Standards Can’t Handle It Alone Community Should Come Up, Anurag Priyadarshi, Tata Global Beverages
‘Standards can't do it alone, the community should also come up to make difference’. It was the point of consensus in the session which deals with the issue of collaboration Vs. competition among voluntary sustainability standards, during the last session of an interesting conference.
Nicole Pasricha from the rainforest alliance said, "sustainability standards in India are still in a very early stage, we can think of them hardly as a young kid learning from every passing day". She has also accepted that competitive pressure is already felt in the sustainability standards area. It started with groups like FSC, rainforest alliance and USDA organic in early 1980’s to 1990 and then it was in 2000 to 2012 when groups like BCI and BON SUCRO came up with their standards followed by company standards and regional standards by various governments from 2003 to now on.
Karin from ISEAL alliance has shared the valuable insights of the industry. She has shared that, it should be more focused work collaboration as it gives chance to shared learning. "Our codes provide a platform to come for collaboration and give a better chance for trade stimulation", continued Karin.
If the challenge does not come in your way, you are driving in the wrong lane. It was necessary to throw the question, ‘if collaboration had to face a challenge in India?
Answers that came up were influential enough to throw light on standardisation and the entire value-driven philosophy behind this. How it can be more effective and how the quality of assurance process impacts the work. Human reach, for instance, has its limitations which collaborative alliance of different agencies had solved. The only issue of major concern is how to avoid the duplication of standard by different certifying bodies.
In a systematic approach, it had been observed that standards use concept of other standards as the input. Sharing the personal experience on the same Anurag has recalled, how rainforest alliance and the possible merger with another group OOTS can show the way forward for other Indian groups to move ahead in direction of collaboration for a sustainable future.
It is the supply chain workforce which may feel happier as it reduces much of paperwork that they had to deal with otherwise said Anurag. Monopoly can be a critical challenge which can come up with the collaboration of two or more big groups, which can be a matter of serious concerned. Anurag raised the bars for all the industry people when said that there is a need of regulator for all what has been done by certifying agencies otherwise it may step outside of its allowed spaces. Anurag shared the experience of how the standard of ‘trustee’, has worked to get Indian tea certified as rainforest alliance has denied coming to Indian tea’s standard due to some pesticide use issue which was necessary to grow the healthy tea in India.
Open sources of information are also of very much importance if collaboration system works, as the data is plays a very critical role in impact assessment.
