This tool is designed for farmers considering organic certification under the crops scope of the USDA's National Organic Program standards. This assessment will provide useful feedback for those who have already decided to certify, by evaluating how close your current farming and record keeping practices are to those necessary to obtain organic certification. This tool is also useful for farmers who have not decided to seek organic certification, but would like an idea of what kinds of changes they would need to make in order to become organic compliant.

To take this assessment, we ask for your name, contact information, farm size, and whether or not you are participating in the Transition to Organic Partnership Program. We use the information you provide in order to connect you with additional technical support, and to better report the assistance you are receiving to the USDA. We do not sell your information or share it with advertisers or spammers. However, we may share your information with organizations assisting organic growers in your region.

This assessment tool has been developed by Michigan's Transition to Organic Partnership Program. Our goal in developing this exercise is to assist Michigan farmers interested in transitioning to certified organic agriculture. The content of this assessment comes mainly from this certification readiness quiz from CCOF. We have modified the structure and phrasing of the questions to better fit the online format.

Yes! This tool is open to any farmer interested in obtaining organic certification. Please be aware that we may forward your information to your state or region's Transition to Organic Partnership Program representatives to provide further support. 

Yes! You do not have to be a mentor or mentee in TOPP to take this quiz. Please be aware that we may reach out to you afterwards to see if there is further technical assistance we can provide to you in transitioning to certified organic agriculture.

In this quiz, less is more -- the lower your score, the closer you are to organic certification. This quiz assigns points for diverging from the National Organic Program standards. A score of 33% or less in any given category puts you in the green "bullseye" zone, meaning you are hitting most or all of the targets for certification. A score of 34-67% in a category puts you in the yellow "caution" zone, meaning that you have some changes to make in order to be fully in compliance. A score of 68% or higher in a category puts you in the red "warning" zone, meaning that you may have to make significant changes to obtain organic certification.

In order to make the graphic at the end of the quiz not look strange for respondents who have "perfect" scores, we assign a minimum value of 0.1 points for each answer in compliance with certifier standards, and a value of 1-3 points for each answer that is not in compliance with standards. This tool is meant to help you evaluate if you are ready to seek certification -- your certification agency may have other criteria not assessed here.