The Montana Organic Association's Annual Conference will be taking place December 4-7, 2019 in Bozeman, MT.
The Montana Organic Association (MOA) brings together people, businesses, organizations, and agencies who are working to develop Montana's organic industry. MOA is proud of its legacy that has led Montana to be a national leader in organic production. But MOA is more than organic production; it also serves to educate about organic products including food, fiber, and non-food items like personal care items and household supplies, and ways to limit the use of chemicals in everyday life. MOA also advocates for policies that protect the environment, promote healthy living, and support individuals, farms and businesses who are actively engaged in developing sustainable businesses and communities. MOA accomplishes this through hosting events, serving as an educational resource, providing network opportunities, and communications.
The Montana Organic Association (MOA) is a member of the Organic Trade Association's Farmers Advisory Council. Organic Trade Association's Farm Policy Director, Johanna Mirenda, will be attending the Annual Conference, and speaking at the following two sessions:
Repairing the Public-Private Partnership in Organic Standards | December 6, 2019 | 2:50 p.m. - 3:40 p.m.
A healthy market for organic products requires critical support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Organic Program (NOP) for uniform and robust standards. However, the USDA is not advancing organic standards, and this failure to keep pace with consumers and the industry is harming and fragmenting the market. In the past 10 years, industry has advanced 20 consensus recommendations for improvements to the organic standards and the USDA has not completed rulemaking on a single one of them. Montana Senators Jon Tester (Democrat), Steve Daines (Republican) and Representative Greg Gianforte (Republican) recognized this issue in a letter to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue demanding that USDA move forward and act on a decade’s worth of stalled recommendations by the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB).
The Organic Trade Association is working on long-term solutions that will repair the broken public-private partnership between USDA and the organic industry to ensure continuous improvement and accountability of the organic standards. At this workshop, attendees will learn about the Organic Trade Association’s efforts to advance concepts for a new framework for advancing federal organic standards to keep up with the marketplace and ensure the credibility of the USDA Organic seal. Attendees will participate in a facilitated discussion about these concepts and other strategic ideas for how organic will evolve within the public-private partnership into the future.
Federal Organic Policy Update | December 7, 2019 | 8:00 a.m. - 8:50 a.m.
This panel will provide an of-the-moment update on federal policy related to organic agriculture, including implementation of the 2018 Farm Bill. Specific focus will be given to Strengthening Oversight and Enforcement of Organic; Appropriations; Research; Conservation Programs; Risk Management Programs.
The full conference agenda is available here. Organic Trade Association will also be exhibiting in the tradeshow portion of the Conference! For more information, contact Johanna Mirenda.
Conference Information:
December 4-7, 2019
Bozeman, MT