Vietnam has been selected by a consortium of organizations led by one of the UN Agencies (UNGC) for the pilot.
There are more than 400 million farms in the world. The need for a unique I.D. for farms has been identified as an essential requirement by United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) and the International Trade Centre (ITC- a subsidiary organization of the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) plus other agencies. The I.D. key is needed in the process of monitoring and reporting of compliance with standards/protocols on sustainable farming practices. The UNGC initiative is fundamentally about encouraging small and medium sized farmers to adopt good practices and to increase their production in return for better market access and prices. These farms are, in practical terms, not currently reached by the GS1 system. UNGC are planning a pilot in up to 20 countries, before global roll-out, with approximately 500,000 farms.
The current list of pilot countries identified by UNGC are: Colombia, Denmark, Malaysia, Myanmar, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Vietnam.
In the past, the Global Gap Agency (part of this new consortium) undertook a similar project. They bought one GCP (10,000 €) and it was used to identify over 100,000 farms.
How does the system works? In a nutshell, GS1 will have a central GLN Registry for farms run by the GO. The local UNGC agencies will contact the small farmers and will be asked to register. All the costs of the GLNs and GLN Registry will be borne by UNGC and there will be no cost to the farms concerned. The content of the GLN Registry is owned by GS1, so the MOs will have access to the information if they wish. The MOs do not need to do any work. However, you can reach your local UNGC agency and plan services for your local farms.
What is the funding model? The pilot is for 5 years, 20 countries and targets 500,000 farms. There is a fixed for the whole project and variable part for the total of the pilot.
The importance of this project is to establish the GS1 system in this sector that will be fundamental for our future traceability standards and systems. This includes potential Traceability trainings for the farms. Furthermore, we will have the endorsement of the UN and WTO for the project.