The agricultural development initiative in Haiti, WINNER, began exploring the feasibility of GLOBALG.A.P certification for its beneficiaries in 2012. The consultancy aimed to assess the feasibility of GLOBALG.A.P certification for WINNER’s beneficiaries, with a focus on the Association of Champion Farmers (APCs). The report was prepared by Criss Juliard, an agricultural, environmental, and rural business development consultant, under contract No. EPP-I-0404-000200-00 with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The GLOBALG.A.P standard is a private standard established by large European wholesalers and retail supermarkets to assure food product safety. The standard grew during a period when small corner grocery stores had to compete with ever-larger supermarkets and their wholesalers. Fresh produce were no longer a monopoly of street vendors or corner grocery stores, but an international, interconnected cornucopia. This came as a result of increased consumer demand in food importing countries, particularly for year-round fresh produce and for a greater variety of exotic fruits and vegetables.
The consultancy found that GLOBALG.A.P developed a special option that permitted small landholders to obtain certification if they did it through a legally constituted entity such as a cooperative or farmer association. The option is well adapted to WINNER’s APCs. A major task of the consultancy was to familiarize WINNER staff and APC representatives with GLOBALG.A.P’s production standard, demands, and process to achieve GG certification. WINNER’s APC and member farmers wanting to attain GG certification need to arrange to meet 232 different Control Points and Compliance Criteria, and 11 documents that are expected to take seven to ten months to complete.
Prior to working on meeting compliance to the CPCCs, interested APCs and members must go through a process to create and develop their own internal Quality Management System (QMS) and produce a manual specific to the APC. The Quality Management System provides the base for Association members to acquire the approach needed to implement the GLOBALG.A.P certification requirements. The process to attain GLOBALG.A.P certification involves several steps, including creating a Quality Management System, conducting a risk assessment, and implementing Good Agricultural Practices.
The advantages of seeking GLOBALG.A.P certification include reduced food safety risks and an incentive to adhere more rigorously to details either required or recommended by expanded Good Agricultural Practices. However, the disadvantages include the amount of time it will take for all producers to reach certification level, estimated at seven to ten months from start to finish. Many of the standards are new activities for the farmer, requiring training sessions, such as preparing a farm’s risk assessment. One of the most cumbersome is the requirement to keep detailed daily records of all activities taking place on the farm.
A rough cost estimate based on a total of 214 APC associations that WINNER presently works with, representing an estimated 85,000 farmers, is approximately $270,000. GLOBALG.A.P certification must be renewed annually, but that should be re-evaluated in the future. The consultancy concluded that GLOBALG.A.P certification is not for everyone, and that the process and costs associated with it must be carefully considered before embarking on the certification process.