Control Union Peru (CUP) has become an independent third-party certification body (CB) with Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP).
To be recognised by BAP, CBs must be accredited under ISO/IEC Guide 17065 by an International Accreditation Forum-member accreditation body and a Multilateral Recognition Arrangements signatory to another internationally recognised scheme. Further, auditors must be trained and recognized by the BAP program and its qualified trainers to audit an aquaculture facility against the rigorous BAP certification standards.
“We are pleased to have Control Union Peru join our program as an experienced certification body. CUP operates on a global scale and are starting strong with 13 auditors already capable of auditing against all BAP standards,” said Ali Blais, BAP operations manager.
Six CBs currently
Currently, there are six CBs accredited to audit and certify aquaculture facilities against the BAP standards: Acoura, Bureau Veritas, Global Trust/SAI Global, NSF International, SGS and Control Union Peru. Collectively, these six CBs have 149 auditors qualified to audit against the BAP standards.
The need to train and recognise more auditors against the BAP certification standards has grown with the BAP program. Through the first half of 2018, there were 2,079 BAP-certified processing plants, farms, hatcheries and feed mills in 34 countries and six continents, which is a 197% increase from the 700 certified facilities at the end of 2015.
The next BAP auditor training course is in Bali, Indonesia, from 21-27 October.
