Proceedings on administrative offences for legal persons operating in organic farming

Proceedings on administrative offences for legal persons and for natural persons engaged in business are carried out on the basis of a finding that there has been a violation of organic farming rules.

(1) As a legal person, you commit an administrative offence when 

• (a) you use seeds or vegetative propagating material not obtained through the organic production method, without an exemption from the Central Institute for Supervising and Testing in Agriculture,
• (b) you do not keep records of organic production (inventories, accounting documents, animal pharmaceutical journal, etc.), 
• (c) you do not prepare or keep a description of the economic unit and records of measures taken,
• (d) as an organic entrepreneur, you do not notify the Ministry of changes regarding an organic farm and land on an organic farm,
• (e) you use chemically synthesised allopathic veterinary pharmaceuticals or antibiotics in animal husbandry, 
• (f) you use tethered housing of animals,
• (g) you keep the same species of livestock in both organic and non-organic ways, or grow varieties that cannot be easily distinguished in both organic and non-organic ways,
• (h) you do not provide the animals with quality housing conditions (e.g. intensive farming),
• (i) you do not ensure that organic products, organic food or other organic products are unambiguously differentiated from other non-organic products during storage,
• (j) you do not separate the production of organic feed or food from other processed feed or food,
• (k) you do not comply with the rules for the transition to organic production (e.g. the transitional period for conventional animals brought to the farm),
• (l) you use, during the cultivation of plants, animal husbandry, and the organic production of food, products and substances not permitted in organic farming (e.g. plant-protection products),
• (m) you do not clearly divide the agricultural holding into an organic farm and other operating units, or you do not keep the land, animals and products intended for non-organic production separate from the land, animals and products for organic production,
• (n) you use genetically modified organisms or products derived from genetically modified organisms, or
• (o) you fail to comply with any other statutory obligation.

(2) As a legal person or natural person engaged in business, you commit an administrative offence when 

• (a) you refer to organic production without all the ingredients of the product coming from organic farming and without proper registration and certification of the product,
• (b) you import a product from a third country and place it on the market as an organic product, but it does not meet the organic farming conditions (it is not certified as an organic product),
• (c) you fail to comply with an obligation imposed by a special measure by the set deadline.

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