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The future structure of the organic conversion information service (OCIS) in England.

28 June 2006

The Farm Animal Welfare Council (FAWC) would like to comment on a couple of aspects of the Future Structure of the Organic Conversion Information Service in England.

Firstly as regards scope (3.9), FAWC believes that the technical aspects of the conversion process are indeed challenging in particular with respect to animal welfare and animal health. This point was explicitly made in the FAWC report on the Welfare Implications of Farm Assurance Schemes published in 2005:

“116. FAWC recommends that for new entrants to organic livestock farming undergoing the conversion process from conventional livestock production, the health and welfare plan should stand as a centrepiece in the conversion plan, and new producers should receive explicit attention and guidance from their certifying bodies in adapting to the new health management regimes that are required.”

In this context guidance from the Organic Conversion Information Service is, at least, as important as from certification bodies and we would recommend that animal welfare and animal health are considered as technical difficulties considered during conversion.

Secondly, when it comes to accreditation of advisers (3.11) the competency of the adviser with respect to practical animal welfare and animal health indicators/outcomes is obviously critical. We would therefore, urge that these aspects are included within any competency framework that might be drawn up to support an accreditation type system. Other key issues that would need to be addressed are discussed in the FAWC report but critically they would include basic understanding of welfare and risk assessment associated with changes in husbandry, routine medication and vaccination programmes.

We hope that these comments from FAWC are helpful.