RTRS becomes an ISEAL Community Member
RTRS has become an ISEAL Community Member.
ISEAL is the global membership organisation for ambitious, collaborative and transparent sustainability systems.
We wanted to share some good news. RTRS has become an ISEAL Community Member. ISEAL is the global membership organisation for ambitious, collaborative and transparent sustainability systems. They advocate for the development and adoption of credible, effective sustainability systems, and work to promote the conditions for their uptake.
RTRS is the first certification system in the soy sector to comply with ISEAL eligibility criteria and become Community Member. As an ISEAL Community Member, RTRS will work to continually improve its certification system by taking part in ISEAL’s learning, collaboration, and innovation activities.
ISEAL Executive Director Karin Kreider said, “I am delighted to welcome RTRS to the ISEAL community, and am excited that we now have one more country in which our members are present. RTRS is committed to promoting the growth of production, trade, and use of responsible soy. To become a Community Member of ISEAL reflects their dedication to credible practices and ongoing improvement. I look forward to working together in the coming months and years.”
As you know, the credibility and transparency of RTRS are fundamental in our work with our colleagues and partners. We are committed to this credibility and this means the following:
- We are inclusive. We work with affected stakeholders in a truly multistakeholder, open, consensus-based process to develop and revise our production standard. This results in more meaningful requirements for the soy industry to improve such as zero conversion and zero deforestation; zero forced labour and zero child labour. When more and diverse stakeholders are consulted, it is more likely that the standard will have buy-in at all levels, which leads to faster scale up and deeper impact.
- We are transparent. RTRS is setting the bar for credibility in soy certification. We make our audit reports and RTRS certified producer lists public and available so that stakeholders can directly connect and have a more precise conversation about what is happening on the ground.
- We go deeper. RTRS´ verification and certification is independent and rigorous to assure that positive changes made by soy producers and facilities are proven. We are dedicated to maintaining this thoroughness and impartiality now and in the future.
- We promote positive change. RTRS has committed to measuring our impact, and to improving from what we learn. Our Theory of Change and our Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) system are reflections of this commitment. It also means that we address some of the most pressing problems facing the soy sector today: deforestation and conversion, land tenure issues, and poor labor conditions, among others.
This is a major achievement for RTRS, but basically for the soybean sector as a whole.
In the coming months we will share more specific details on how we are working within the ISEAL Community to learn, collaborate, innovate, and improve. Now, we invite you to read ISEAL´S article about our incorporation into this learning community here.
Marcelo Visconti
RTRS Executive Director
