International Organizations

The International Accreditation Forum (IAF) is the world association of conformity assessment accreditation bodies and other bodies interested in conformity assessment in the fields of management systems, products, services, personnel and other similar programmes of conformity assessment.  

The International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC) is the international organisation for accreditation bodies accrediting calibration laboratories, testing laboratories, medical testing laboratories and inspection bodies.

Accreditation body members of IAF and ILAC operate in accordance with the international standard ISO/IEC 17011 “Conformity assessment -- General requirements for accreditation bodies accrediting conformity assessment bodies”.  Each organisation maintains a multilateral mutual recognition arrangement between signatory accreditation body members who have been successfully peer evaluated in accordance with this standard to demonstrate their competence.  Signatories agree to accept the results of each other’s conformity assessment bodies under the arrangements, and so accredited conformity assessment under the accreditation of each signatory is able to be recognized internationally.