The ISEAL report ‘Understanding Certified Small Producers’ Needs: Interviews with certified producers to understand their needs and how sustainability standards can innovate to meet them’ is based on interviews with 63 producers in five countries across six sectors.

The report outlines the key challenges facing producers and suggests opportunities for sustainability standards to innovate to meet these needs. Seven cross-cutting challenges emerged from the research.

Producer challenge 1: Fluctuating and low prices for certified products

Producer challenge 2: Market access

Producer challenge 3: Accessibility and cost of assurance

Producer challenge 4: Rising cost of agricultural inputs

Producer challenge 5: Environmental and social issues like climate change, the natural environment and human safety.

Producer challenge 6: Access to finance

Producer challenge 7: Demand for practical education, data access and information sharing

The report explores these challenges and goes on to lay out opportunities for how sustainability standards can evolve and innovate to tackle these challenges.
To find out more and read the full report, go to www.iseal.org/producers.