The ANSI National Accreditation Board (ANAB) has expanded its signatory status with the International Accreditation Forum (IAF) multilateral recognition arrangement (MLA) to level 3 main scope of ISO/IEC 17029, Conformity Assessment - General Principles And Requirements For Validation And Verification Bodies, as of March 20, 2024.
Accreditation is an important tool in the removal of technical barriers to trade and in promoting the international acceptance and recognition of goods and services. This is achieved through Multilateral Recognition Arrangements (MLAs) signed by accreditation bodies that have demonstrated their competence through rigorous peer evaluation. IAF is the global oversight body for conformity assessment accreditation bodies whose core function revolves around establishing a unified global framework for conformity assessment, aimed at minimizing risks for both businesses and consumers.
As global needs evolve and standards and systems of conformity assessment keep pace, the MLA systems require continual update. To this end, MLAs continue to be developed or expanded, with ANAB ensuring that its accreditation programs adhere to those updates. ISO/IEC 17029 was released in 2019 as a new standard for validation and verification for a variety of potential sector applications. The most prominent example of ISO/IEC 17029 has been in the validation and verification of environmental information, specifically with the use of ISO 14065, General Principles And Requirements For Bodies Validating And Verifying Environmental Information. ANAB operates an ISO 14065 program and has been a signatory for the IAF MLA for greenhouse gas since 2018.
While not new to validation and verification, the recent recognition demonstrates ANAB’s continued dedication to providing best-in-class accreditation of validation and verification bodies. Expanding this signatory status means that ANAB’s validation and verification accreditation program is recognized internationally as meeting the requirements of:
ANAB undergoes periodic rigorous evaluation to maintain and expand its signatory status and commit to the IAF MLA. As part of this commitment, ANAB will maintain conformity with ISO/IEC 17011, Conformity assessment — Requirements for accreditation bodies accrediting conformity assessment bodies, and recognize the competence and impartiality of accreditation of conformity assessment bodies by all other members of the MLA. Through this recognition of other MLA accreditation bodies, ANAB is helping to maintain the conformity assessment infrastructure—reducing the need for multiple assessments and helping to facilitate international trade by encouraging regional and worldwide acceptance of valid certificates, registrations, and results issued by signatory accreditation bodies.
“ANAB is deeply committed to assuring the integrity of accredited validation and verification, and supporting our many stakeholders in the ongoing journey to build integrity in carbon and sustainability disclosure frameworks,” said Lori Gillespie, ANAB vice president of management systems, validation and verification, product certification. “The extension of the MLA to include ISO/IEC 17029 will bolster our efforts to add new programs under the MLA as we continue along this path in new areas of validation and verification.”
