For Consumers

Note on Baystate Certified Packaged Products

Baystate Organic Certifiers often gets calls about packaged agricultural commodities that are certified by BOC and state that they are grown in a foreign country. We only certify crop production in the U.S. Therefore, for those products grown in a foreign country, we are not certifying the crop, we are certifying the packaging of the agricultural commodity in the United States. For all of these products, another accredited certifying agent has certified the crop production aspect, and BOC has verified the certification of the crop.

The National Organic Standards requires certified agricultural commodities be certified at every step in the production process where the commodity is handled or packaged. The certifying agent for the final distributor is to be listed on the packaging. That is why frozen fruit or packed grain grown in South or Central America is listed as certified by BOC.

Baystate Certified Operations

The National Organic Program maintains a database of all organically certified operations including operations certified by Baystate Organic Certifiers. The organic database of operations may be accessed here.