GMP (Good Manufacturing Practices) guidelines are established by the Food and Drug Administration to assist food manufacturers in the production of unadulterated products. Under a Silliker Food Safety / GMP audit, companies must comply with recognized standards in their overall programs and execution related to their grounds, building and equipment; pest control; employee practices; receiving, storage and shipping; plant sanitation; and processing. Company procedures and records are also reviewed for the presence of viable, complementary safety programs, such as Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) systems, quality assurance programs, and employee training initiatives.
Informed-Choice is a third-party certification organization for the supplement industry. The Informed-Choice certification program was established in 2007 by one of the world’s leading doping control laboratories, HFL Sport Science. Although HFL had been testing supplements since 2002, it became clear that there was a need for a comprehensive certification program that not only tested products for banned substances, but also ensured they were manufactured in qualified facilities that met FDA cGMP (current Good Manufacturing Practices) quality control standards.
Informed-Choice is a voluntary supplement testing and certification program that ensures users that products carrying the Informed-Choice logo are manufactured to strict GMP standards and regularly tested for substances prohibited in sports. Responsible supplement companies have made Informed-Choice part of their existing quality assurance systems to ensure their products are safer for athletes to use. For more information on Informed-Choice, go to www.informed-choice.org
Admittedly, we could choose from an alphabet soup of third-party endorsers, but frankly until now, none of them met our own extremely stringent standards of quality. The Informed-Choice program does.
Informed-Choice certification requires that supplements produced within the AAP facility are manufactured to strict cGMP standards established by the FDA and are regularly tested for prohibited substances in sports—steroids and stimulants—that appear on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) prohibited substance list.
Informed-Choice is also the only program that gives consumers a way to know quickly and confidently that the product they are buying is unadulterated through the Informed-Choice green ? mark logo on supplement packaging.
For AAP, quality is not about meeting the lowest minimum standard. That’s why we continually challenge our own methods to establish new levels of purity, safety and authenticity. For example, even though Informed-Choice does not require it, we also test our products for contamination by all metals on the periodic chart of elements.
We want our customers, and ultimately consumers, to have confidence in the quality and safety of AAP products and to know that we continuously look for new ways to ensure efficacy and authenticity.