GFSI Certification

The Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) is a non-profit making foundation, created under Belgian law in May 2000. The daily management of GFSI is undertaken by The Consumer Goods Forum. GFSI benchmarks existing food standards against food safety criteria, and also looks to develop mechanisms to exchange information in the supply chain, to raise consumer awareness and to review existing good retail practices.

What does GFSI do?

Primarily Benchmarking – Within GFSI, benchmarking is a “procedure by which a food safety-related scheme is compared to the GFSI Guidance Document,” a copy of which can be found on www.globalfoodsafetyinitiative.com.  The process is intended to be executed in an independent, unbiased, technically proficient and transparent manner. The GFSI Board Benchmarking a scheme successfully means that all recognized schemes have a common foundation of requirements which should provide consistent results, in regard to the common requirements applied during the audit, but the benchmarked schemes cannot be considered as equal.

GFSI Guidance Document Version 6 (click to view)

• Overview of GFSI and Accredited Certification
• What is the GFSI Guidance Document Version 6?
• Certification and Accreditation Framework
• Perceived Barriers to the Acceptance of Third Party Certification

Reductions in Food Safety Audits Through GFSI Acceptance