They identify products that:

• have been produced in an environmentally and/or socially responsible manner
• support consumers in shopping consciously
• promote responsible economic action

Other terms for label are standard, certificate, certification as well as quality label or quality mark.

Environmental and social labels can be very different from each other in their

• degree of substantive requirements
• credibility
• extent of the product life cycle they cover

Some labels are specifically dedicated to the issues in a certain industry or part of the product life cycle. Here they define high but very specific requirements.

Other labels, on the other hand, tend to have lower requirements. However, this does not automatically mean that they are worse: By enabling a large number of small producers to meet the requirements, they also make an important contribution to greater sustainability in the end.

The goal of a label should always be: set higher standards for environmental friendliness and social compatibility than is usual in conventional production!

The standard is a document. It specifies the content requirements for the product or production process.

The standard system goes beyond the standard. It involves the implementation process and the control mechanism that comes with the award of a label.

It decides whether a product may display the respective label. It defines which goals are to be achieved with it. It defines the standard and the standard system.

Different bodies can - alone or together - establish a standard-setting organisation:

• Government agencies
• Civil society organisations
• Companies

The requirements set out in a standard document may relate to different aspects:

• manufacturing process, e.g. the prohibition of child labour
• characteristics, e.g. energy consumption of an electrical appliance
• management process, e.g. operational environmental management

Recognised inspection bodies verify the requirements. They should be independent of the companies applying for a label for their production process (cf. What is certification?). Some organisations award labels for which they have formulated requirements themselves and subsequently check compliance with them themselves. Some labels do not provide for any controls at all.

Certification is used to check whether products, processes or systems meet the comprehensive requirements of a standard. This can happen, for example, in the form of an audit. For many certifications, control by an independent third party is required. These are often recognised inspection bodies that are independent of the organisation issuing the label and the company that applied for the label. If the company to be certified successfully passes the assessment by the inspection body, this is confirmed with a certificate. This allows the company to label its product with the logo of the standard organisation.

Yes! However, the focus of Siegelklarheit is currently on Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS). Historically, these have played a pioneering role in promoting sustainable production and fair supply chains. They are now firmly established in the market and provide important guidance for many consumers interested in sustainability when shopping. However, as the topic of sustainability has become increasingly important in recent years, other approaches have also been established. Some of these differ from the classic VSS approaches. They include, for example:

• company-labels of companies that have defined their own requirements and label their products with their own label.
• Business-to-Business (B2B) labels, which focus exclusively on trade between companies and which you as a consumer usually cannot recognise on the product itself. However, you may encounter these labels if companies actively communicate them through reporting or advertising.
• factory certificates that examine whether a factory complies with the environmental and/or social requirements defined in the standard. As a consumer, you cannot usually see on the product itself whether it comes from a factory with a corresponding certificate.
• membership-based initiatives that, for example, work on sector-specific sustainability issues and thus advocate for more sustainability in the supply chain.

Every purchase decision determines the market success of products. If consumers can see that products have been manufactured in an environmentally friendly and socially responsible way, they can make more conscious purchaising decisions and consume more sustainably. And thus, contribute to a more sustainable production of the things they use every day. This is where labels play an important role!

This can make an active contribution to conserving resources and promoting the implementation of fundamental labour and social standards.

The goal must be to make purchasing more sustainable overall. This can help ensure that both present and future generations can live in security and dignity worldwide.

This is exactly what environmental and social labels help with. They make it easier to choose products from demonstrably responsible production.

Whether a product is truly sustainable depends on numerous factors along the entire value chain: from the extraction of raw materials (e.g. the use of pesticides) and processing (e.g. water consumption) to production, use and finally disposal.

Labels play an fundamental role here and are an immense help in the search for sustainable products. With Siegelklarheit we help you to recognise demanding labels and identify sustainable products.

Siegelklarheit is an initiative by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ).The BMZ continues to finance the portal and has commissioned the GIZ with the secretariat of Siegelklarheit.

The aim of Siegelklarheit is to strengthen sustainable private consumption. By helping consumers to better understand environmental and social labels, we want to contribute to more sustainable purchasing decisions. In addition, we want to promote the market penetration of demanding labels and the international implementation of ambitious environmental and social standards. By comparing the labels, the standard-setting organisations also have an incentive to constantly work on improving their systems.

Some of the labels mentioned on Siegelklarheit are or have been supported by the Ministries involved. You can get further details on some supported labels in this document. 

International partners

Siegelklarheit works closely with international partners, in particular the International Trade Center (ITC) and the International Social and Environmental Accreditation and Labelling Alliance (ISEAL).

The ITC is supported by the World Trade Organisation and the United Nations. Its mission is to promote the sustainable development of developing and emerging countries through trade and international business relations. There is closer cooperation between the ITC and Siegelklarheit: we access the ITC database (Standards Map) when we evaluate the social and environmental standards as well as the credibility of labels. In this process, however, the ITC only provides the technical infrastructure. The organisation itself was not involved in the development of the assessment methodology. For the provision of data the ITC's disclaimer applies.

The ISEAL Alliance is the international umbrella organisation of label providers from the environmental and social sectors. It encourages the standard systems on their way to achieving the best possible effects for people and the environment. ISEAL has many years of experience in defining and communicating social and environmental standards. For this reason, the organisation has helped us to develop our assessment methodology (cf. the section below on The Assessment Methodology of Siegelklarheit), which we use for Siegelklarheit - together with many other stakeholders. In 2020/2021 it also provided technical support for the revision of our credibility requirements.

Siegelklarheit can only evaluate and thus display those labels for which there are already evaluation requirements. Such requirements currently exist for the product groups textiles, paper, laptops & co., detergents & cleaning agents, natural stones, leather and mobile phones. For you this means: You can currently find ratings for labels from these product groups on Siegelklarheit.

If a label cannot be clearly categorised, it is assigned to the product group with which it overlaps in most points. In that case, a rating and therefore the presentation on Siegelklarheit is not possible.

At Siegelklarheit we are working on providing you with even more and broader information about labels in the future. For this reason, we are constantly checking whether we can include more product groups in our portal.

There can be several reasons for this:

The label cannot be assigned to any of the product groups.

• In principle, only those labels that can be assigned to one of the product groups can be evaluated on Siegelklarheit. This is only possible if there are corresponding requirements. Such requirements currently exist for the product groups textiles, paper, laptops & co., detergents & cleaning agents, natural stones, leather and mobile phones. Therefore, you can currently find ratings for labels from these product groups on Siegelklarheit.

The label sought is not a consumer label.

• Siegelklarheit focuses on consumer labels (business-to-consumer / B2C labels). In other words, labels that you as a consumer can find on the end product itself. Currently, we only map a few labels on Siegelklarheit that are not classic consumer labels.

The label does not meet the minimum requirements.

• On Siegelklarheit, we can only evaluate labels that meet the minimum requirements in the areas of credibility and environment/social issues. If a label does not meet these minimum requirements, it cannot be presented on Siegelklarheit.
• You can find out which requirements these are in detail in the lists of criteria for the individual product groups.

The label does not want to be evaluated.

The evaluation of a label as well as its publication on Siegelklarheit is voluntary. If you find a purely informative label here, it may be that the organisation issuing the label was/is not in agreement with an assessment. This can happen without giving reasons. Another reason for not showing an assessment could be that the label did not want to undergo an assessment in the first place. 

The label still needs to be completed.

• The world of standards is very dynamic and the number of available labels is constantly growing. Keeping an overview here is a big challenge - all the more we appreciate your help!

If you are missing a label on this website and none of the above explanations apply, simply contact us. We look forward to hearing from you!

In general, Siegelklarheit only evaluates the sustainability of labels - not that of products. Because: We want to promote sustainable consumption by making comprehensive information available to consumers. On this basis, they can then make their own conscious and sustainable purchasing decisions. Therefore, we do not act on the product level and do not make any purchase recommendations.

Yes! Fortunately, there are many further sources that you can use to find out more about sustainability standards and sustainable consumption in general. Some of them can be found in Further Initiatives. 

The evaluation of a sustainability standard for Siegelklarheit is carried out in three dimensions: Credibility, Environmental and Social. Each dimension is based on a comprehensive grid of criteria – so requirements against which a label is assessed.

Within these criteria grids we distinguish between minimum requirements and additional requirements. The minimum requirements are particularly important as they are the prerequisite for a comprehensive assessment in all three dimensions.

Each label is evaluated on the basis of the criteria grids of these three dimensions, so that there is a separate result for each dimension. The overall rating ("Good choice!" or "Very good choice!") is obtained from the joint consideration of the individual dimension ratings.

You can see how this works in detail in the description of the Download and Information Area.

The awareness of sustainability is increasing more and more, so that the number of standard systems (in the following: standards) has been growing rapidly for 20 years. It is difficult to keep track of them all, because they look at very different aspects of sustainability or are applied at very different points in the value chain. The result: for many consumers, the growing landscape of labels is more confusing than guiding, and so they demand more transparency and information on the credibility and claim of a standard.

This is where the Sustainability Standards Comparison Tool (SSCT) comes in. It is a tool with which we can analyse and evaluate sustainability standards. The SSCT was developed in 2013/2014 by GIZ in cooperation with national and international experts on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. The methodology was revised in 2020 to make it leaner, more transparent and thus more comprehensible - without losing the depth of the assessment.

The methodology is applied on two platforms: In addition to Siegelklarheit on the portal Sustainability Compass (Kompass Nachhaltigkeit), which is aimed at public procurement, with its standard comparison tool.

Further information on the SSCT can be found in the Download and Information Area.  

We assess the credibility of a label with Siegelklarheit based on these topics:

• System management: How is the standard-setting organisation structured? How transparent are its structures and how are the decision-making bodies composed?
• Standard setting: Who is involved in formulating the requirements? Are the objections of stakeholders taken into account? How often is the catalogue of requirements revised?
• Control system: Are the requirements checked by an independent qualified body? Are abuses sanctioned?
• Product labelling and traceability: What does a label claim and who may adorn themselves with it? Can certified raw materials also be traced back through the production phases?

We work with the International Trade Centre (ITC), established by the UN and WTO, to collect the standard data. The ITC coordinates the review process and provides the raw data for the evaluation by the SSCT. The standard-setting organisations provide all relevant documents for the external reviewers hired by ITC and review the data after the collection process is completed. Final quality assurance is then carried out by the ITC before the raw data arrives at the backend of Siegelklarheit and the SSCT assessment methodology (cf. What is the Sustainability Standards Comparison Tool (SSCT)?) is applied.

If the standard organisation agrees to publish its own assessment, the assessment result is submitted to the Siegelklarheit Steering Committee (cf. What is Siegelklarheit? And who is behind it?) for approval. This Committee ultimately decides whether the results are to be published on Siegelklarheit. Afterwards, the Secretariat, which is hosted by GIZ, posts the evaluation on the website and the App.

You want to check in detail which requirements we have formulated for certain product groups and what they are based on? Then take a look at our detailed list of all requirements by product group, which you can find in the Download and Information Area. There you will also find further helpful documents on all aspects of Siegelklarheit.

The overall catalogue of requirements, which consists of 300 requirements (also called criteria), covers the three dimensions that form the basis for an assessment for Siegelklarheit (see How does the Siegelklarheit assessment methodology work?). The catalogue was originally developed in 2013/2014 on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) as part of a multistakeholder process coordinated by GIZ. More than 200 experts from academia, civil society and the private sector were involved. In the area of credibility, the criteria are based on the ISEAL Credibility Principles. The environmental and social criteria are based on international agreements, such as those adopted by the International Labour Organization (ILO).

Some of the requirements have already been revised - to ensure that the criteria grids we apply at Siegelklarheit are up to date and, for example, address the most important challenges of more sustainable production. We are also checking whether there is a need to revise the other criteria grids.

In such a revision, we involve experts from the respective sector. We also conduct a public consultation so that everyone can participate. We also make a recommendation on which criteria should be defined as minimum requirements, as they cover issues that are particularly important for more sustainable production. The Steering Committee (cf. What is Siegelklarheit? And who is behind it?) will make the final decision on this. The BMZ decides on the further criteria.

The evaluation requirements currently used on Siegelklarheit, separated according to product groups, can be found in the Download and Information Area.

The minimum requirements are selected from the overall catalogue of requirements. They cover topics of particular relevance in the respective dimensions (environmental friendliness / social compatibility  / credibility) and thus ensure that

• the labels address the most important social and environmental challenges in their product group and
• they are backed up by a credible implementation system.

It is important to differentiate here between the additional / extended requirements and the minimum requirements (both of which together form the overall catalogue of requirements), as labels are structured very differently. Some labels are very comprehensive and set ambitious requirements for products. Other labels focus only on one dimension, for example environmental aspects, or only look at certain parts of the respective value chain. Still others set particularly lower requirements for certification. However, they all make an important contribution to sustainable development and should be mapped to Siegelklarheit, provided they have a credible standard system.

Therefore, this subdivision aims, on the one hand, to identify and award very comprehensive and demanding labels that fulfil more than just the minimum requirements ("Very Good Choice"). On the other hand, labels that fulfil at least the minimum requirements ("Good choice") and thus make an equally important contribution to more sustainable consumption should also be awarded.

You can find the evaluation requirements currently used on Siegelklarheit separated by product groups in the Download and Information Area. You can see from these overviews which requirements are considered  minimum requirements.

Siegelklarheit has a very detailed evaluation system. The assessment of the labels is based on a catalogue of more than 300 requirements that leading experts from academia, civil society and the private sector have developed with us (cf. How did the evaluation criteria come about and what are they based on?).

Nevertheless, all labels are based on very different approaches, each with their own complex awarding and control systems. Therefore, we cannot present every special feature of a label on our portal and include it in the evaluation, although we use an extensive evaluation methodology. However, in the short descriptions of the respective labels, we point out such essential peculiarities, if they exist.

What e.g. cannot be assessed is the extent to which a standard addresses specific problems of production in a particular region. This would require individual assessment in order to understand how a certification affects the situation of an individual cultivation or production site. Whether, for example, water conservation requirements are particularly important or not depends on the region in which production takes place.

Why might Siegelklarheit be interesting for me?

Siegelklarheit offers you the opportunity to make your label even better known. It also gives you the opportunity to credibly demonstrate the high standards you are pursuing. This requires data collection via the International Trade Centre (ITC) for the Standards Map. You can find out exactly how data collection works in the section above The Assessment Methodology of Siegelklarheit. 

If you are interested in having your label listed on Siegelklarheit, please contact us at kontakt@siegelklarheit.de or via the contact form. To check the admission of your label, we will send you a questionnaire in which you can provide the relevant information about your label.

I am already presented on Siegelklarheit and have a request - what do I do?

If basic information about your label has changed or if you have any other questions about your presentation, please feel free to contact us through kontakt@siegelklarheit.de or via the contact form!

How can I have my products certified?

Certification is not carried out by Siegelklarheit, but always by the respective labelling organisation. All details of a certification (prerequisites, requirements, costs, etc.) are therefore to be enquired about with the label-issuing organisations.

In what form may I display labels on my website?

The prerequisites and conditions for the use of the label are very different and must be found out individually from the respective organisation issuing the label.

Why are there no B2B / industry labels on Siegelklarheit?

The overarching goal of Siegelklarheit is to promote sustainable consumption by presenting private consumers with the most comprehensive information possible, on the basis of which they can then make conscious and sustainable purchasing decisions. Accordingly, Siegelklarheit currently focuses primarily on consumer labels - i.e. labels that are explicitly aimed at consumers.However, a few business-to-business labels (B2B labels) are already being assessed and presented for Siegelklarheit.

Which label is right for my product  / company?

Answers to questions about the certification of products can be found in the information offered by the respective labelling organisations.

We would also like to draw your attention to the SME Compass. Here you will find a quick overview of how to implement corporate due diligence in order to better fulfil your responsibility along the value chain. With the Label Compass that is currently being developed, you can also discover and compare sustainability standards with a focus on corporate due diligence in the future!

If you have further questions please feel free to contact us through kontakt@siegelklarheit.de or via the contact form!

I would like to use the topic of sustainability standards and sustainable consumption in my class or integrate it into my research. Will Siegelklarheit support me in this?

The overall aim of Siegelklarheit is to evaluate sustainability standards in order to support private consumption towards more sustainability. At the same time, the portal also offers general information about different sustainability standards, which helps to get an overview. Above in the section Basic Questions you can find further information. In the Download and Information Area and Our Network you can find additional information as well as an overview of some other initiatives for more sustainable consumption.

If you have further questions please feel free to contact us through kontakt@siegelklarheit.de or via the contact form!

I would like to write about the topic of sustainability standards and sustainable consumption in general, or Siegelklarheit in particular. What can I use?

The overall aim of Siegelklarheit is to evaluate sustainability standards in order to support private consumption towards more sustainability. At the same time, the portal also offers general information about different sustainability standards, which helps to get an overview. Above in the section Basic Questions you can find further information. In the Download and Information Area and Our Network you can find additional information as well as an overview of some other initiatives for more sustainable consumption and a selection of previous appearances of Siegelklarheit in the media.

If you have further questions please feel free to contact us through kontakt@siegelklarheit.de or via the contact form!