Protect & Sustain Certification

The IFA “Protect & Sustain” certification proposes a practical framework for implementing product stewardship practices, as well as tools to maintain them and measure the progress achieved.

Protect & Sustain was developed by IFA members for IFA members, with independent auditors DNV-GL and SGS, and has become the de facto global product stewardship standard for fertilizers.

Six areas are examined: management system, product development and planning, sourcing and contractor management, manufacturing techniques, supply chain to customer, as well as marketing, sales and application.

What makes this certification distinctive is the focus on product security and the in-depth coverage of the whole supply chain: from raw material sourcing to security of fertilizer sales.

The certification process usually takes between three to five months.

Protect & Sustain is available for fertilizers producers and other companies in the fertilizer value chain (fertilizer distributors, ports, traders and transporters).

IFA Benchmarks

100 percent voluntary, 100 percent confidential, 100 percent accessible: IFA offers all members three benchmarks to measure their progress in SHE (Safety, Health and Environment) management.

These benchmarks are:

Safety and Security

Our target is ZERO. Injuries and occupational illnesses, as well as safety and environmental incidents, are ALL preventable.

IFA has published the 4th edition of its Safety Handbook, a practical guide for managing safety in the fertilizer industry, which provides the guiding principles of positive safety management, an outline of the specific processes to manage safety and guidance for day-to-day safety management.

Phosphogypsum (PG), a mineral that occurs both naturally and as a co- or by-product of many industrial processes, has a wide range of uses in industry and agriculture. PG is a safe, reusable resource for which there are many beneficial uses, such as a multi-nutrient sulfur-rich fertilizer, high-quality plaster or wallboard, or as a road-bed material.

Different countries regulate PG differently, but in the majority of PG producing countries such as Brazil, Canada, China, India, Russia, Morocco and Belgium, the industry has been working with academia to review and revise the approaches to its use. In some countries, such as Brazil and Belgium, re-use is reaching 100 percent.

You can find out more about the sustainable management and reuse of PG through our 2020 Report, infographic and webinar: