THE SFA CHAIN OF CUSTODY
The SFA has developed a Chain of Custody system for tracking fibre from certified herder organisations along the supply chain, allowing SFA members to make credible claims about the content of SFA-certified cashmere in their products and use the ‘SFA Certified’ logo effectively.
The system was first implemented in Mongolia in 2020 and was extended into China in 2021. In October 2024, the SFA published the SFA Chain of Custody Standard v1.1, which will come into effect in March 2025, obsoleting the SFA Chain of Custody Guidelines v3.1. View the latest version of the SFA Chain of Custody Standard and related documents on our Resources page.
If you would like to comment on the SFA Chain of Custody system, please do so through our open consultation platform.
Chain of Custody entry requirements:
To take part in the SFA Chain of Custody, compliance with the following SFA Standards is required:
Mongolia
Mongolian producers must comply with the relevant requirements of the following Codes of Practice targeted at the producer level in Mongolia:
China
Chinese producers must comply with the relevant requirements of the following Codes of Practice targeted at the producer level in China:
Primary Processors
Primary processors must comply with the SFA Clean Fibre Processing Standard.
HOW IT WORKS
All companies wishing to participate in the SFA Chain of Custody (CoC) are registered on our online tracking system and audited against our Chain of Custody Guidelines
Herders use paper transaction receipts to sell certified fibre to CoC participants, which are then inputed onto our online tracking system as part of the verification process
Whenever a CoC participant sells products containing SFA Certified fibre, this transaction is verified in the tracking system and a digital Transaction Certificate is issued.
SFA certified material must remain separate from non-certified material at all stages of transportation and storage. This is verified during CoC audits.
Electronic SFA Transaction Records form a 'chain of custody' along the supply chain, which can be used to verify on-product 'SFA Certified' claims.*
*These will replace paper Transaction Certificates when the SFA traceability platform is launched.
MAKING CLAIMS
Entities can start making general marketing claims as soon as their SFA Membership and/or certification has been approved. On-product claims cannot be made unless 1) the entity has been certified as per the most recent version of the SFA Chain of Custody Standard or any of its predecessors that are still in effect, 2) the product meets the requirements of the most recent version of the SFA Chain of Custody Standard or any of its predecessors that are still in effect, and 3) the on-product claim has been approved by the SFA or an SFA-approved Conformity Assessment Body (CAB).
All on-product claims must first be submitted to your CAB for approval. Or, if you do not have a CAB, then claims can be submitted to the SFA through the Claims & Logo Approval Form.
You can find more information on making SFA claims on the Resources page of our website.
GET CERTIFIED
To provide more information on how to become ‘SFA Certified’, we have created a series of certification guides for producers, primary processors, manufacturers, brands and retailers. Click the banner below to discover our Get Certified Guides now.
