India's organic cotton cultivation is once again in global controversy. This time, it's up to the Organic Cotton Market Report 2022, a non-profit organization that claims to be taking positive action on climate change.
It has estimated the global organic cotton crop in 2020-21 at 342,265 tonnes produced from 6,21,691 hectares of certified organic land. Organic cotton accounts for 1.4 per cent of the total cotton production and its production has increased by 37 per cent since 2019-20.
However, it has less confidence in data from five countries - India, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkey and Uganda - which accounted for 76 per cent of the certified organic total in 2020-21. In addition, he says he trusts Turkey's data two out of three times.
due to doubt
Terry Townsend, a textile industry consultant and former executive director of the International Cotton Advisory Council (ICAC), said on LinkedIn that one of the reasons to be skeptical (about the report) is that yields are calculated from the reported certified area. And the output is too high to be true.
In his posting, Townsend, who is demanding the report be withdrawn, said, "Almost by definition, yields in organic agriculture are lower than those achieved by conventional farmers, and the reported organic cotton for 2020-21 The yield of the same in itself raises suspicion of fraud."
One reason India's data is being viewed with skepticism is that the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) – India's nodal agency for organic farming – has sued at least four certification agencies for irregularities in the certification process. has been punished.
all parameters violated
The agencies were found to be violating all norms regarding organic cotton certification and, ironically, the growers were not aware that they were part of the organic farming group.
These growers did not follow any norms for organic farming and used agro chemicals in their crop. Certifying agencies did not have internal control systems, requiring an office at the location where the producer group grew organic produce.
One of the organizations penalized by APEDA did not have any records of the growers group registered for organic farming. Earlier this year, the International Organic Accreditation Service suspended the accreditation of the Control Union (CU) India to test and sample Indian organic textile products, alleging irregularities in the certification process.
Mentioning India and four other countries, Townsend said that farmers, ginners and traders around the world know that it is possible to make fraudulent claims of organic cotton content without much risk.
no penalty
“After all, no one is ever jailed or fined for falsely claiming organic certification. Of the five countries for which the 2020-21 data has admitted to having low confidence, none has a system of Permanent Ballast Identification Number (PBI),” he said.
Therefore, bales of cotton in these countries can be swapped and once the bales reach the spinning mill, there is no way to trace their origin or origin. A company making a bogus claim of organic ingredients risks losing certification and becoming an unlisted-supplier, losing the certified organic value premium, potential customs detention and reputational damage, he said, but it means a lot.
Townsend wrote, "Not to say that his production estimates are almost certainly inflated, there are reasons to be highly skeptical of the figures reported by the certification agencies."
Unique case of Türkiye
The report noted that organic yields in eight countries, which account for 3,07,214 tonnes (90 per cent of the world's total) of 2020-21 production, were equal to or higher than total yields in each country, they said.
"At the very least, he explained how such high yields could be achieved, and nowhere did he address the issue," he said.
In the case of Turkey, which is the primary issue raised by the former ICAC official, while organic cotton production has tripled, the country's agriculture ministry says it has fallen fourfold!
Townsend objected to this with the disclaimer that it is "purely an aggregator of data" and does not perform an authentication function. He added that farmers, ginners and traders around the world know that it is possible to make fraudulent claims of organic cotton material without much risk.
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