globalaccreditationboard

GAB is an autonomous body responsible for providing accreditation of conformity assessment bodies (CABs) in the fields of certification and inspection. Accreditation by GAB demonstrates the competence and independence of these CABs.

GAB accredits CABs who in turn have certified more than 1,00,000 organizations. GAB provides services in over 25 countries like

What is Accreditation

Accreditation is an endorsement of a conformity assessment body's (CAB's) competence, credibility, independence and integrity in carrying out its conformity assessment activities.

In everyday language the terms accreditation and certification are often used interchangeably. In the conformity assessment industry however, these terms have very different and specific meanings.
 Formal definition of accreditation is third party attestation related to a conformity assessment body conveying formal demonstration of its competence to carry out specific conformity assessment tasks. (ISO/ IEC 17000:2004) Certification is "third party attestation related to products, processes, systems or persons." (ISO/ IEC 17000:2004). GAB only accredits organisations who provide certification and/ or inspection services. These organisations are known as Conformity Assessment Bodies (or CABs).

Accredited CABs provide certification and inspection services to organisations. Common schemes that CABs certify are quality management systems (QMS) based on the ISO 9001 standard, and environmental management systems (EMS) based on the ISO 14001 standard.