The National Accreditation Entity (ENAC) declared, according to Royal Decree 1715 of 2010 of the Spanish state is the only body in Spanish territory, endowed with public power to grant accreditations in accordance with the provisions of European Regulation No. 765/2008.

ENAC is the entity that has the purpose of accrediting, through the evaluation of a system according to national and international standards, the technical competence of ACERTA CERTIFICACION , so that we can carry out the activities of “Conformity Assessment”, in the sectors in which we operate (industry, environment, agriculture, fishing, food, health, transport, or others) and of the activities that we carry out in a voluntary as well as obligatory scope when regulations are established in this way.

In the governing body of ENAC (General Assembly, Board of Directors and Standing Committee), its members represent all those who have an interest in the different aspects of accreditation: conformity assessors, representatives of state and regional administrations, companies and business associations using conformity assessment services, are represented in a balanced way, both the Administrations and the parties interested in the accreditation process.

ENAC has a President appointed by the Administration, holds the legal representation of the Entity, acts on its behalf and is responsible for formalising the agreements adopted by the governing body. The President is appointed by the Industrial Safety Coordination Council, and this position is held by the Subdirector General of Industrial Quality and Safety of the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness, Mr. José Manuel Prieto.

1) We start from an application for certification that must be correctly filled out by the client and reviewed by the technical department of ACERTA.

2) A budget is issued that includes both the official rates of GLOBALG.A.P. according to what is stated in the certification application, as well as the rest of the costs of the certification process. The quotation must be accepted by the client.

3) After which the contract for the provision of services and the GLOBALG.A.P. sublicense and certification agreement are sent, which must be signed by the client before being registered in the GLOBALG.A.P. Database under ACERTA and be able to generate the company’s GGN in the event that it has not been previously certified.

4) A main difference with the rest of scopes, is that for the scope of Aquaculture it is MANDATORY to obtain the certification that the evaluation on social risks of GLOBALG.A.P. is carried out. known by its acronym GRASP. For this reason, a specific evaluation contract for GRASP is also sent, which must also be signed by the client.

5) Then, a date for the audit is specified, taking into account that if it is an initial audit you must have at least 3 months of records of implementation of the standard prior to the conduct of the audit, as well as having performed the internal self-assessment. An audit plan will be sent with all the details of the same before it is carried out, informing the company officially.

6) Once the audit has been carried out, if Non Conformities (NCs) have been detected, the company has 28 natural ones to present a Corrective Action Plan (CAs) together with the evidence of having implemented them (up to 3 months in the case of initial audits).

7) Since the company submits the CA, the certification body has another 28 days to review the file and rule after the certification committee and, if everything is in compliance according to the standard, issue the corresponding certificate.

8) The certificate is valid for one calendar year and must be renewed annually in a window of no more than 4 months prior to the date of validity of the certificate and, it is recommended, no less than 2 months prior to this date to have time to meet the deadlines set forth above.

9) Additionally, as a rule, all certification bodies have the obligation to make unannounced audits to 10% of their certified clients annually, in which case nothing can be communicated to the company before 48 working hours from the date scheduled for the audit. Such unannounced audits do not cost clients.

CoC GR: Chain of Custody – General Rules

All assess requirements regarding the production of safe, legal and quality food.

The certificate is valid for one year.

IFS is recognized by the retail market in Germany, France and Italy. IFS (International Featured Standards) is a private standard belonging to HDE (Germany), FCD (France) and the Italian Retailers Association.
BRC is recognised by the retail chain in the UK, Belgium and Switzerland. BRC Global Standards, being also a private standard belongs to the British Retail Consortium.

At IFS:

• Levels of requirements all equal
• Types of Nonconformities: KO, Major
• A level is obtained depending on the score obtained: >95% Higher and >75% Basic.

In BRC:

• Levels of requirements: Fundamental and the rest uncategorized.
• Types of Nonconformities: Critical, Major, Minor.
• A level is obtained depending on the nonconformities: A, B, C, D (not certified)

Non-conformities declared in the Certification Audit:

BRC allows a supplier to be certified with a Major nonconformity and several minor nonconformities, provided that the supplier provides objective evidence that it has remedied such nonconformity within 28 days.
IFS in no case allows certification if there is any type of KO nonconformity and for Major nonconformity a complementary audit must be performed to verify the correction of the nonconformity within 6 weeks to 6 months from the audit. For all other non-compliances they are audited as deviations and verified at the next annual audit.

Your client’s demand.

If you sell your products to a food chain you will be required to meet a specific standard. For example, they require certification in BRC, among others Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury’s. To work with Aldi, Lidl, Carrefour or Auchan, the IFS Standard is required.

The BRC logo can only be obtained by direct submission from BRC (certification bodies are not authorized to submit the logo, nor are certified companies authorized to obtain it from sources other than BRC directly). To do this, and according to BRC rules, once the company is certified (with a valid certificate in force), you can obtain it through the following link: http://logo.brcdirectory.com/

As for the IFS logo, it is similar. You must access the IFS portal (www.ifs-certification.com) and there you can download the logo (you will have to fill out a short form where your data are requested so that IFS has controlled its download).

At Acerta we are continually increasing the number of certification services we offer our customers, so it’s best to check out this page.

– Production Site: Production area (e.g. field, plot, farm, orchard, greenhouse, etc.) that is owned or rented and managed by the applicant legal entity, and where the same supplies are used (e.g. water management, workers, equipment, warehouses, etc.). A single production site can be understood as several non-contiguous zones, but which meet the above requirements.

– Farm (Homogeneous Cultivation Unit), plot, land, sector or greenhouse: separate units of land within a production site, which together make up the production unit.

The scope of CoC certification covers the entire supply chain for fruits and vegetables, the scope of CoC certification covers unprocessed products such as whole and packaged fruits and vegetables, and excludes processed products such as fruit salads, juices, packaged salads, etc.

The scope of CoC certification covers the handling, storage, processing, and marketing process of GLOBALG.A.P. certified products, from the farm to the retail distribution center. CoC certification must include any company that is legally responsible for the production, processing, packaging, marketing, transport, slaughter and sales of GLOBALG.A.P. certified products.

The CoC certification scope of a producer must not include the same production process that is already certified under the GLOBALG.A.P. Integrated Farm Assurance Standard. Example: A site that produces and packs apples under the IFA Standard and also under the CoC Standard cannot be certified.

The scope of CoC certification may include a product not produced on the site, i.e. purchased from third parties, where the producer acts as a trader or service provider. Example: you can certify a site that produces and packages apples under IFA on the one hand, and certify the same site under CoC for the packaging of purchased pears.

All products found in the list of products GLOBALG.A.P. published on the website GLOBALG.A.P. could be included in the scope of CoC certification.

We understand operational site as the term “exploitation” of the General CoC (Chain of Custody) Regulations. The term “exploitation” refers to those places of production, processing, handling, storage or administrative offices where the product is produced, processed, handled, stored or delivered/marketed. It is obligatory to register all the sites through which the products to be included in the scope of the chain of custody pass physically or by document.