African Certification and Testing (PTY) Ltd (ACT) has been established to provide a vehicle in which to operate a mark scheme for the benefit of the utility wooden pole industry in Africa.
ACT are accredited through SANAS to conduct GLOBALG.A.P. IFA audits for fruit and vegetable farms.
The company has SANAS Accreditation for ISO/IEC 17065 and ISO/IEC 17021.
ACT is established with independent shareholders who appoint the directors of the company.
ACT operates independently from any other industry associations and bodies. Other industry bodies are not able to influence its policies or decisions. As a result, there are no related bodies to act. Currently act does not carry on any other business activities apart from certification and testing within the wood pole industry and the fruit and vegetable sector.”
ACT employs full time and, when required, contracted staff to ensure all activities (administration, auditing, testing etc.) are adequately resourced with qualified and competent staff. ACT takes full responsibility for all personnel matters such as impartiality, training, competence and confidentiality.
ACT is currently accredited for ISO/IEC 17065 for product certification with regards to SANS 754; SANS 457-3; SANS 1288; SANS 1783 – Part 1, 2, 3, 4; SANS 10096 and SANS 457-2. ACT is currently accredited for GLOBALG.A.P. IFA V6 Smart and IFA V6 GFS farm audits.
ACT is currently accredited for ISO/IEC 17021-1 for Quality Management System Certification for EAC 6: Wood and Wood Products (ISO 9001).
Note: Documents that have a reference number ending with “.21”; “.sm” or “.V6” are applicable to ISO 9001 (ISO/IEC 17021-1) audits; saw-milling (ISO/IEC 17065) and GLOBALG.A.P. IFA V6 audits respectively.
The company is financially independent and the ACT Shareholders ensures the supervision of all the loans and finances to the company.
ACT was originally funded by the Shareholder in the form of seed capital. Currently ACT is funded by means of permit, inspection and auditing fees based on non-discriminatory rates as per the ACT pricing model.
ACT has developed an audit and inspection programme to satisfy the requirements of ISO/IEC 17065 and ISO/IEC 17021 as well as wooden pole end user contracts and specifications.
ACT have consulted with large wooden pole customers such as Eskom (South Africa) and Kaap Agri to determine the quality standards required by the end users.
An auditing and inspection program has been developed for all the ACT clients in order to ensure the product supplied under the ACT mark continuously complies to the product standard and end user requirements.
