Standards innovation: our work

Find out about our work around organic standards and how you can take part in consultations.

1. Our current consultations and how to take part.
2. How do we set standards?
3. Why do we consult?
4. Our ongoing work.
5. Our past work.

Our current standards development work

Standards consultation: Food and Farming inputs in Northern Ireland

5 December 2025

The Soil Association is consulting on proposed changes to our standards for farming, growing, feed mills and food processing in Northern Ireland. Most of these are the result of recent changes to the EU Organic Regulation for permitted inputs including fertilisers, soil conditioners and nutrients, additives and processing aids for animal feed and processed food. There is an additional proposed amendment – related to country of origin labelling – resulting from a previous change to the EU Regulation.

We are seeking feedback from everyone with an interest in organic farming, growing, feed mills and food and drink production in Northern Ireland – licensees, farmers, growers, vets, animal feed producers and food manufacturers, consumers and academics, to help ensure that we set standards which are stretching yet achievable and continue to deliver for climate, nature, human health and animal welfare.

Your feedback is important to us and we take it into account when making recommendations to our independent Standards Board about the Soil Association standards. So please have your say today using our short online survey, which should take no more than 10-15 minutes to complete. 

Why are you asking me what I think about your organic standards?

For an organic farmer or food producer to use the Soil Association symbol, they must be certified to our higher standards. These are stricter than the legal minimum for organic in areas including animal welfare, protection for the environment and human health and clarity for consumers. We maintain these higher standards because we want to drive change and to continue to set the gold standard for organic certification and food production.

Following the UK’s exit from the European Union, organic farmers and food producers in Northern Ireland follow a different set of organic rules from those in Scotland, Wales and England (GB). In Northern Ireland, the baseline organic rules are set by the EU. Because the standards we are consulting on have been amended by the EU Organic Regulation, they will apply only to organic producers in Northern Ireland.

The new Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/973 makes a number of amendments to the products and substances authorised for organic farming and food, including fertilisers, vet treatments given via animal feed and food additives.

We have carefully reviewed each of these amendments and we are now consulting on including most of them in the Soil Association higher standards. There are some changes made by this Regulation for which we are looking for more detailed input from our stakeholders, and we will use this feedback to help inform our decision on whether any new higher standards are required. Find out more and have your say here. The survey is open until 3rd February 2026.

For further information please contact us at standards@soilassociation.org 

How do we set standards?

We don’t just make them up! Soil Association standards are set and overseen by the independent expert Standards Board.

The governance process we follow to set our standards is open, transparent and robust. We aim for our standards to be stretching and ambitious, yet achievable.

Find out more about the wider process of how we set our standards.

Why do we consult?

We run in-depth, far-reaching and targeted public consultations as part of the standard-setting process, in line with industry best practice set out by ISEAL. We want to hear feedback from the full breadth of our stakeholders. We take all feedback into account before introducing or amending our Soil Association standards.