The GGN label is a universal mark of good farming practices, with a strong core in food safety and traceability. But responsible farming involves more than that. This is why the GGN label follows a holistic approach. This means that it encompasses not just one but several central aspects of the farming process.

Together with food safety and traceability, a holistic approach ensures that the food and plants you buy have been produced under responsible conditions that conserve soil and water, use energy efficiently, reduce waste, enable biodiversity, and protect both the people who produced them, and the animals on the farm.

All these aspects are key to a holistic approach to good farming practices that aims towards transparency and a sustainable future. This is what makes the GGN label unique. And it’s how the GGN label can give you the reassurance you need in your day-to-day grocery shopping.

We believe you have the right to know where your food comes from and how it was produced. We promote the dialog between producers and consumers in order to lay a foundation for modern, conscious, and responsible production.
By making visible the people and mechanisms involved in the production and labeling process, we make them accountable for how they produce their products.

And we believe you have the right to know how the product landed in your market. Food production today is no longer a simple matter of one farmer selling products directly to a few retailers. Whether it is from the seed to the fully-grown plant, vegetable or fruit or from the roe to the marinated salmon steak, a product goes through many stages and hands and, very often continents, before it reaches you. This makes it difficult to figure out who was involved in producing it. We are committed to making the roots of the finished product visible for everyone.

A magnifying glass enlarges and focusses attention on details that are not easily seen with the naked eye. As a symbol of searching and investigating, a magnifying glass sheds light on complex issues and allows us to better understand and inspect what we are seeing.

This is in essence what our GGN label does. The GGN magnifying glass enhances transparency by revealing the hidden people producing the food and plants you buy. It enables us to inspect the processes involved in farming to ensure they are being carried out responsibly with respect to people, animals, and the environment. And it is the instrument we use to check, verify, and confirm the roots of your products to offer you peace of mind.

The label confirms that the products were farmed in line with certified good farming practices that cover food safety, sustainability, environmental protection, animal welfare, social responsibility, and supply chain transparency.

The GGN label comes with a 13-digit farm or farmer group identification number. This number allows you to trace your product back to its roots. And you can do that while you’re shopping, right on your mobile device!

All you have to do is type the GGN number into the GGN search and you will learn all about the farm, its location, and the products it produces.

And because our entire certification process is transparent as well, the transparency we require from our producers is transferred to the GGN label and on to you, the consumer.

That’s how the GGN label gives you transparency down to the roots of your seafood, plant or agriculture (fruit and vegetables) products and the reassurance that your products were grown responsibly and with your safety in mind.

In 2018, we began a pilot program in Japan that introduced a green GGN label for fruits and vegetables. Following the successful conclusion of that pilot program, we are proud to announce that the GGN label is being reintroduced to the Japanese market as the yellow cross-category label for fruits and vegetables, farmed seafood, and flowers and plants.

You might be wondering what is the difference between the two? Other than incorporating two additional scopes, the yellow label like the green label is a mark of responsible farming practices, with a strong core in food safety and traceability, but the yellow label has a stronger holistic approach incorporating also aspects like social practices. 

As we make the transition to the new yellow cross-category label, you will notice both the old and new labels on store shelves. However, rest assured that regardless of the color of the label, you can still use ggn.org to trace the origin of your products.

If you'd like to learn more about this transition, read our press release here: https://ggn.org/News/Post?Link=6febf585-bc01-46b3-b982-ab771ce58993

The GGN label covers farmed products only and not wild farming. So, for example, you won’t find the label on swordfish, because swordfish can’t be farmed in a controlled environment. It can only be fished in the ocean. Salmon, on the other hand, can be farmed in aquaculture farms using certified processes that can be regulated, controlled, and monitored, as well as checked by trained auditors working for independent and accredited certification bodies.

Currently, you can find the GGN label on:

Floriculture products: Cut flowers, such as tulips and roses, as well as potted plants and Christmas trees sourced from farms with certified production processes.

Aquaculture products: Primarily farmed salmon, trout, mussels, and shrimp sourced from farms with certified production processes.

Agriculture products: fruit and vegetable products such as fresh fruits and vegetables including fresh herbs (not dried or otherwise preserved) sourced from farms with certified production processes. In case of packed products all products contained in the pack should come from certified production

All the products with the GGN label can be traced back to their roots. You can find a selection of GLOBALG.A.P. certified farms here.

The GGN label is built on certified and responsible farming and transparency.

The foundation of the GGN label is an internationally recognized and accredited set of good farming practices that cover food safety, sustainability, environmental protection, animal welfare, social responsibility, and supply chain traceability. Our goal is to certify responsible farming that benefits producers, retailers, and consumers around the globe.

The GLOBALG.A.P. Integrated Farm Assurance standard (IFA) covers all forms of farming – agriculture, floriculture, aquaculture, and livestock.

The IFA standard specifies a set of rules and requirements that farms must comply with to show they have good farming practices on the farm and become certified. It includes a checklist that farmers can use to implement the standard rules. Certification bodies, the third-party independent and accredited organizations that inspect the farms and issue the certificates, use this checklist in their annual farm inspections. These rules, called compliance criteria, are developed in coordination with everyone involved in the industry, including producers, retailers, government agencies, and NGOs, and so reflect the current demands of the market as a whole. Learn more about the GLOBALG.A.P. IFA Standards.

On the standard level, GLOBALG.A.P. also has a certification integrity program, the first of its kind in certification, that also checks both the farms and the certification bodies to make sure the standard is being implemented according to the set rules. Learn more about the GLOBALG.A.P. Certification Integrity Program.

The GGN label confirms that:

• An auditor from an accredited and independent certification body approved by GLOBALG.A.P. has checked the production process on the farm and found that it fulfils the requirements of the GLOBALG.A.P. IFA Standard.
• The farm was also checked to see if it complies with strict rules and regulations to protect its workers’ health, safety, and welfare.
• Certified products that leave the farm gate and reach your market are not mixed with non-certified goods all along the supply chain.
• The certification body has also been checked to make sure that the standard is being implemented correctly.

The GGN label is visible proof that several complex processes have been checked to reassure consumers in their day-to-day grocery shopping.

A standard is a set of accredited and industry-approved rules and specifications for farming practices. Farmers must comply with them to prove that their production processes are in line with nationally and internationally accepted requirements for food safety, sustainability, workers’ health and safety, animal welfare, traceability, and environmental protection.

A producer that wants to certify the production process on the farm will have to implement a farm management system that is based on the specifications set out in the GLOBALG.A.P. IFA standard. When the farmer is ready, an inspector from a third-party, independent certification body will visit the farm to verify compliance with the standard based on its farming activities, because a farm producing salmon has to fulfill different requirements than a farm producing tulips. If the inspector finds no violations, the farm process gets certified, and the producer now becomes part of the GLOBALG.A.P. system.

GLOBALG.A.P. certified farms go through an inspection once a year. The GLOBALG.A.P. certification system also requires producers to keep clear documentation of all the farm’s processes and procedures. And farms are subject to additional unannounced inspections to ensure the system is working.

Standards are organic, living documents that frequently need to be aligned to the current market conditions and needs. To make sure they stay relevant, everyone in the industry needs to be involved in the process of revising them on a regular basis.

The GLOBALG.A.P. standards are the result of a transparent and independent development process that involves the close collaboration of everyone in the industry, including producers, retailers, and other relevant stakeholders.

This process involves several steps:

1. A technical committee defines the basis for the standard in a draft. This committee consists of GLOBALG.A.P. members, including producers, traders, retailers, and food service industry representatives, who are elected by their peers to represent their interests during the standard development process.
2. Each standard draft is published for public consultation, making it possible for everyone concerned, including NGOs and government agencies, to contribute to the standard in order to refine and improve it.
3. Once a standard clears this critical stage and is adopted by the GLOBALG.A.P. Board, it is published as the current version. Find out more about our standard setting.
4. When a standard is published, farms wishing to achieve GLOBALG.A.P. certification can contact one of more than 155 GLOBALG.A.P. approved certification bodies operating all around the world. Certification bodies are independent, third-party organizations that inspect the farms and issue the certificates. Learn more about our five steps to get certified.

GLOBALG.A.P. also has an Auditor Training Program that ensures that our standards are consistently applied and inspected on every GLOBALG.A.P. certified farm.

And the GLOBALG.A.P. Certification Integrity Program, the first of its kind in certification, checks the certification bodies to make sure they are doing their job in line with good business and certification practices.

Our aim is to create trust and transparency on two levels: on the level of production, and on the level of our standard. At every step of the certification process, the GLOBALG.A.P. certification system has built-in monitoring, controlling, documentation, and verification mechanisms to make sure every part of the system is working in full integrity, transparency, and good farming and business practices.

And that’s what makes the GLOBALG.A.P. IFA standard one of the leading certification systems in the world, with over 200,000 certified farmers in more than 135 countries worldwide.

All GLOBALG.A.P. standards drive improved efficiency in production and require a general approach to farming that lays the groundwork for best practices for future generations. Find out more about our standards.

As a mission-driven organization that is passionate to the cause of protecting people, animals, and the environment, we strive to build a more sustainable future that serves every generation on this planet. We regard responsible farming as the key to producing food and plants while protecting our finite resources and our environment. And we believe in the right to responsibly produced food and plants for everyone on this planet. This is at the core of our mission: to drive positive change by promoting responsible and transparent farming for a sustainable future.

The GLOBALG.A.P. standard, programs and partnerships are in line with 9 of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. See how the GLOBALG.A.P. standard specifically aligns with the sustainable development goals.