OREANDA-NEWS. June 1, 2011. The Center for Advanced Studies on Applied Economics (Cepea) and BM&FBOVESPA has been granted the ISO 9001 certification for four of its agribusiness price indexes: Live Cattle (Sao Paulo price), Corn (Campinas, SP), Feeder Catlle (Mato Grosso do Sul) and Rice (Rio Grande do Sul). This internationally recognized certification is a milestone for the Brazilian agribusiness and represents, for market agents, a guarantee of quality of the daily processes of collecting, calculating and releasing reference prices.

For the users of the price indexes, the ISO 9001 certification granted to Cepea and BM&FBOVESPA represents a guarantee of total traceability of the calculation process, reliability in the application of calculation procedures and punctual publication. This certification means that price indexes are collected and processed strictly in accordance with all of the ISO 9001 regulations, whose scope ranges from the analysis of legal contracts for agreements between the entities responsible for the indexes (Cepea/Esalq and BM&FBOVESPA); infrastructure and technology; all operational aspects of the respective staff; examination of the administrative, communication and IT procedures that integrate all the process to reach the release to the entire market.

The detailed documentation of all of these actions allows a certified company to follow up all the procedures adopted by the Cepea’s teams until the information is transmitted to BM&FBOVESPA at the end of the day. The BM&FBOVESPA, in turn, follow the release procedures which can also be subject to inspection.

The adaptation process to ISO 9001:2008 norms to elaborate and release ESALQ/BM&FBOVESPA price indexes for Fed Cattle, Calf, Corn and Rice, started back in 2009 by Lannes & Hoffmann. Certification was granted by ABS Quality Evaluations.