Feedstock Certification for Ingeo
We've partnered closely with select NGO's, brands, and certifiers to create a comprehensive palette of tools for certifying the sustainability attributes of the current feedstocks used to manufacture Ingeo.
Base Certifications
Today Ingeo is made from plant-based sugars and does not require a genetically modified (GM) feedstock. Current US corn growing practices produce a mixed stream of GM and conventional (non-GM) corn that we use for production. However, our final product, Ingeo biopolymer, does not contain any GM material due to the high heat used in the manufacturing process. Ingeo is certified to be free of any genetic material by Eurofins GeneScan, recognized by both government and NGOs as the leading authority for testing food, feed and raw materials. eurofinsus.com/gmotesting
Verification that 100% of the carbon in the Ingeo biopolymer originates from renewable agricultural resources instead of oil. 3rd party certification based on ASTM6866 is provided in Europe by Vinçotte and in the US by the USDA's BioPreferred program.
USDA BioPreferred: www.biopreferred.gov
Vinçotte: www.vincotte.com
ISCC Plus Certification
Some of the production criteria include:
- The farmer cannot source from land with high biodiversity, high carbon stock or from peatland (reference year 2008).
- The farmer must meet sustainable agricultural practices concerning e.g. fertilizer & pesticide use, storage, disposal, tillage practices, equipment calibration and irrigation.
- The farmer must have measures in place to protect the surrounding environment such as the natural vegetation and water courses; the farmer also has to take measures to avoid soil erosion and to increase soil organic matter.
- The farmer must meet a set of social sustainability related criteria on e.g. child labor, workers protection, labor condition, land rights, training and water rights.
Optional Certifications
Since in today’s ISCC PLUS program specification of GM/conventional corn is not a part of the requirements, a combination of NatureWorks’ feedstock sourcing program and the ISCC PLUS program is used. In this way both aspects are covered: conventional corn sourcing combined with sustainable corn production. We consider this as an intermediate solution and ISCC Systems is working on a project including the conventional corn requirement in the ISCC PLUS scheme.
The US-based NGO, the Institute of Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), provides the Working Landscapes Certificate (WLC) program; an independent third-party scheme certifying sustainable agricultural production for emerging biomaterials sectors, including the bioplastics industry. WLC includes the requirement of using conventional corn seed. Both ISCC PLUS and WLC focus on sustainable farming practices, but have slightly different sets of criteria. www.iatp.org
Some of the production criteria for WLC's include:
- Use of non-genetically modified (GM) crop varieties to protect biodiversity
- No continuous annual crop production on same acreage
- Soil testing on contracted acres and fertilization according to test results and state agronomic recommendations to assure that nutrients are used efficiently and are not likely to leach or run-off
- No use of chemicals that are known human or animal carcinogens, including atrazine
- Use of cover crops or assurance that at least 70 percent of crop residues remain on the entire field to minimize soil erosion
- Creation of farm plan that includes information on biodiversity, energy use and greenhouse gas emissions to help identify and encourage improvements in sustainability areas not currently addressed by WLC’s
