Spanish organic vegetables: organic specialist trade is taking action against artificial fertilizer

Spanish organic certification authorities allow the use of artificial fertilizer in organic vegetable farming. Organic-market.info asked whether the German organic specialist trade is affected as well. The result: Those with activity in Spain and high quality standards have known about the problem for a while and are well prepared.

According to a report of the German newspaper taz, the Andalusian organic certification authority Sohiscert is allowing a fertilizer with 30 percent nitrogen for organic agriculture. Taz experts confirm that such a nitrogen concentration can only be reached with artificial fertilizer and indicate that this is not an isolated case. Organic-market.info approached the organic specialist traders Naturkost Schramm and Biotropic about this topic. Naturland went to the public on its own initiative.

Strategy of Naturkost Schramm

Christian Kaufmann is the manager of Naturkost Schramm, a company importing fruit and vegetables for the organic specialist trade – also from Spain. According to Naturkost Schramm, the company has been aware of the problem long before the authorities. In Schramm’s opinion, it is mainly one certification authority that turns a blind eye on the circumstances. As an importer, Naturkost Schramm cannot control all of the producers’ actions itself. In their answer, they said that they are pointing out the products that are viewed critically to their producers and carry out random checks with isotope analysis. This measurement method makes it possible to determine with reasonable certainty whether the nitrogen in a tomato originates from organic fertilizer or from artificial fertilizers.

Kaufmann said that two years ago, Schramm hat a case in which they were able to prove the use of artificial fertilizer by analyzing it. The farm showed them the fertilizer permitted by its certification authority. Through a isotope analysis, they were able to prove that it was synthetically produced nitrogen. Kaufmann reported the case and the produced disappeared from the market within two weeks. However, such an analysis costs 250 euros, takes longer than a pesticide test and is not completely certain. Nevertheless, it gives good indications and confirms that in general the products are okay.

Strategy of Naturland

Naturland has now certified 44 producers in Spain, many of them in the Almeria vegetable region. They are looked after by Alexander Koch. In an interview on naturland.de (in German), Koch says that unfortunately the situation in Spain is that some of the certification authorities apply very lax criteria when certifying inputs such as fertilizers. Some fertilizers certified by them can impossibly be eco-compliant. That is why with new enterprises, fertilizers and other inputs are right at the top of the examination list.

In several cases, this has already led to Naturland not taking in enterprises, says Koch. Additionally, Naturland makes regular visits to the certified farms, some of which are unannounced, and works together with selected certification bodies. Therefore, Koch is certain that the Naturland certified farms in Spain are not using any non-eco-compliant fertilizers. This was explicitly confirmed again against the light of the current reporting.

Strategy of Biotropic

Sascha Suler, operations manager at the organic specialist trade importer Biotropic says that they have been worried for some time about the growing use of purchase nitrogen – particularly in greenhouse agriculture, pointing this problem out in consultations. Nevertheless, they assume that the organic farmer is on the safe side when using EU-organically certified inputs. If now certified means are on the market which are based on synthetically produced nitrogen, Biotropic sees this as a striking failure of the control authority. According to them, it is the task of the certification bodies and authorities to provide information on currently controversial products as quickly to possible. In addition, Suler calls for critically analyzing and improving the procedure for the certification of operating means.

Strategy of the authorities

Organic-market.info asked the German Federal Ministry of Agriculture (BMEL) how long the organic farming department had known about the situation (artificial fertilizers for Spanish organic vegetables). They answered that the BMEL has only recently received information on this process. Furthermore, the issue has not yet been dealt with at EU level in the responsible Committee of Organic Production (COP).

We also wanted to know who should now prevent Spanish vegetables fertilized with artificial fertilizers from continuing to be marketed in Germany as organic vegetables. The BMEL does not see itself in the responsibility, saying that the monitoring and control of companies and goods Is the responsibility of the federal states. These are informed about the process. And in Spain, the local authorities would have to check whether the facts described by the taz were correct. At least, according to the BMEL, they will inform the European Commission and ask it to facilitate a debate on the facts described at the next meeting of the COP at the end of November.

Comment: Please test – and quickly

If I were editor-in-chief of Ökotest, ZDF Wiso or Panorama, I would quickly send my employees to Aldi, Lidl, Edeka and co to buy organic cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes from Spain. Right to the lab and I bet you: where it's all about price and quantity, you'll find artificial fertilizers. And then we have another beautiful organic scandal.

This can only be prevented if the authorities and inspection bodies are quicker. For example, a state authority could instruct the inspection body responsible for the central warehouse of a large retail chain to take samples of organic cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes fresh from Spain and send them to the laboratory. The inspection bodies could also check on their own initiative whether their customer has a Spanish supplier who has been certified by the inspection body Sohiscert. Their publicly accessible list of operating resources would be sufficient grounds for suspicion. If so: block goods, take samples... that must be done anyway if Ökotest was faster.

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