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Please post any comments relevant to the Mission & Principles Task Force here.

I've inserted a section on fundamentals (into Jim Pierce's edited version of the Principles document) that I hope will contribute to today's discussion. Thanks for your consideration. (I'm also learning how to use the wiki; thanks for your patience.) --Don Hodge

I have attached a letter requesting that M&P members take a look at the draft Principles document.

Responding to Russell's request for input, I want to reiterate my comment on the 2/2 task force call (not reflected in the letter) that the draft principles document omits some widely recognized, fundamental principles of sustainabiity. I suggested text to address this omission in the "fundamentals insert" version of the draft in the attachments above. The ANSI process could certainly result in a standard that does not apply these principles, but many would argue that it would not be a standard of sustainable agriculture as sustainability is generally understood. This would encourage promotion of competing standards (as in the grass-fed vs. naturally raised controversy), negating one of the primary benefits of an ANSI standard, the unification of an increasingly crowded, confusing field. Thanks for your consideration.

I suggest adding to section IV. Principles of Sustainability, above subsection A., the following text:

Fundamentals of Sustainability Thinking

The following fundamentals requirements of sustainability thinking underly the sustainability principles proposed below.
1. A long-term view: Sustainability principles must contemplate a long time horizon, of many human generations at a minimum.
2. A systems view: Sustainability principles must address the interconnections among the three sectors, ecology, society, and economy and, not the individual entities that make up the sector but the diversity of entities within each sector that provides resilience to the system. Sustainability principles must also recognize the limits to the three sectors that the laws of thermodynamics and a finite material world impose.
3. A precautionary view: Sustainability principles must incorporate precaution in the presence of scientific uncertainty in order preserve options for future generations.

Some concerns about the emphasis and wording of the Sustainable Principles document:

1) It's important to keep "socially just" in the Vision/Mission statement. "Respectful of social norms" is not OK as a replacement.

2) In the Working Definition of Sustainable Agriculture, we need to say something about fulfilling labor rights. Right now there is nothing about workers. "Enhance the quality of life for farmers and society as a whole" is not enough.

3) I strongly favor including a statement in the Working Definition and in Ecological Principles about substituting renewable for nonrenewable resources and steadily reducing use of nonrenewable resources. It is not enough to just "Make the most efficient use of ... nonrenewable... resources." Nonrenewable = nonsustainable in the long term.

4) In Ecological Principles, it's not enough to "consider" the environmental footprint. We need to reduce that. And we want to reduce the entire environmental (or ecological, as it is more commonly known) footprint---not just the climate footprint.

5) In Economic Principles, please change to, "Financial stability for producers and workers". (The standards discussion has only been considering producers as having livelihoods at stake, but lots of others depend on the food system for their income and livelihoods.)

6) In Social Principles, please add, "Produce healthy, safe food and other products." (This might seem obvious, but there's nothing about health and safety of the products of the food system anywhere in this document.)

7) In Social Principles, please add/keep "Respect and protect animal well-being." This is important to much of the public now, and I believe will become increasingly important.

I'd like to see the language about consumer awareness retained and would suggest the following "and 6) increasing consumer awareness of sustainability practices in many varied industries, including agriculture."

In the working definition section we discussed at the Feb 2 meeting to change the wording of farm and ranching to a more inclusive term (see notes). I would suggest "agricultural practices" to replace "farm and ranching".

The first bullet point seems rather redundant "food, nutrition, feed" are different but to the casual reader they seem to address the same issue. I would like to also see the word 'ornamental' included in the string to call out the inclusion of ornamnetal production of agricultural products (tree, shrub, flowers). This is consistent with the call out of 'fiber'.

A few quick comments:

Title: since we're talking about principles of sustainability (not principles that will be sustainable), the title should reflect that, e.g., "Sustainability Principles for a Standard for Sustainable Agriculture".

Section I, para. 4: the concept expressed in the deleted text "and 6) Increasing consumer awareness of the need for paradigm shift and demand for sustainably grown products either instead of or in addition to organic certification" seems valid to me and should be retained. Similarly, in Section I, current para. 5, the ceoncept expressed in the text "In addition, rapidly advancing technology in agriculture has led to increasing questions of sustainability, quality and safety" seems valid and should be retained. These sections could be marked for Standards Committee discussion by some typographical convention like brackets or italics.

Section I, para. 7: some examples of ways modern production agriculture has shifted to meet environmental concerns would illustrate this point.

Section II and comment JP2: generally an organization or process has a vision and mission and a document has a purpose, so there is a discrepancy between the title of the section and the text. A vision statement generally begins with something like "in the year [date], agriculture will [description of what agriculture should look like in that year]". A mission statement would begin with something like "The mission of the ANSI consensus process to develop a sustainable agriculture standard is ...", as distinct from "The purpose of the ANSI Standard for Sustainable Agriculture is to..." or "The purpose of this [Sustainability Principles] document is to...". No doubt this seems like "mere" semantics or "wordsmithing" but precise usage will help convey the exact intended message.

Also, I support Molly's comments. My two cents; thanks for your consideration. --Don Hodge