GOTS Adopts IROCB and Explains Why

The Global Organic Textile Standards Program (GOTS), an international quality assurance system for organic textile processing, has adopted the International Requirements for Organic Certification Bodies (IROCB) as its normative reference for accrediting certification bodies.

The Global Standard, GmbH, which administers the standards program, licenses operators who have demonstrated compliance to GOTS textile. Operators must be certified against the GOTS standard by an approved certification body.  Approval is based on a formal accreditation process, conducted by the International Organic Accreditation Service (IOAS), which has an agreement with Global Standard GmbH to use IROCB as its reference norm for the certification process.

“We are very pleased with the adoption of IROCB in the GOTS Program, declared GOMA Steering Committee member, Sophia Twarog. “Although the main aim of IROCB was to provide a tool for equivalency of requirements for the organic certification process, we also envisioned that it could be adapted quite easily for direct accreditation.”

Marcus Breugel, Technical Director for the International Working Group on the GOTS provided insight into the decision to adopt IROCB as its norm for the certification process.  “In our research work for a suitable basis for our accreditation program we identified IROCB as most appropriate for various reasons, he stated.” It is specifically developed for worldwide harmonized and equivalent quality assurance of organic products. Compared to ISO 65 it is therefore much more specific, focused and appropriate to meet the specific requirements in certifying organic products and accrediting organic certifiers. However it is still based upon ISO 65, the widely recognized industry standard for accreditation in the field of product certification. Furthermore, it is developed by reliable organizations with UNCTAD, FAO and IFOAM involved.  And it is flexible and accessible. It explicitly offers to be adopted by governments and private sector organizations at their convenience, without need to request permission for use ; and also it  offers the opportunity to modify, amend and specify the given criteria where needed, in this context we added textile sector-specific and GOTS specific requirements to get a most appropriate tool for GOTS.”