Greenpeace Gütezeichen-Guide

Greenpeace in Austria has issued a quality seal check ("Zeichen-Tricks. Der Gütezeichen-Guide von Greenpeace in Österreich") in October 2018. From about 100 quality seals that are around in Austria, Greenpeace has checked 26 of them closely.

In Austria, there is a difference between "Gütesiegel" (seal of approval), which have official restrictions in law and "Gütezeichen" (sign of approval, quality mark), which have regulations defined by its issuing organization. The difference for consumers isn't there, since not one is better than the other.

Greenpeace has looked out for the following criteria:

1. Strict and clear definitions and criteria concerning the impact on environment, people and animals
   1. Criteria need to be found transparently and easy on the internet
   2. Criteria need to be defined in a transparent process with independent parties involved
   3. Criteria must refer to already existing products and standards and cannot inherently include improvements in the future
   4. Criteria are constantly checked and improved
2. External, independent certification and regular, strict check of criteria, clear rules for loss of certification when violating the criteria

See also

• Palm oil
• Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO)