It’s been more than two decades in the making, but organic dairy farmers now have a final rule from USDA clarifying how conventional livestock are transitioned into organic production and how they are managed in the organic system.

The rule does away with the practice of continually transitioning or cycling dairy animals in and out of organic production.

The Origin on Livestock final rule specifies that a producers can transition nonorganic cows to organic production only once.

It further clarifies that once an operation is certified organic, a producer cannot source transitioned animals from other operations and can only add livestock that have been organically managed from the last third of gestation.

“The Origin of Livestock rule has wide support across the organic industry, from small family farms to some of the largest organic dairies across the country,” said Johanna Mirenda, farm policy director at the Organic Trade Association.

“Over our years of advocacy on this rule, OTA members and organic industry leaders have submitted over 2,700 comments across three different comment periods in support of this rule,” she said. “We are extremely pleased that USDA has today issued this long-awaited final rule.”

The National Organic Standards Board began working to clarify origin of livestock standards in 1994. The first of six recommendations came in 2002.

In 2006, USDA Agricultural Marketing Service stated inconsistent allowances for replacing organic animals was a significant concern and additional clarification was needed.

USDA published the Origin of Livestock Proposed Rule in 2015, reopened the comment period in 2019 and reopened it again in 2021.

In an earlier interview, Gwendolyn Wyard, vice president of regulatory and technical affairs for the Organic Trade Association, told Capital Press some organic certifiers allow dairies to routinely bring in nonorganic animals and transition them for one year, rather than raise their own replacement animals under organic management.

Farmers who do not raise their own organic replacement animals have lower costs of production, creating an economic disadvantage for organic farmers who comply with the regulations, according to an OTA analysis.

“Additionally, some farmers are allowed to remove organic dairy animals from a herd, raise them using conventional feed and other prohibited management practices and then retransition them back to organic,” she said.

A fair and final Origin of Livestock rule has been the top priority for the Organic Farmers Association every year since the organization was founded in 2016, Kate Mendenhall, the association’s executive director, said on Tuesday.

“We are delighted to see it finalized today at USDA,” Mendenhall said. “This is a huge win for organic farmers and the organic community as a whole.”

The key will be uniform enforcement, she said.

“We have already lost too many organic dairy family farms to unfair competition. Strong enforcement of the Origin of Livestock rule is imperative to regain economic competition for family farms within the organic milk market,” she said.

More information about the Origin of Livestock rule is available at: www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/national-organic-program-origin-livestock