. The certification programme permits certification of the supplier of products by any of the certification bodies accredited under NPOP,' Angamuthu said.

This results in the involvement of multiple certifications for a single product, resulting in APEDA developing the Web-based traceability system. On the other hand, in order to carry out efficient verification and validation through onsite inspections and document verifications, only competent certification bodies have been provided accreditation to certify the processing and trading units, he said.

Surveillance activities

The inspection and certification procedures followed by these certification bodies are assessed by a team of subject experts annually. In addition, to the routine audits and assessments, inspections to check compliance at the level of selected farmers, processors and exporters are carried out unannounced, besides verification audits being done, the APEDA chairman said.

'In all these surveillance activities, conformity to NPOP and the specific requirements of importing countries are assessed and the deviations reported are taken into consideration for appropriate disciplinary measures,' he said.

India has developed the standard for accreditation under NPOP in line with the requirements of major importing countries. 'The international standard for conformity assessment has been adopted for accreditation and certification. This has provided added advantage to India in obtaining recognition from importing countries. Accordingly, the unprocessed plant products which are certified under NPOP do not require additional certification as per the Regulation of the European Union, Switzerland and Great Britain,' Angamuthu said.

Deal with Taiwan

The farmer community enjoys the privilege since compliance with NPOP provides additional benefits for seamless export to multiple destinations. India is negotiating with major trading countries such as South Korea, Japan, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and UAE for mutual recognition, allowing smooth conduct of bilateral trade.

'Recently, we concluded a negotiation with Taiwan. It is expected to enhance the organic trade between both the countries in the coming days,' the APEDA Chairman said.

Organic products were being exported before NPOP was launched but subsequently, the trade has expanded with India going in for equivalence arrangements with other countries. 'With demand increasing for organic feed from livestock and poultry abroad, India has turned out to be one of the main suppliers of organic feed,' Angamuthu said.

Stating that India has immense potential to export organic products since it was shipping out only 25 per cent of its total production, the APEDA chairman said the difficulty in capturing the overseas market was because retail brands were exporting as raw material commodities or ingredients.

Action against defaulters

To a question on the disciplinary action taken by APEDA against a few certification bodies, Angamuthu said surveillance activities during the Covid pandemic have been found to have loose ends which required rectification to maintain the integrity of Indian organic products in overseas markets.

'To protect the credibility of the certification programme, actions have been taken against non-compliant certification bodies based on the severity of the non-compliance. Disciplinary measures have been imposed on responsible actors also in the supply chain such as grower groups, processors and exporters,' he said.

If the identified irregularities are found to be due to willful violations, action is taken imposed to prevent further lapses in the certification programme, he said, adding that APEDA is in the process of introducing several control mechanisms in the monitoring system to prevent willful violations and irregularities.

The authority is also taking additional steps to educate farmer producer organisations, groups, producer companies and self-help groups to meet the requirements at the farm and post-harvest levels.

APEDA is also laying special emphasis on promoting organic products from the North-Eastern region. It is also promoting organic millets as part of the International Millet Year in 2023.

'As millets are generally consumed as the staple food in the country, value-added products of millets are being taken up for promotional activities to generate better foreign exchange,' he said.

thehindubusinessline.com

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