GlobalG.A.P. Farm Assurance Implementation Training Course

Course overview

Farm businesses supplying retailers, exporters, packhouses and food-service buyers must show that production controls are not merely documented but applied consistently in fields, facilities and records. GlobalG.A.P. certification audits can expose gaps in traceability, crop-protection records, hygiene controls, worker welfare, water management and corrective-action follow-through. This course prepares agricultural professionals to translate GlobalG.A.P. requirements into workable farm procedures, evidence files and internal controls that can withstand inspection.

Participants work through the GlobalG.A.P. Integrated Farm Assurance (IFA) framework, with emphasis on interpreting control points and compliance criteria, assigning responsibilities and collecting objective evidence. They learn to build a farm compliance register; conduct risk assessments; manage crop-protection product, fertiliser and irrigation records; establish harvest and post-harvest hygiene controls; test traceability and mass balance; and manage non-conformities through root-cause analysis and corrective-action plans. The course also addresses GRASP requirements where social-practice verification is relevant.

Instructor-led sessions are combined with farm-document reviews, audit simulations and practical workshops using realistic production scenarios. Each participant develops an implementation pack for a selected farm or producer group: a gap-assessment checklist, compliance action plan, document register, traceability test plan and corrective-action log. Participants receive a certificate on completion and can use the pack as the starting point for internal preparation before an external certification-body audit.

The programme is designed for professionals who already work with commercial crop production, farm quality systems or supplier assurance and need a structured method for implementing or strengthening GlobalG.A.P. Farm Assurance controls.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Interpret GlobalG.A.P. IFA control points and compliance criteria for a crop-production operation
• Build a farm compliance register that maps requirements to owners, records and evidence
• Conduct production-site risk assessments covering food safety, environmental and worker risks
• Design crop-protection, fertiliser and irrigation record systems that support audit verification
• Create a farm-to-customer traceability test and reconcile quantities through mass-balance checks
• Perform an internal GlobalG.A.P. audit using evidence sampling, interview questions and checklists
• Write non-conformity reports and corrective-action plans using root-cause analysis
• Prepare an implementation pack for certification readiness, including priorities, timelines and responsibilities

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Farm Managers — who must convert certification requirements into daily field and packhouse controls
• Quality Assurance Managers — who maintain food-safety, traceability and audit evidence across farm operations
• Agronomists — who oversee crop-protection, fertiliser and irrigation decisions requiring compliant records
• Internal Auditors — who need to assess farm conformity before a certification-body audit
• Producer Group Managers — who coordinate common controls and verification across multiple growers
• Export and Supply Chain Managers — who must qualify farms against buyer and retailer assurance requirements

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have practical familiarity with commercial crop production, farm operations or agricultural supply chains, including basic terminology for crop protection, fertiliser use, irrigation, harvesting and farm records. Experience with a quality-management system, internal inspections or customer compliance requirements is useful but not essential. Participants should be able to read operational procedures and work with simple spreadsheets; Microsoft Excel or an equivalent spreadsheet tool is assumed for workshop templates. Prior GlobalG.A.P. audit experience, certification-body training and detailed knowledge of every IFA control point are not required.

Training methodology

The five-day programme combines focused instructor-led interpretation of GlobalG.A.P. requirements with applied farm-assurance workshops. Participants review sample procedures, spray records, worker documents, harvest logs and traceability data to decide whether evidence meets a control point. Small groups conduct a simulated farm audit, classify findings and build corrective actions using realistic crop-production cases. Daily exercises add sections to an individual implementation pack. On the final day, participants present a prioritised application plan for their own farm, supplier base or producer group and receive instructor feedback.

Course outline

Day 1: GlobalG.A.P. framework and farm compliance baseline

• GlobalG.A.P. Integrated Farm Assurance architecture and certification scope
• Control points and compliance criteria: Major Must, Minor Must and Recommendation
• Certification options, multi-site operations and producer-group responsibilities
• Farm context, product scope and site mapping for implementation planning
• Document hierarchy: policies, procedures, work instructions and operational records
• Compliance-register design linking control points, evidence and accountable roles
• Initial gap-assessment methods and certification-readiness prioritisation

Workshop: Participants map a selected farm operation, build an initial IFA compliance register and identify the highest-priority implementation gaps.

Day 2: Production controls, risk assessment and responsible resource use

• Food-safety risk assessment for production, harvesting and handling activities
• Crop-protection product selection, authorisation and application records
• Sprayer calibration, application competence and pre-harvest interval controls
• Fertiliser storage, application planning and nutrient-use documentation
• Water-source risk assessment, irrigation controls and water-quality monitoring
• Soil management, biodiversity and environmental management evidence
• Waste, fuel, chemical-storage and emergency-response control measures

Workshop: Using a crop-production case, participants complete a risk assessment and design supporting controls for chemical use, water and environmental risks.

Day 3: People, hygiene, harvest and product integrity

• Worker health, hygiene and training controls for farm and harvest teams
• Personal protective equipment, welfare facilities and incident reporting
• GRASP v2 social-practice requirements and worker representation evidence
• Harvest hygiene procedures, container control and foreign-body prevention
• Post-harvest handling, storage sanitation and temperature-management records
• Visitor, contractor and vehicle controls in production and handling areas
• Product contamination incidents, withdrawal triggers and communication protocols

Workshop: Groups review a harvest and packhouse scenario, then produce a hygiene-control procedure and a GRASP evidence checklist.

Day 4: Traceability, internal auditing and corrective action

• Lot identification from field, harvest crew and date through dispatch
• One-step-back and one-step-forward traceability testing methods
• Mass-balance reconciliation using harvest, packing, stock and sales data
• Internal-audit planning, sampling and evidence-gathering techniques
• Interviewing staff and observing practices against documented procedures
• Non-conformity classification and objective audit-report writing
• Root-cause analysis and corrective-action effectiveness verification

Workshop: Participants conduct a tabletop traceability and mass-balance test, then write audit findings and corrective actions for identified breaks.

Day 5: Certification readiness and implementation leadership

• Certification-body audit stages, audit preparation and staff briefing
• Evidence-file organisation and document-control review before inspection
• Closing gaps through action owners, due dates and resource allocation
• Management review inputs, compliance indicators and seasonal performance tracking
• Producer-group internal management system and member verification controls
• Responding to audit non-conformities and managing closure evidence
• Ninety-day GlobalG.A.P. implementation roadmap and readiness review

Workshop: Participants finalise and present a 90-day implementation roadmap with an evidence file, internal-audit schedule and corrective-action priorities.

Tools & standards covered

GLOBALG.A.P. Integrated Farm Assurance (IFA) v6 Smart, GLOBALG.A.P. Risk Assessment on Social Practice (GRASP) v2, GLOBALG.A.P. Database, Microsoft Excel

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions