Now available: Draft guidance on using certification in responsible sourcing
16 January 2025
The AFi has published a ‘working draft’ of new guidance on the uses of certification in responsible commodity sourcing

Today the AFi has released a new draft guidance document on ways companies can use sustainability certification programmes in their responsible sourcing approaches. After a period of public consultation, the draft guidance is expected to be finalised by the AFi Coalition and published as a new piece of Operational Guidance within the Accountability Framework.
Evolving uses for certification
For many years, companies have used certification to help meet their responsible supply chain commitments, and to differentiate their products in the marketplace. Now, companies are also looking to certification as a way to help achieve compliance with trade and due diligence regulations, or to fulfil reporting and disclosure expectations.
As the potential uses of certification have broadened, questions have arisen about when and how companies can best use these programmes. The new AFi guidance serves to clarify how certification can help achieve a variety of purposes. It also explains how certification can be supplemented with other measures, when needed, to help fulfil various goals and obligations.
Scope of the guidance
The first substantive section of the draft guidance presents information on how to assess the capabilities of different certification programmes in relation to specific use cases. Key aspects to consider when assessing a programme are its production level standards, chain of custody model, and system requirements for credibility and rigour.
The guidance also identifies the conditions under which certification is suitable to demonstrate product volume compliance, performance, and due diligence. Generally, this is possible only when the chain of custody system provides physical separation of materials with specific compliance or performance attributes.
When this is not the case—for instance under mass balance chain of custody—certification can still fulfil or contribute to other objectives, but may need to be supplemented. The guidance explains how this may be done.
Further, the draft guidance includes a decision tree to support companies in evaluating options for the use of certification to demonstrate compliance of product volumes against specific sourcing policies or requirements.
Supporting alignment
The AFi has published the guidance as a ‘working draft’ so that companies and other stakeholders can begin using it while also providing feedback on how it can be improved to best address current questions and decision-making needs regarding the uses of certification.
This approach also enables the AFi to pursue strong alignment of its materials with resources and guidance currently being updated by ISEAL, the global membership organisation for credible sustainability standards.
The AFi and ISEAL intend for their respective published resources to complement one another to provide all stakeholders with clear and commonly-agreed information about certification and its applications in relation to responsible sourcing, regulatory compliance, and other use cases.
Provide your input
Certification is one of several topics included in the AFi’s 2025 public consultation process. Other topics included in the consultation pertain to supply chain management, monitoring, verification, and fulfilment of responsible supply chain commitments and targets. Please visit our public consultation web page to provide input through this process. The consultation is open through 14 March.
The AFi expects to update the certification guidance ‘working draft’ with a final version later this year. The final guidance will consider input from the consultation, advancements in ISEAL’s work, and any other relevant developments.
To get started, we invite you download the working draft of Uses of Certification in Responsible Sourcing now.