Consumer Information on the Accuracy of Environmental Claims
As environmental concern among Canadian consumer’s increases, industry and advertisers are putting more emphasis on "green" or "environmentally friendly" claims to convince buyers that their product or service has a low negative impact on the environment. In order to provide consumers with greater assurance about the accuracy of environmental claims, CSA, in cooperation with the Competition Bureau Canada, has developed new guidelines to help ensure that green marketing is not misleading.
Plus 14021 Environmental Claims: A Guide for Industry and Advertisers addresses a number of commonly used green claims and provides examples of best practices and guidelines on the most current, internationally accepted, information for the use of environmental claims.
Among other practices, the Guide states that:
- The use of vague claims implying general environmental improvement are insufficient and should be avoided.
- Environmental claims should be clear, specific, accurate and not misleading.
- Environmental claims should be verified and substantiated, prior to being made.
Additional examples and explanations can be found in the Backgrounder to the Guide.
To better provide businesses and consumers with information on standards for truthful and accurate environmental claims, the cost of sales of the Plus 14021 Guideline is covered by the Competition Bureau Canada and it is available to the public for download at no charge, click here to access this document.
Two sections of this document are particularly useful to help consumers avoid purchasing products with misleading labels: Specific Requirements for Self-declared Claims (Page 8) and Principles for all Environmental Labels (Page 58).