Benchmark sustainable cereal and oilseed – DTP112 (09.01.2020) Ver 5 and ProTerra V4.1 + ProTerra Europa

ProTerra Foundation and CSQA Certificazioni Srl agreed to conduct a benchmarking exercise to verify the alignment of both ProTerra Standard v4.1 and ProTerra Europa V1.0 against SUSTAINABLE CEREAL AND OILSEED – DTP112 Ver 5. This benchmark was completed in 2021 and final results were agreement by both institutions.

Several indicators, including CORE indicators, from ProTerra Standard found no equivalence in DTP112 as per benchmarking results and therefore require additional attention should an organization during a DTP112 certification audit wish to also be certified as ProTerra. This approach is necessary as ProTerra has as requirement that to be ProTerra certified, organisations have to meet 80% of all ProTerra indicators, in which all CORE indicators are included. Additionally, Certification Body (CB), must confirm compliance of organization with the provisions of DTP 030 RT 11 for GMO free crops/products.

The additional certification activity to be conducted by the CB in relation to these ProTerra indicators that have no equivalence in DTP should follow the procedures that apply to CBs when conducting a ProTerra Certification audit[1]. They should also follow the standard audit approach, level of rigor and type of evidence expected in a ProTerra audit. A specific checklist has beendeveloped to support CBs in this additional activity.

A list of the ProTerra indicators that find no equivalence under DTP112 is presented here. The ones relevant to comply with ProTerra Europe are indicated in green.

It is noted that for ProTerra Certification full compliance is necessary for the indicators classified as CORE and that for the non-core indicators an action plan should considered[2], as applicable, to strive continuous improvement. Under DTP112 certification is only possible if all requirements are met.

A summary of the results is presented below.

[1] ProTerra Certification Protocol, ProTerra Terms of Use, ProTerra Terms of Certification and Guidelines and Requirements for the Use of the ProTerra Logo and Seal.

[2] To be ProTerra certified an organisations has to meet 80% of all ProTerra indicators, in which all CORE indicators are included, meaning that all Core indicators must be met and at least 29 noncore ProTerraindicators must also be met.It is noted that as part of the benchmarking result there is automatically non compliance with 23 Proterra noncore indicators due to the absence of such requirement in DTP112.