Our Standards System

For continuous improvement, credibility and transparency

The Aid by Trade Foundation is an umbrella organization for three cotton standards: Cotton made in Africa (CmiA), Cotton made in Africa-Organic (CmiA-Organic) and the Sustainable Cotton Standard (SCS, currently not in use). These standards were developed to improve the living conditions of African smallholder farmers and working conditions in ginning factories and to promote an environmentally friendly cotton production.

The setting and revision of our cotton standards system is clearly defined by our Standard Setting Procedure.

All standards are embedded in an integrated system that ensures credibility, transparency, and continuous improvement:

Principles, Criteria, and Indicators:

Principles, Criteria, and Indicators define social, ecological and economic parameters that are suitable for the African context. They come along hand in hand with management requirements.

Assurance:

The process of regular self-assessments and independent third-party verification under AbTF oversight demonstrates compliance of the Managing Entities with Standard requirements and helps them identify areas for continuous improvement.

Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL):

Results from Self-Assessments, Verifications, and additional impact evaluation studies enable AbTF to measure progress and validate if our intended impacts are actually achieved.

Trainings:

Standard requirements define training content, the assurance programme as well as MEL help identify areas where trainings need to be extended, improved, or newly established.

Chain of Custody:

Guidelines define how supply of verified CmiA / CmiA-Organic / SCS cotton can smoothly be integrated into global supply chains to match demand from brands and retailers specifically interested in sustainable cotton from Africa.

Claims Framework:

The Claims Framework supports all involved parties to communicate about the standards in a correct and credible way.

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