It is official. The USDA has now added the Cal/West Seeds Laboratory to its website list of Accredited Seed Laboratories.

Woodland, CA
March 22, 2011

Since 1950, the Cal/West Seed Laboratory, located in Woodland, California, has provided world class seed testing services to fill the needs of the cooperative. In fall 2003, the lab began offering testing services to external customers and has experienced steady growth since that time.

The lab performs a full array of seed analysis services including purity testing, germination testing, tetrazolium testing, rice blast testing and GMO strip testing for alfalfa. Seeds analyzed include grasses, cereals, legumes and vegetables. Testing is not performed on seeds of trees, shrubs, flowers or herbs.

Seed Lab Accreditation

For many years, the Cal/West Seed Lab had been considered an “Accredited Seed Lab,” authorized to perform seed analyses in support of OECD certification (as required for many international seed exports). However, to comply with the recently tightened oversight policies of the USDA for labs offering these services, much of the last year has been spent developing and documenting improved internal procedures and controls.

A new Manual of Standard Operating Procedures and a separate Quality Manual were written to address every single function and physical aspect of the lab. These detailed documents, along with a formal application for accreditation, were submitted to the USDA in July 2010. In August, the USDA conducted an initial review of the submitted documents and issued several requests. To comply with these requests, an internal audit was conducted at Cal/West and the SOP Manual and the Quality Manual were revised and resubmitted.  A final audit was conducted in December, 2010.  Full Accreditation was reinstated on January 10, 2011.