ARA and TFI announce plans for Fertilizer Code of Practice
The Agricultural Retailers Association (ARA) and The Fertilizer Institute (TFI) announced on June 3 that they are partnering on a Fertilizer Code of Practice Initiative to establish uniform safety guidelines for the handling, storage, and distribution of fertilizer products.
ARA and TFI said the goal of the program, which also calls for third-party inspections to ensure compliance, is to create an inspection and auditing system that is effective in improving safety while being transparent, practical, simple, and efficient for retailers. They said the existing system, with specific regulations coming from different agencies, “results in a confusing compliance puzzle that is some cases has duplications and in others has gaps.”
The initiative began earlier this year when ARA’s board of directors decided to evaluate existing codes of practice for anhydrous ammonia handling and storage, but the scope was broadened to include ammonium nitrate after the April 17 fire and explosion at the West Fertilizer facility in West, Texas.
“Safety for our members, employees, and the communities in which they live and work is of paramount importance to everyone in the fertilizer business,” the two organizations said in a joint statement. “This initiative embodies that commitment.”
ARA and TFI said the initiative will provide a comprehensive collection of regulatory requirements and industry best management practices into one code of practice, with subparts for product-specific issues. Part of the mission is also to integrate as much as possible with existing state regulatory programs, again with the goal of efficient compliance for retailers.
ARA and TFI stressed that a fundamental component of the program is third-party audits. “Third-party inspectors will base their audits on adherence to the code of practice,” they said. “The results of the inspection will be made available to participating suppliers, so they know the audit results for the company they’re shipping to, and retailers will also be able to verify that their suppliers are participating.”
Workgroups will be meeting this summer to develop details of the program. The ARA board will receive an initial update report at its fall meeting on September 18, 2013, and a presentation and discussion for ARA member retailers will follow at ARA’s Annual Conference in December.
As an interim step, ARA and TFI, in cooperation with the Asmark Institute and the American Agronomic Stewardship Alliance (AASA), are making information available to retailers about a free Compliance Assessment Tool developed by Asmark for retailers to quickly self-assess their compliance with existing regulations.