CCPB srl and Istituto Mediterraneo di Certificazione (IMC) join together in order to chart a course for certification in organic market
The union of CCPB srl and Istituto Mediterraneo di Certificazione (IMC) will change permanently the assets of Organic Market, in Italy and beyond: a new highly qualified and skilled certification body, unique in national and international scenario, will be born.
There will be a strategic merger, on a progress nature, with the main aim of optimizing and developing assets and skills with the highest standards of excellence and proficiency. It is the first time in Italy, for this branch that two such important companies decide to join their efforts in order to assure the safeguard of the production supply chains that believe in certification and inspection activity as a qualifying factor for their products and services.
The bond between these two leader companies in Italian Organic market is now official, after a more than 10 years long partnership, developing synergies and sharing strategies mostly on the organic agrifood branch. Now together they are creating a new key player intended to have a leading role in a dynamic and growing market.
Established in 1995, IMC is a private company with the due public authorizations and international accreditations in order to carry on the certification activity for agriculture Branch, agrifood branch, horeca and geographical indications and traditional specialties in the European Union. The company comes from the experience of Associazione Marchigiana Agricoltura Biologica (AMAB). CCPB srl is on the other hand an inspection and certification body founded in 1988 from a group of Organic agrifood market companies in order to offer better warranties to consumers and to the market.
CCPB srl also has considerable experience in product inspection and certification in the fields of integrated production and traceability in the agricultural food and feedstuffs sectors and in the agriculture and food industry in general.
Included in the remit for organic products, CCPB srl operates specialized schemes in the organic and natural cosmetics sector and for organically managed green areas.
The brand new player, which will be simply called CCPB, will present itself as the first certification body in Italy in organic market in terms of turnover of certified products, of dimensions and relevance of the certified companies, with a wide range of services focused on sustainability of products and processes.
Towards the big influence of the main issues of EXPO 2015 – “Feeding the planet, Energy for life”– in the near future a big player like CCPB will run for having a leading role of a growing market such as Italian organic production.
Italian organic production, in fact, observes 3 billion euro of total turnover (1, 2 billion euro for the export), and in 2012 underlined the growth of 3% of professionals and of 6, 4% of hectares of cultivated surface. Moreover, in the first 10 month of 2013 there has been a growth of 7, 5% of purchasing of packaged organic products (a trend we can observe from about ten years now)
In the new CCPB sphere will enter about 9000 certified companies, 80% of those certified in Organic sector. In these numbers, we can count well-known agrifood sector groups, important retailers, SME; with those figures, about one third of the total turnout of Italian organic market will be certified by the new CCPB.
On the international field, CCPB is authorized and accredited for certifying organic products in the European Union (in compliance with EU Regulation 834/2007) in order to offer to the agrifood companies the required certification in order to export in Usa, Japan, Canada, Switzerland, Korea and all the most important international markets. CCPB is also a recognized Certification Body by EU commission for certifying organic products in equivalence to the EU regulation 834/2007 for principal countries in the Mediterranean Area, in Asia (comprehending China) and Latin America.
The new CCPB, will gather the inheritance built thanks to the happy intuition of IMC, and will lead the group of 5 certification companies in the Mediterranean area which are authorized by their respective Agriculture Ministries: IMC Egypt, IMC Tunisia, IMC Turkey, IMC Lebanon and IMC Morocco.
We have extremely encouraging data regarding future perspectives. Now CCPB and IMC every year incur in about 200.000 euro of laboratory analysis, and more or less 10% of their total turnover (it is now about 8 million euros) is addressed to investments in R&D.
The main aim is to offer more opportunities in training, and the development of new services and certification schemes, which can be able to face a continuously evolving market.
The union of these two entities will permit to raise resources addressed to this context, in a frame of the global activity of a new Certification Body which will be capable of redraw the future paths of certification in organic market and respecting principles of quality, innovation, and accountability in product certification market with a sustainability approach.
This is so because certification improves product quality and its environmental impact, assures food safety, makes the production process more effective and virtuous, but is also a unique service of warranty and trust towards the consumer.
Stefano Curone (TG1), Remo Ciucciomei (IMC), Lino Nori (Consorzio il Biologico), Fabrizio Piva (CCPB)