A great place to start with FairWild
Certification is an excellent way to implement the FairWild Standard. FairWild certification means that buyers - from ingredient traders up to consumers - know they are dealing with legally, ethically and sustainably harvested products. They are fair traded, meaning that the benefits are felt by all those involved, right down to the local communities harvesting the wild plants.
WHAT PRODUCTS CAN BE CERTIFIED?
FairWild certification is a third-party audited system, requiring annual onsite visits by authorised certification bodies. Over a five year period, the certified operations demonstrate their commitment to the FairWild Principles and Criteria, putting in place the building blocks of a sustainability system and meeting increasing requirements year-on-year.
Products collected from the wild (e.g. medicinal and aromatic plants, gums and resins, wild fruits, nuts and seeds, mushrooms);
Processed ingredients for finished products (e.g. essential oils and fatty oils);
FairWild certification: the steps introduced
1 APPLICATION
The first step is to contact a FairWild Foundation approved control body to begin discussions. An application to FairWild is submitted in parallel.
4 evaluation
Audit reports are evaluated by the control body. The evaluation is conducted by an independent evaluator with final documents submitted.
2 AUDIT PREPARATION
Preparation for the audit commences, including the performance of a basic self-assessment, guided by the approved control body.
5 certification
The final assessment and approval of the evaluation results with regard to compliance with the FairWild certification requirements.
3 AUDIT
The audit takes place, assessing compliance with the FairWild Standard. This process is an on-site inspection that normally takes 2–3 days.
6 continuation!
Successful FairWild certificates are valid for 15 months. Audits are required annually, based on species harvest times.
Chain of custody
Value chains for wild products are often complex, involving a number of different actors and processing steps. For practical purposes, we define three different types of company in the value chain:
wild collection operations, which can get certified following an on-site annual audit by an approved control body
traders/processors, which register with FairWild Foundation to buy and sell certified ingredients
finished product manufacturers (licensees and microenterprises), which register with FairWild Foundation and sign a license agreement in order to use the FairWild mark in product labelling and marketing
A model chain of custody for FairWild
For all our listed ingredients, see Buy Fairwild.