Accreditation
Accountability
Last updated
Accountability
Last updated
Accreditation is a process of evaluating conformity assessment bodies against established standards to guarantee their impartiality and competence in carrying out specific activities, such as certifications, inspections, tests, validation, and verifications.
Conformity assessment is a demonstration that a product, service, system, organization, or individual is meeting the stated requirements or claims. This process can encompass activities such as testing, validation, inspection, verification, and certification. The demonstration of compliance with standards and other criteria is increasingly important for consumer confidence, particularly in the case of environmental claims. As a result, conformity assessment is critical for environmental claims. Accreditation bodies exist in many countries to oversee conformity assessment bodies and ensure they are subject to authoritative review. By utilizing international standards, government entities, consumers, and procurers can have confidence in the validity of validation and verification statements provided by accredited validation and verification bodies. All validation and verification bodies providing validation and verification for projects for ICR are accredited under approved GHG program or for ISO 14065 by an accreditation body that is a member of the International Accreditation Forum (IAF). The IAF is a global network of accreditation bodies and organizations involved in conformity assessment activities. Its primary objectives are:
To expand and maintain the IAF Multilateral Recognition Arrangement (MLA) between Accreditation Body Members, reducing risk for businesses and customers and ensuring that an accredited certificate or validation/verification statement can be trusted globally.
To harmonize accreditation practices around the world.
To promote accreditation as an effective tool for providing confidence in goods and services, which is essential for the facilitation of global trade.
Validation and verification bodies are eligible to provide validation and verification services under the ICR if they have signed an agreement with ICR and are accredited under an ICR approved GHG program (CDM, VCS and GS4GG and/or accredited under ISO 14065 by an accreditation body that is a member of the International Accreditation Forum (IAF).
