Pursuant to the enactment of the Seed Act, and the need to provide and sustain adequate of seeds of the desired quality, the following criteria for accreditation of seed producers are hereby promulgated.

1. That he must be an individual farmer or a member of cooperatives/seed association/farmer organizations.

2. That he must have undergone training on seed technology and gained skills and experience on the basic principles of seed production of the crop he/she is involved in.

3. For seed associations, cooperatives and farmer organizations, the names of its members with their corresponding area planted for seed production must be submitted to seed certifying agency, before any accreditation is issued. In cases where new members are accepted by the associations, cooperatives and farmer organizations after accreditations, the Seed Certifying Agency must be notified in writing the new membership including among others, the area planted and the locations of their farms.

4. That the seed must be produces in suitable areas duly certified by the Seed Inspector. The suitability of an area is determined by the following:

1. sustained irrigation throughout the year;

2. access to seed post-harvest operations and storage facilities;

3. the agro-climatic conditions for the crop seed must be appropriate.

5. That the minimum effective area for the particular crop (rice, corn, field legumes) must be one (1) hectare.

6. The application for seed certification for any crop must indicate seed class to be produced, variety, area to be planted and location of the farm. This shall be filled with the Seed Certification Agency two months before planting time.

7. That he/she is willing to have the field inspected by the Seed Inspector or authorized representative of the DA/BPI Seed Certifying Agency anytime before planting, throughout the growing period, harvesting including threshing, processing and storage of the seeds. He should also be willing to have his/her seed lot sampled and to allow the seed inspector to draw the required amount of seed samples for laboratory analysis/seed testing of seed quality and certification.

8. Accreditation for rice, corn, vegetable and other crops shall be recommend by the Regional Director concerned after the designated stated herein.

9. The Certificate of Accreditation duly approved by the Director of the Bureau of Plant Industry shall be furnished to the applicant and photocopies to the Regional Director and Seed Quality Control Services.

10. Certification of accreditation shall be valid for a period of 3 years.

All accredited seed growers must have technical updates in vegetables seed production of the crops he/she is engaged in from time to time at any section of the Department of Agriculture.

The implementation of this Order shall be fully coordinated by the DA Regional Offices through the Regional Seed Coordinators, Chiefs of the Seed Quality Control Services and the Seed Inspectors.

Non-compliance with the above requirements shall be ground for the denial of accreditation or cancellation of existing license.

This Order takes effect immediately and supersedes Administrative Order No. 2, Series of 1991.

Adopted: 15 Feb. 1994

(SGD.) ROBERTO S. SEBASTIAN
Secretary