Equivalence

What is equivalence?

Through our equivalence programme we certify imported products and ingredients already certified to other organic standards. This re-certification (without further inspection) allows licence holders to use the Soil Association symbol on such products, providing they meet all our additional product requirements and are compliant with all national legislation. This process also establishes differences between our standards and other key international standards, like the EU organic regulation.

It is not feasible to check all aspects of our standards at source. However, through our equivalence process we will check each product against key standards areas we consider most important to the integrity of the Soil Association organic symbol. The full details of equivalence are available in the

• Equivalence Annex of our Standards (PDF, 288KB)

Product acceptance

We have signed over 30 contracts with certifiers. To improve their effectiveness we want to know more about the products that your licensed operators wish to sell into the UK market and what their future product priorities are. We also wish to identify the key companies that you certify and who our operators would like to work with so they can meet their markets requirements.

Product acceptance documents

• List of certification bodies [DOC, 173KB] - with signed Product Acceptance contracts
• Product acceptance overview [PDF, 112KB] - this gives more detail on why we have contracts, how we set them up and the work we can do to make the most use from them.
• GM matrix [PDF, 196KB] - this highlights high risk products or products sourced from a country or region that grows GM crops, especially on a commercial scale. The level of checks we need to make is evaluated by the use of this matrix.

If you would like a contract with us, wish to extend the scope of your existing contract or discuss any of these issues, please do get in touch.

Andrew Bayliss
Equivalence Coordinator
E: abayliss@soilassociation.org
T: +44 (0)117 987 4597

Helen Davies
Equivalence Administrator
E: hdavies@soilassociation.org
T: +44 (0)117 987 4609