Explainer
The Common Organic System Plan, explained
Every certified operation must keep an Organic System Plan (7 CFR 205.201). Historically, every certifier asked for it on different forms. The USDA-supported Common OSP standardizes those forms, so a grower answers one set of questions regardless of certifier.
What it is
A shared template for the OSP, developed with accredited certifiers. It splits the plan into lettered grower modules — each one covers a topic the rule requires your plan to describe, from seed sourcing to recordkeeping. Certifiers adopting it accept the same answers, which makes switching certifiers and renewing less painful.
The grower modules
| G3.0 Seeds & Planting Stock | What you plant, organic seed sourcing, treatments |
| G4.0 Crop Rotation & Soil | Rotation plan, fertility practices, tillage, monitoring |
| G4.1 Compost & Manure | Raw manure intervals, compost method and records |
| G4.2 Natural Resources | Soil, water, and biodiversity conservation |
| G5.0 Pest, Weed & Disease | Prevention first, then allowed materials, monitoring |
| G6.x Production & Handling | Buffers, drift, harvest, transport, storage |
| G7.0 Labeling | How 'organic' appears on packaging and sales documents |
| G8.0 Record Keeping | Which records you keep and how an auditor traces a lot |
Plus required attachments: field and crop information, a product list, a materials list, and a supplier list — published as workbooks you complete.
How Trazo helps
Trazo's guided modules follow the Common OSP's own structure — the G-series section codes, the record-keeping checklist with its verbatim record types, and the four attachment workbooks. The Common OSP is a public USDA template, not anyone's proprietary software, and any tool can and should align to it.
Trazo walks you through each module as a guided questionnaire in English or Spanish, suggests answers from the activity records you already keep — with the evidence named, for you to confirm or edit — and assembles the result into one renewal packet: module PDFs, per-parcel applications, workbooks. You review and confirm every answer: the plan is yours, Trazo just makes sure nothing is missing when your certifier asks.
See your own OSP take shape
The Starter plan is free — log a week of work and open the module list.