CleanScan

CleanScan certification has been created for​:

• Single ingredients from suppliers
• Single-ingredient food, supplement, personal care and clothing products (products sold to consumers)
• Multi-ingredient food, supplement, personal care and clothing products (products sold to consumers)

If you are a product manufacturer and all of your ingredient suppliers are CleanScan certified you can automatically receive CleanScan certification without the product testing steps listed below. You will only have to sign the certification agreement and pay the annual certification fee.

If your ingredient suppliers are not all CleanScan certified you need to follow our full certification process for your product(s) – see below:

1. You Apply for Certification using our Registration Form – Provide basic information of your company and product (including official ingredients list or program details).
2. We put you in touch with a third-party ISO 17025 accredited laboratory to test your product(s) confidentially for pesticide and heavy metal residues. You can also select a laboratory for testing your product/s, as long as they meet our laboratory standards (which can be viewed in our FAQs section above).
3. You send your product to be tested by the third-party ISO 17025 accredited laboratory using liquid chromatography, gas chromatography or ICPMS methods.
4. The laboratory prepares a confidential report on the pesticide and heavy metal levels in your product.
5. You send us testing results within 5 business days of receiving them from the laboratory – We confidentially evaluate them in order to determine compliance with our Standard. For GMOs you will need to send us a valid Non-GMO certification Certificate of Compliance.
6. We send you our Certification Decision.
7. If your certification is accepted we send you the certification agreement to fill in and sign. You pay us $1900 in total for the certification upon signing the agreement (this annual price is a flat rate fee and covers certification for as many products as you wish to certify). If you own multiple brands each brand requires a separate certification.
8. During the year we will send you product testing requests at least once more. If you have many products we will work with you to format a cost-effective testing protocol.
9. All certified products are included in The Detox Project CleanScan certified product database.
10. Maintaining Certification: Certificates are valid for one year – Annual testing is required to maintain your certification (minimum 2 times per year + spot checks). If there are less than 2 lots produced of a specific product per year then only one sample will have to be tested for that product.

Introduction

The CleanScan certification programs (the “Program”) has been established to:

• Reduce Consumers’ risk of exposure to toxic chemicals and GMOs in foods, supplements, personal care and clothing products they purchase or use;
• Educate Producers about the toxic chemical profile of their products;
• Enable Producers to fine-tune production and supply chain strategies to minimize reliance on toxic chemicals and GMOs;
• Encourage farmers to reduce their reliance on toxic chemicals and GMOs

Purpose of the Standard

The Standard:

• Describes the certification framework and testing requirements applicable to products certified as CleanScan (“Certified Products”); and
• Provides guidance for public claims made in connection with Certified Products, either on or off product.

Intended Users of the Standard

The Standard is intended to be used by ingredient suppliers and food, supplement, personal care and clothing manufacturers interested in having products certified under the Program, as well as farmers and value chain handlers and purchasers of Certified Products.

Handlers include distributors, wholesalers, importers, and food processors and manufacturers.

Purchasers of Certified Products include food manufacturers, grocers, restaurants, consumers and institutional buyers.

Voluntary Standard

This Standard is voluntary and nonbinding. It is not intended to replace the legal or regulatory requirements of any country in which agricultural products or food, supplement, personal care or clothing products are produced, handled, or sold.

Manufacturers participating in the Program are not ultimately required to utilize the CleanScan certification mark on Certified Products.

Scope

This Standard applies to products and ingredients submitted for assessment to determine whether they can be CleanScan certified.

Program Applicant Submissions

As a prerequisite for assessment, Farmers / Ingredient Suppliers / Food Manufacturers / Supplement Manufacturers / Personal Care Manufacturers / Clothing Manufacturers / Producers are required to submit a Program Application Form and supporting documents alongside the third-party laboratory results for testing of product samples tested for certification purposes and/or a valid Non-GMO certification Certificate of Compliance.

Required supporting documents may include, but are not necessarily limited to the following:

• Signed CleanScan services agreement
• Ingredients List Disclosure

Conformance Requirements for Certified Products

Note: You can choose which claims of the three below you wish to make via your brand’s CleanScan QR code. If you do not wish to make one of the claims below you do not need to perform testing for it:

Tested For

1. Pesticides
2. Heavy Metals
3. GMOs

In order for a product or ingredient to be CleanScan certified:

• A representative sample of an identified Product or Ingredient must be collected and sent by the Producer to the agreed third-party laboratory for analysis in accordance with Program sampling requirements at least two (2) times a year and increasing from that number depending on the number of product lots produced. If there are less than two (2) lots produced of a specific product per year then only one sample from each lot will have to be tested.
• The sample must be laboratory tested by a qualified third-party laboratory (if accepted) in accordance with the Program testing requirements (using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) methods or ICPMS methods); and
• Test results must show that the product meets the following requirements:
  • Pesticides: You will need to test your product/s for 400+ pesticides, in a multi-residue test for pesticides that includes a similar list of pesticides to the one found here. We also require you to test for glyphosate, which is not included in most multi-residue tests. Your product/s must have no pesticide residues down to government-recognized limits of detection (LODs) for food, commodity and supplement samples (usually 0.01 ppm), and lower levels than default government Maximum Residue Limits (MRLs) in the European Union and Japan.
  • Heavy Metals: You will need to test your product/s for four of the major heavy metals: Mercury, Lead, Cadmium and Arsenic. As heavy metals are often naturally occurring in some products, rather than a non-detection requirement, we instead base our required limit of 0.3 ppm on the most stringent national government Standard for heavy metals in the world: Taiwan’s Standard for the Tolerance of Heavy Metals in Plant Origin. For Baby Food our Standard is even more stringent on the heavy metals listed above and is based on the 2021 proposed U.S. Baby Food Safety Act and what is commonly used as an LOD in laboratories – 0.01 ppm.
  • GMOs: You will need to provide us with a valid Non-GMO Certificate of Compliance from a third-party certifying body that is widely recognized, such as the Non-GMO Project or SGS.

• CleanScan certification testing is based on government-accepted limit-of-detection protocols for products. The product name is clearly stated on the Certificate issued upon certification. The owner of the Program is not responsible for, or supportive of claims made by the client pertaining to Products that are not listed on the Certificate.

Limit of Detection

The “limit of detection (LOD)” is the level below which a laboratory cannot confirm the presence of a specific residue in a given sample. LODs for international pesticide residue free certification standards are established in accordance with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) PAM II validated methods / protocols for pesticides and other international government validated methods / protocols. Currently the LOD used by qualifying third-party laboratories while testing samples for CleanScan certification is 0.01 ppm, or the lowest possible LOD for a specific sample, if this is higher than 0.01 ppm but lower than government maximum residue levels. The 0.01 ppm LOD is recognized as the internationally accepted LOD for widely used validated methods for pesticide analysis (including glyphosate analysis) and heavy metal analysis in food, commodity, supplement, personal care and clothing samples.

Duration of Certification

Once a Product has been successfully certified, the certification shall remain in effect for one calendar year, unless the certification is suspended or revoked in accordance with the provision ‘Revocation or Suspension’ below or under the contract provision which enables the owner of the Program to cancel certification 6 months after your Certificate of Compliance is sent via e-mail, for any reason.

As a quality control measure, Certified Products may be spot retested at any time. The results of spot retests will remain confidential and will only be released to the Producer of the retested Certified Product/s.

Revocation or Suspension.

A certification will be placed under review or suspended or revoked if any of the following conditions exist:

• Pesticide or heavy metal residues are found at any point during or following the certification process to exceed the requirements for certification, until such time that conformance is reestablished;
• The Non-GMO certification Certificate of Compliance provided by the manufacturer / ingredient producer for CleanScan certification, becomes invalid for any reason;
• A manufacturer / ingredient producer is unwilling or unable to correct observed discrepancies;
• A manufacturer / ingredient producer is unwilling or unable to meet financial or contractual arrangements;
• A manufacturer / ingredient producer is intentionally misusing the CleanScan certification mark; or
• A food manufacturer / ingredient producer is intentionally violating any program requirements.

Product Integrity and Traceability

The Producer of a Certified Product is required to:

• Demonstrate the ability to recall CleanScan certified products if a pesticide or heavy metal is found above the allowed levels after certification, if compliance is not reestablished as per the Protocol for Conformance Infringements; and
• Demonstrate the ability to prevent comingling and contamination of Certified Products with non-certified products.

Use of CleanScan Certification Mark

The Producer of a Certified Product is permitted to use the CleanScan certification marks in connection with the Certified Product, either directly on product labels, signage and other point-of-sale materials, or indirectly in websites, brochures, and other printed and online collateral.

If the CleanScan certified product is sold in a country or territory which requires a labeling language other than English, the words “This product is CleanScan certified” should be translated accordingly and placed on the packaging with the English CleanScan certification mark.

The Producer of a Certified Product must include the following statement alongside the certification mark either off or on product in a viewable location (e.g. producer’s website or packaging): “Based on government limit of detection protocols and default Maximum Residue Limits (MRLs), which are usually 0.01 parts per million (ppm) for all pesticides and heavy metals.”