Reference metadata describe statistical concepts and methodologies used for the collection and generation of data. They provide information on data quality and, since they are strongly content-oriented, assist users in interpreting the data. Reference metadata, unlike structural metadata, can be decoupled from the data.
The collected statistics for the country cover the following data:
Certified registered organic operators (referring to their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of operators)
Certified registered organic processors who manufacture organic products (as their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of processors)
Certified organic crop area (under conversion and fully converted) (expressed in hectares)
Certified organic crop production from fully converted area (expressed in 1 000 kg)
Certified organic livestock (expressed in heads of live animals)
Production of certified organic products of animalorigin (expressed in 1 000 kg of carcass weight and in thousand eggs)
Production of certified organic milk products (Produced on farms or Processed on farms or by dairy enterprises) and Honey and products of bee-keeping (expressed in 1 000 kg of products obtained)
Certified organic aquaculture sold by producers (expressed in 1 000 kg live weight)
Certified registered organic operators (referring to their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of operators)
Certified registered organic processors who manufacture organic products (as their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of processors)
Certified organic croparea (under conversion and fully converted) (expressed in hectares)
Certified organic cropproduction from fully converted area (expressed in 1 000 kg)
Certified organic livestock (expressed in heads of live animals)
Production of certified organic products of animal origin (expressed in 1 000 kg of carcass weight and in thousand eggs)
Production of certified organic milk products (Produced on farms or Processed on farms or by dairy enterprises) and Honey and products of bee-keeping (expressed in 1 000 kg of products obtained)
Certified organic aquaculture sold by producers (expressed in 1 000 kg live weight)
Calendar year 2022
6.1. Institutional Mandate - legal acts and other agreements
REGULATION (EU) 2017/625 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL
Article 3
(5) ‘delegated body’ means a separate legal person to which the competent authorities have delegated certain official control tasks or certain tasks related to other official activities;
and
Article 27 states” the competent authority may delegate control tasks to a particular control body only if the conditions laid down in Article 5(2) of Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 are satisfied, and in particular where:
(a) there is an accurate description of the tasks that the control body may carry out and of the conditions under which it may carry them out;
(b) there is proof that the control body:
(i) has the expertise, equipment and infrastructure required to carry out the tasks delegated to it; (iii) has a sufficient number of suitable qualified and experienced staff; and
(iii) is impartial and free from any conflict of interest as regards the exercise of the tasks delegated to it;
(c) the control body is accredited to the most recently notified version, by a publication in the C series of the Official Journal of the European Union, of European Standard EN 45011 or ISO Guide 65 (General requirements for bodies operating product certification systems), and is approved by the competent authorities;
(d) the control body communicates the results of the controls carried out to the competent authority on a regular basis and whenever the competent authority so requests. If the results of the controls indicate non-compliance or point to the likelihood of non-compliance, the control body shall immediately inform the competent authority;
(e) there is an effective coordination between the delegating competent authority and the control body.
6.2. Institutional Mandate - data sharing
A Data Sharing agreement and Service level agreement are in place with both our Organic Control Bodies.
7.1. Confidentiality - policy
In accordance with Article 27 and 28 of Council Regulation (EC) No. 834/2007, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine has delegated control tasks to the Organic Control Bodies In accordance with Article 27 of EU Regulation 834/2007, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine is the Competent Authority in respect of organic production. In order to operate the control systems to which operators producing, preparing storing, or importing from third countries, products as referred to in the relevant EU Regulations are subject, data sharing is required with the Organic Control Bodies to which the certification and inspection of organic operators is delegated. As such, the Organic Control Bodies are the operators of the control system to which operators producing, preparing, storing, or importing from third countries, products as referred to in Article 1 of Council Regulation (EC) No. 834/2007 are subject. We have Data Sharing agreements in place under the above legislation with both Organic Control Bodies. The Data Sharing Agreement is specific that all steps and all information shared should be under the control of the Organic Control Body specifically see headings Processing of Data by Receiving Bodies, Security, Confidentiality and ownership & procedure for data loss/breach. No idenitifier is used when gathering information for the dataset provided by the commission
7.2. Confidentiality - data treatment
Not applicable
8.1. Release calendar
Data is publised by the Commission on the Eurostat webpage, however if a request is made to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine the data could be supplied.
Data will only be made available once the Commission has signed off same typically after the 30th of June of the following year.
No national release calendar is in place for organic production statistics. Information will be released on an adhoc basis where appropriate when it is requested
8.2. Release calendar access
Not applicable
8.3. Release policy - user access
Not applicable
Yearly
10.1. Dissemination format - News release
NA
10.2. Dissemination format - Publications
Commission publishes statistics on the Eurostat Webpage, see below URL.
Statistics are not published nationally, however information is available if requested.
Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, would disseminate data mostly through Parliamentary Questions, however most questions don't require the full set of data as an answer.
10.5.1. Metadata - consultations
Once a year for Commision, Other queries throughout the year do not require the full set of data as an answer.
10.6. Documentation on methodology
NA
10.6.1. Metadata completeness - rate
Not applicable.
10.7. Quality management - documentation
NA
11.1. Quality assurance
Organic Control Bodies sign a Service Level Agreement in which they are required to be accredited to current ISO Standards (currently ISO 27001)
A yearly audit is completed with each Organic Control Body, see below audit checklist
DAFM carry out an office audit on each approved OCB (annual inspection) as per commission regulation 2017/625 (Art 33) and Regulation 2018/848 (Art 40). During the annual inspection, the DAFM will verify the following: (a) the compliance with the control body’s standard control procedure as submitted by the control body to the competent authority in accordance with Article 40(1) of Regulation (EC) No 2018/848.; (b) that the control body has a sufficient number of suitably qualified, experienced and impartial staff, as well as the expertise, equipment and infrastructure required to perform official control tasks in accordance with Article 29(b) of Regulation (EC) No 2017/625 and that training concerning risks affecting the organic status of products has been implemented; (c) That the control body has and follows documented procedures and templates for: (i) The risk assessment procedure in accordance with Article 38 of Regulation (EC) No 2018/848 and Article 9 of Regulation (EU) 2017/625. (ii) Preparing a risk-based sampling strategy, conducting sampling and laboratory analysis. (iii) Information exchange with other control bodies and with the competent authority. (iv) Initial, follow-up controls and effective monitoring of operators under their control; (v) The application and follow-up to the catalogue of measures to be applied in case of suspected or established non-compliance. (vi) Observing the requirements of the protection of personal data for the operators under its control as laid down by the Member States where that competent authority operates and in accordance with Directive 95/46/EC. (vii) That the Control Body works and is accredited in accordance with standard EN ISO/IEC 17020 ‘Requirements for the operation of various types of bodies performing inspection’ as required under Article 29 of Regulation (EC) No 2017/625 During this audit the inspector will randomly select several files for inspection. These files are checked to ensure the effectiveness of the OCB inspection. Any issue identified will be conveyed to the OCB for their appropriate attention. If a serious non-compliance is found that implicate the OCB, DAFM may suspend or withdraw the approval of the OCB, as provided for in Section 10 of the Service Agreements. The 2022 HQ audit finds that both OCB's operate to a satisfactory level as an approved OCB
12.1. Relevance - User Needs
Commission uses the information to update Eurostat.
Members of Parliament require certain aspects of the statistical information, depending on their speciality or area of concern.
Memebers of the media have previously requested access to certain aspects of the statistcal informaiton again dependant on area of speciality.
12.2. Relevance - User Satisfaction
All feedback is welcome, however we do not send out offical surveys regarding statistics.
12.3. Completeness
All compulsory fields are completed
12.3.1. Data completeness - rate
WE provide 100% of all information that is required within the Dataset
13.1. Accuracy - overall
Transcribing error's - i.e data is correct however when being transcibed onto dataset a input error could be made by the organic control body.
To reduce this bias we have instructed the organic control bodies to have a second check on the data returned to us. Department of Agriculture staff also compare data with the data provided under the same heading in the previous year. If there is a large difference we could ask the organic control bodies to reexamine the data provided.
13.2. Sampling error
NA
13.2.1. Sampling error - indicators
NA
13.3. Non-sampling error
NA
13.3.1. Coverage error
Na
13.3.1.1. Over-coverage - rate
NA
13.3.1.2. Common units - proportion
NA
13.3.2. Measurement error
NA
13.3.3. Non response error
NA
13.3.3.1. Unit non-response - rate
NA
13.3.3.2. Item non-response - rate
Na
13.3.4. Processing error
Transcribing error's - i.e data is correct however when being transcibed onto dataset a input error could be made by the organic control body.
To reduce this bias we have instructed the organic control bodies to have a second check on the data returned to us. Department of Agriculture staff also compare data with the data provided under the same heading in the previous year. If there is a large difference we could ask the organic control bodies to reexamine the data provided.
13.3.5. Model assumption error
Not applicable.
14.1. Timeliness
See concepts below.
14.1.1. Time lag - first result
6 months
14.1.2. Time lag - final result
Normally 6 months but could be 7 months if queries arise
14.2. Punctuality
See concepts below.
14.2.1. Punctuality - delivery and publication
Release is directed by the commission. The datasets are completed when required.
15.1. Comparability - geographical
Data is comparable
15.1.1. Asymmetry for mirror flow statistics - coefficient
Not applicable.
15.2. Comparability - over time
Statistics are comparable
15.2.1. Length of comparable time series
No break since 2009 for all of the below headings.
Certified registered organic operators
Certified registered organic processors
Certified organic croparea
Certified organic cropproduction
Certified organic livestock
Production of certified organic products of animal origin
Production of certified organic milk products
Certified organic aquaculture
15.3. Coherence - cross domain
IFS data and annual crop statistics are sourced by using the same administrative sources as data for organic production statistics.
15.3.1. Coherence - sub annual and annual statistics
Not applicable.
15.3.2. Coherence - National Accounts
Not applicable.
15.4. Coherence - internal
Statistics are consistent
One executive office salary .5 of a day per week over the year. We also require our Organic Control Bodies to provide some of the information, this is not within our remit and therefore we are unable to quantify same.
We are in the process of developing a new system, which should capiture the majority of information required for these returns. This will be used to help with the burden.
17.1. Data revision - policy
We do not make any alternation or amendments to data recieved from our Organic Control Bodies.
17.2. Data revision - practice
We do not make any alternation or amendments to data recieved from our Organic Control Bodies.
17.2.1. Data revision - average size
Not applicable.
18.1. Source data
The data is complied by our Organic Control Bodies who collect the information.
18.2. Frequency of data collection
Annual
18.3. Data collection
We use the Dataset provided by the commission. This is sent to the Organic Control Bodies for completion. Figures are compared to previous returns to ensure accuarcy.
18.4. Data validation
Checking that the population coverage and response rates are as required; - All organic licenced operators are included in the statistics.
Comparing the statistics with previous data collections; - Each year the statistics are checked against the previous years return.
Investigating inconsistencies in the statistics; - If there are any queries, we request a double check on the numbers.
Flagging of data (confidentiality, reliability). - No identifier is included with any of the statistics.
18.5. Data compilation
We use the Dataset provided by the commission. This is sent to the Organic Control Bodies for completion. Figures are compared to previous returns to ensure accuarcy.
18.5.1. Imputation - rate
No substitute values are used
18.6. Adjustment
NA
18.6.1. Seasonal adjustment
Not applicable.
The collected statistics for the country cover the following data:
Certified registered organic operators (referring to their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of operators)
Certified registered organic processors who manufacture organic products (as their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of processors)
Certified organic crop area (under conversion and fully converted) (expressed in hectares)
Certified organic crop production from fully converted area (expressed in 1 000 kg)
Certified organic livestock (expressed in heads of live animals)
Production of certified organic products of animalorigin (expressed in 1 000 kg of carcass weight and in thousand eggs)
Production of certified organic milk products (Produced on farms or Processed on farms or by dairy enterprises) and Honey and products of bee-keeping (expressed in 1 000 kg of products obtained)
Certified organic aquaculture sold by producers (expressed in 1 000 kg live weight)
Transcribing error's - i.e data is correct however when being transcibed onto dataset a input error could be made by the organic control body.
To reduce this bias we have instructed the organic control bodies to have a second check on the data returned to us. Department of Agriculture staff also compare data with the data provided under the same heading in the previous year. If there is a large difference we could ask the organic control bodies to reexamine the data provided.
Certified registered organic operators (referring to their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of operators)
Certified registered organic processors who manufacture organic products (as their main or secondary activity) (expressed in number of processors)
Certified organic croparea (under conversion and fully converted) (expressed in hectares)
Certified organic cropproduction from fully converted area (expressed in 1 000 kg)
Certified organic livestock (expressed in heads of live animals)
Production of certified organic products of animal origin (expressed in 1 000 kg of carcass weight and in thousand eggs)
Production of certified organic milk products (Produced on farms or Processed on farms or by dairy enterprises) and Honey and products of bee-keeping (expressed in 1 000 kg of products obtained)
Certified organic aquaculture sold by producers (expressed in 1 000 kg live weight)
We use the Dataset provided by the commission. This is sent to the Organic Control Bodies for completion. Figures are compared to previous returns to ensure accuarcy.
The data is complied by our Organic Control Bodies who collect the information.
