ISO/TS 14029 is the ISO technical specification that sets out how two environmental product declaration programmes formally recognise each other's work. A declaration verified under one can then be accepted by the other instead of being checked twice.
Its 2022 edition does the same for programmes publishing product footprints. It is also the unusual document in this family whose subject is not a product, but the arrangement between two organisations.
The people who apply this document are not the people it saves money for. Programme operators negotiate the arrangement, and the manufacturer who stops paying for a second verification never opens it.
What mutual recognition actually means
Four terms carry the whole document, and they are worth settling before the mechanics.
An environmental product declaration, or EPD, is a quantified report of a product's environmental impact across its life cycle, independently verified before it is published.
A programme operator is the body that runs the scheme an EPD is published through. ISO/TS 14029 defines that body broadly: a company or group of companies, a trade association, a public authority, or an independent scientific body.
A mutual recognition arrangement, called an MRA throughout the text, is the deal two or more of those operators strike to treat each other's results as valid.
The specification is then careful about two words most people use interchangeably. Recognition is acknowledging that another body's result is valid. Acceptance is actually using it. They get separate definitions because a programme can do the first without committing to the second.
The visible payoff has its own term. Dual registration is a declaration registered in both programmes at once, carrying the logos of both operators.
ISO/TS 14029 in brief
Here are the details worth having in front of you before reading any further.
| Detail | ISO/TS 14029 |
|---|---|
| Full title | Environmental statements and programmes for products, mutual recognition of environmental product declarations (EPDs) and footprint communication programmes |
| Current edition | 2022, the first edition, published in April and confirmed by ISO as still current in September 2025 |
| Type | A Technical Specification, not a full International Standard, and not something you get certified to |
| Who signs one | Two or more EPD or footprint communication programme operators, never a manufacturer |
| What can be recognised | EPDs, footprint communications, or the product category rules behind them |
| Published by | ISO/TC 207/SC 3, the environmental labelling subcommittee |
Nineteen pages hold all of it. Clause 4 sets the principles and clause 5 covers getting started. Clauses 6 and 7 define what an arrangement has to contain, clause 8 governs how it is run, and clause 9 handles peer evaluation. An informative annex closes it out by walking through setting one up.
The document places itself in the ISO 14020 family, and it makes five other documents binding on anyone using it.
Three are its neighbours: ISO 14025 on EPDs, ISO 14026 on footprint communication, and ISO/TS 14027 on product category rules. Two come from conformity assessment, ISO/IEC 17030 on marks of conformity and ISO/IEC 17040 on peer assessment.
The full record sits on ISO's own catalogue page for the specification.
How two programmes get to a signed arrangement
The 2022 text does not expect two programmes to sign anything on first contact. It lays out a deliberately slow path in three stages.
- Exploratory talks. Two operators open an informal discussion and assess whether an arrangement would actually benefit them both.
- A cooperation memorandum of understanding. If the interest holds, the document says informal cooperation should be captured in an MoU before any MRA is agreed. An MoU typically settles confidentiality, the aim and scope of the cooperation, the intended outcome, who the parties are, and how long it lasts.
- The arrangement itself. The MoU can carry a plan to move to a full MRA that meets the specification's requirements.
That path is not theoretical. The International EPD System publishes a memorandum of understanding with the Japanese operator SuMPO that it describes as following ISO 14029, with no recognitions agreed yet. That is precisely stage two.
Running underneath all three stages are eleven principles, grouped by what each one constrains.
| What it governs | The principles it sets |
|---|---|
| The recognition itself | Competence, openness, comparability, documentation |
| Each programme operator | Impartiality, participation, confidentiality |
| The recognition process | Fairness, proficiency, procedural approach, disclosure |
Competence is the one with teeth. To join an MRA, a programme operator has to meet ISO 14020, ISO 14025 and ISO 14026 as well as this specification. Recognition is only ever offered between programmes already built to the same rules.
What an arrangement has to cover
An MRA is not one fixed thing. The specification lets two programmes scope it to what they actually want to share, and writes separate requirements for each choice.
- An EPD arrangement covers finished declarations.
- A footprint communication arrangement covers published product footprints.
- A product category rules arrangement covers the underlying rules alone, so one programme can adopt another's product category rules without recognising its declarations.
A separate clause deals with equivalence between two programmes, which is a stronger finding than recognising individual outputs.
Clause 7 then turns to what each operator must have in place for any of that to hold.
It covers the rules the declarations are built on, consistency between the two programmes, requirements for data, databases and data integrity, the documentation each operator keeps, and an internal dossier for the programme.
One requirement is easy to overlook and quietly decisive. The parties have to agree a common language for all relevant documents, because two operators cannot check each other's work if half of it is unreadable to one of them.
Keeping an arrangement honest
Signing is the start of the obligation, not the end of it. Clause 8 reads like the constitution of a small joint venture, and clause 9 supplies the audit.
What clause 8 fixes in writing
It sets what an MRA document must contain and how it is managed day to day. It requires the parties to be evaluated, with criteria for admitting a new party, for handling a change to an existing party's scope, and for evaluating everyone again at regular intervals.
It also sets out how complaints are handled, both between the parties and from outside bodies, how the marks of the cooperating programmes may be used, and how the arrangement is communicated publicly.
Clause 8 additionally covers harmonising product category rules. That is the ambition stated in the document's own introduction: make better use of the rules that already exist, and stop a second set being written for a product category that already has one.
The check that keeps it credible
Parties are peer evaluated. The specification sets competence requirements for the peer evaluators doing that work, and the evaluation ends in a written report.
Recognition is not a rubber stamp in practice either. Institut Bauen und Umwelt holds mutual recognitions with programme operators across Europe and North America, and notes that some partners still require extra content in the declaration.
The Italian programme asks for verified recycled content information, because the underlying rules are not identical.
Who reads this document
The audience is narrow, and knowing that saves a producer a wasted afternoon.
It is written for EPD and footprint communication programme operators, the bodies that run the schemes.
In practice that means organisations such as the International EPD System, Institut Bauen und Umwelt, EPD Danmark, EPD Norge, AENOR GlobalEPD and PEP Ecopassport. The International EPD System alone publishes active arrangements with six other operators.
Its second audience is the peer evaluators who assess those programmes, since the specification sets the competence they have to bring.
Manufacturers, packaging teams and consultants are the beneficiaries rather than the audience. You never apply this document. You meet it as an answer when you ask whether the declaration you already paid for will be accepted somewhere else.
Why it matters if you publish EPDs
The honest version of this section starts with what the specification does not do.
What it does not do
It is not a packaging compliance instrument. It plays no part in Extended Producer Responsibility fee modulation, and it puts no obligation on a producer to hold an EPD at all.
Where the saving actually comes from
What it governs is duplication, and duplication costs real money. The specification's own introduction says arrangements are intended to help companies avoid duplicate verification of similar programmes on shared markets.
Institut Bauen und Umwelt puts the effect in plainer terms. An EPD listed in a partner programme's database does not have to be re-verified, which saves the holder both time and money.
That shape will be familiar to anyone filing EPR reports across several countries. The same underlying product data gets re-proved to a different national body in a different format, and the second proof adds cost without adding information.
An EPD verified twice is the same problem in a different register.
The question to ask before you commission a declaration
Ask a programme operator which other programmes recognise its EPDs, and on what terms. The answer decides how many markets one verification will reach.
Keeping track of which declarations you hold and where each one is accepted is the same records problem that Repax Core handles for EPR registrations and reports.
Where ISO/TS 14029 sits in the ISO 14020 family
The family splits neatly by what each document governs, which makes it easy to tell them apart.
| Document | What it governs |
|---|---|
| ISO 14020 | The umbrella principles behind every environmental statement |
| ISO 14025 | What an EPD is and how a programme runs one |
| ISO/TS 14027 | How the product category rules behind a declaration are written |
| ISO 14026 | How a product footprint is communicated |
| ISO/TS 14029 | The arrangement between two programmes |
The first four all point inward at one programme's own work. ISO/TS 14029 is the one whose subject sits between two of them.
It matters that ISO 14025 and ISO 14026 both recommend mutual recognition. Neither says how to do one, and the introduction to ISO/TS 14029 names that gap as the reason it was written.
On footprints, the specification covers every kind of footprint communication programme. It notes that two International Standards currently address footprints themselves: ISO 14046 for water and ISO 14067 for carbon.
Frequently asked questions about ISO/TS 14029
Below are the seven questions that come up most often about ISO/TS 14029.
What is ISO/TS 14029?
ISO/TS 14029 is an ISO technical specification, published in 2022, that sets requirements for mutual recognition arrangements between EPD and footprint communication programmes. It covers how two programme operators agree to treat each other's declarations as valid.
Is ISO/TS 14029 a certification?
No. It is a Technical Specification that programme operators conform to and reference, not a scheme any organisation gets audited and certified against. There is no such thing as being ISO 14029 certified, for a programme or for a manufacturer.
What edition of ISO/TS 14029 is current?
The 2022 first edition, published in April 2022, is the only edition. ISO reviewed it and confirmed it as still current in September 2025, so there is no newer version to cite and no withdrawn predecessor to be confused with.
Who can sign a mutual recognition arrangement?
Only EPD or footprint communication programme operators, and only those already meeting ISO 14020, ISO 14025 and ISO 14026. A manufacturer cannot sign one. The arrangement is between the bodies running the schemes, not the companies publishing through them.
What is the difference between an MoU and an MRA?
A memorandum of understanding records an initial commitment to work together, and typically covers the aim, scope and confidentiality of that cooperation. A mutual recognition arrangement is the formal step after it, where each party actually recognises the other's results.
Does mutual recognition mean an EPD is accepted with no extra work?
Not always. Recognition removes the need to re-verify the declaration, which is where the saving comes from, but partner programmes may still ask for extra content where their underlying rules differ. Check the terms of the recognition first.
How does ISO/TS 14029 relate to ISO 14025 and ISO/TS 14027?
Both are normative references, so their requirements bind anyone applying ISO/TS 14029. ISO 14025 defines what an EPD is and recommends mutual recognition without explaining it. ISO/TS 14027 covers product category rules, which an arrangement can be scoped to alone.
