Organic food refers to food that comes from an organic agricultural production system. Organic agriculture refers to a sustainable agriculture that does not use synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, growth regulators and feed additives in the production process. It emphasizes strengthening the virtuous cycle of natural life and biodiversity. Organic food certification agencies certify that the production, processing, storage, transportation and sales points of the food meet the standards of organic food through certification. It is worth noting that there are many organic certification agencies at present. Some certification agencies can issue organic certification certificates as long as they pay money, which seriously disrupts the normal order of the organic food market. Relevant departments are investigating. Therefore, when choosing an organic food certification agency, the chairman must pay attention to verify whether the certification agency has been recognized by authoritative departments such as the China National Certification and Accreditation Administration (CNCA) and the China National Accreditation Service for Conformity Assessment, and has a formal approval number. The following takes the certification process of the China Organic Food Certification Center (COFCC) under the Ministry of Agriculture as an example to explain the working procedures for applying for certification of organic food.

(1) Application

① Applicants log in to the relevant website to download and fill out the "Organic Food Certification Application Form" and "Organic Food Certification Questionnaire", download the "Organic Food Certification Written Materials List" and prepare relevant materials as required.

② The applicant shall submit the documents required by the Organic Food Certification Application Form, Organic Food Certification Questionnaire and Organic Food Certification Written Materials List to make a formal application.

③ The applicant shall establish its own quality management system, technical measures for quality assurance system and quality information tracking and processing system in accordance with the requirements of Part 4 of the national standard of “Organic Products”.

(2) Document review

① The certification center conducts contract review and document audit on the application materials.

② After the review is passed, the certification center will estimate the certification fee based on the project characteristics and the certification fee details, and send the "Acceptance Notice" and "Organic Food Certification Inspection Contract" (hereinafter referred to as the "Inspection Contract") to the enterprise.

③If the audit fails, the certification center will notify the applicant and will no longer accept the applicant's application that year.

④ After the applicant confirms the "Acceptance Notice", he/she shall sign the "Inspection Contract" with the Certification Center.

⑤ According to the requirements of the Inspection Contract, the applicant shall pay the relevant fees to ensure the normal progress of the preliminary work of certification.

(3) On-site inspection

① After the enterprise returns the "Inspection Contract" and pays the relevant fees, the certification center will send a qualified inspector.

② The inspector shall obtain relevant information of the applicant from the certification center and conduct on-site inspection and evaluation of the applicant’s quality management system, production process control, tracking system, as well as origin, production, processing, warehousing, transportation, trade, etc. in accordance with the requirements of the “Implementation Rules of Organic Product Certification”.

③ If necessary, the inspector needs to take samples of soil and products, and the applicant shall send the samples to the designated quality inspection agency for testing.

(4) Writing inspection reports

After completing the inspection, the inspector shall prepare an inspection report as required by the certification center within the specified time and submit it to the certification center.

(5) Comprehensive review and evaluation opinions

The certification center conducts a comprehensive review based on the application form, questionnaire and other relevant materials provided by the applicant, as well as the inspector's inspection report and sample inspection report, and submits the review report to the certification committee.

(6) Decision on Issuance of Certificate

The certification committee will conduct a comprehensive review of the applicant's basic information questionnaire, the inspector's inspection report, the certification center's evaluation opinion and other materials, and make a decision to approve the certification, conditionally issue the certification, issue the organic conversion certification or refuse the certification. The certificate is valid for one year.

When the application project is more complex (such as aquaculture, fishery, processing, etc.), or within a period of time (such as 6 months), a technical committee working meeting will be held to make a certification decision on the corresponding project.

① Agree to issue the certificate. The application content fully complies with the organic standards and the organic certificate is issued.

②Conditional certification: If the application content basically meets the organic food standards, but some aspects still need to be improved, the organic certificate can be issued after the applicant makes a written commitment to make the improvements as required.

③Organic conversion certificate issuance. If the applicant's base has entered the conversion period for more than one year and continues to implement the organic conversion plan, an organic conversion certificate will be issued. Products harvested from the organic conversion base can be processed in an organic manner and sold as organic conversion products, i.e. "organic conversion products".

④ Refusal to issue the certificate. If the application content does not meet the requirements of the organic standards, the certification committee will refuse to issue the certificate and explain the reasons.

(7) Issuance of the certificate decision

After the certification committee makes the certification decision, the center director authorizes the certification committee secretariat (Certification Department II) to use the signature stamp on the certification report and issue the certification decision based on the conclusions made by the certification committee.

(8) Use of organic food logo

According to the requirements of the certificate and the "Organic Food (Product) Logo Use Regulations", sign the "Organic Food (Product) Logo Use Permit Contract" and go through the procedures for the use of the organic/organic conversion logo.

(9) Maintain certification

① The validity period of the organic food certification certificate is 1 year. In the new year, COFCC will issue a "Notice to Maintain Certification" to the certified enterprise.

② After receiving the "Notice of Maintaining Certification", the certified enterprise shall submit the certification materials as required, communicate with the contact person to determine the time for the on-site inspection and pay the relevant fees in a timely manner.

③ The procedures for document review, on-site inspection, comprehensive evaluation and certification decision to maintain certification are the same as those for initial certification.