Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Internal control systems
One tool that IFOAM and the IOAS developed is a metaregulatory tool, the internal control
system (ICS). If a group of hundreds or thousands of farmers was organised in an association
of producers, and if the producer association had an internal inspection system whereby local
inspectors, be they extension workers or farmers, were trained to inspect other farmers for
compliance to organic standards, where inspection reports were maintained for all participat-
ing farms and issues of non-compliance were addressed, then an external inspector could
come to check on the integrity of the internal control system using a specific sampling tech-
nique, rather than doing a 100% inspection of all producers' farms that would otherwise be
required. In this way, the ICS is able to reduce the costs of inspection and certification. It
should be noted that in the initial stages of development and implementation of the ICS, the
human resource costs borne by the producer group are generally significant, requiring consid-
erable human resources, strong farmer commitment and organisational capacity (Harris
et
al
.
2001, Giovannucci 2005). However, over time, these costs will be reduced (Pyburn 2003).
Beyond reductions in the costs of inspection and certification, a potentially valuable
outcome of the use of the ICS tool in smallholder certification is the empowerment of the
producer group. Instead of having external inspectors come in to evaluate progress, the internal
control system provides producers and their associations with the ability to take control over
the verification of their compliance to organic standards. Ownership of the process by produc-
ers can be strengthened through training and capacity building in verification, documenta-
tion and monitoring mechanisms. It can also strengthen social control mechanisms of the
producer group as it places the decision-making about compliance firmly in the hands of the
producer association, at least in the first instance. In one ICS implemented by an organic rice
producer cooperative in North East Thailand, producers who had been in the organic program
for several years and had seen the changes as a result of the implementation of an ICS, stated
that they had become more organised, that they met more regularly together and that they
were learning much more than before about the certification process because they were a part
of it. While it is more work for them as they are now required to make production plans and
record production inputs among other tasks, participation in the ICS enabled them to think
about their future plans and the next steps for their farms (Lorenzen
et
al
. 2004).
There are different ways in which an ICS can be implemented, however. The example above
is illustrative of an endogenous form of ICS where producers are actively involved in ICS man-
agement. At the other end of the spectrum is an exporter-led model, whereby a buyer organises
producers and controls the ICS through the implementation of external guidelines to regulate
the supply chain and outsourced farmers (Pyburn 2004). Further research is needed to better
understand the impacts and dynamics of these different expressions of ICS.
Although there is much hope and belief in the ICS process to address the needs of small-
holder producer certification, its acceptance by government regulatory authorities has been
mixed with disagreement on the technical issues of how to verify such systems, including
exactly what external inspection sampling rate is appropriate (see Harris
et
al
. 2001, Parrott
and Marsden 2002). IFOAM commissioned a series of workshops for certification bodies and
government authorities since 2000 to facilitate a discussion and agreement on the role of ICS
in organic certification processes. A key challenge is that ICS is partly a soft learning-based
capacity-building tool for development, while at the same time, it is a 'harder' verification and
inspection tool. Tensions between these different roles are clear. There is a need for f flexibility
in the application of ICS to different contexts as producer groups are organised differently in
various parts of the world. Certain features are needed in common for an ICS to be considered
a functional platform for organic certification, thereby making it acceptable to private and
governmental regulatory authorities.
