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Informative

UNTP — Who It's For

UNTP creates value differently depending on where an organisation sits in the value chain. The table below identifies each audience type and summarises the core benefit. Select your audience to go directly to the full description.

Audience	Core Benefit
Primary Producers & Manufacturers	Attach verified ESG evidence to every shipment, making it easier for customers to buy from you, harder for competitors to undercut on false claims, and simpler to meet export market requirements.
Brands & Retailers	Verify supplier ESG claims, meet due diligence obligations, and issue consumer-facing product passports — without locking your supply chain into a specific software system.
Regulators	Issue verifiable digital identity and compliance credentials that reduce border friction for trusted traders, enable automated ESG compliance checks, and lower compliance costs for domestic industry.
Financial Institutions	Access the digital ESG evidence needed to release trade finance payments with confidence and link operational sustainability data directly to IFRS-based investment decisions.
Accreditation & Certification Organisations	Make the chain of trust behind conformity certificates digitally verifiable, strengthening the value of accreditation credentials and differentiating certifiers who adopt UNTP.
ESG Standards Organisations	Publishing ESG criteria as machine-readable vocabularies enables digital verification of conformity credentials and makes those credentials unambiguous and auditable.
Industry Associations	Support members through industry-specific implementation profiles and training services, while gaining a new tool to combat fraud and protect sector integrity.
Environmental & Human Welfare Organisations	Issuing UNTP accreditation credentials extends your trust mark into the digital verification infrastructure underpinning sustainable trade.
Circular Performance	Make recycled-content claims verifiable, enabling manufacturers to meet mandatory thresholds and giving recyclers a way to demonstrate the value of their output.
Transport & Logistics Providers	Make transport ESG credentials discoverable through consignment identifiers, positioning low-emission services to capture growing demand from sustainability-focused shippers.
Consumers	Verify sustainability claims and product authenticity by scanning a barcode, shifting purchasing power toward products with credible ESG performance.
Software Developers	UNTP is a new capability requirement across ERP, ESG management, and traceability platforms — developers who implement it early serve a market growing with regulatory demand.
Service Providers	Build UNTP implementation skills now to serve the tens of millions of businesses that will need support integrating UNTP into existing systems.

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Primary Producers & Manufacturers

Summary: UNTP lets producers and manufacturers attach verified ESG evidence directly to product shipments, making it easier for customers to buy from them, harder for competitors to undercut them on false sustainability claims, and simpler to meet export market requirements.

Most physical products derive from materials grown above ground or extracted below it. Primary producers — farmers and miners — represent the starting point for most supply chains. Manufacturers take raw or recycled materials and produce intermediate components or final products. Together, they form the upstream feedstock supply chain for branded consumer products.

• When producers and manufacturers issue B2B digital product passports (DPPs) and link them to every shipment, they provide customers with data — such as Scope 3 CO₂ emissions — at the right granularity to incorporate into their own product environmental footprint.
• When producers and manufacturers issue UNTP traceability events linked to product passports, they provide evidence of provenance, supporting supply chain resilience and informing preferential treatment decisions by customers and export market regulators.
• When producers and manufacturers link third-party UNTP conformity credentials to their DPPs, they add credibility to their ESG claims, enhancing product value and market access.
• By issuing complete collections of passports, traceability events, and conformity credentials linked to product shipments, producers and manufacturers enable their downstream customers to meet ESG due diligence obligations easily and verifiably.
• When producers and manufacturers link their issuer identity to a strong identity credential — such as a government business registration or trademark ownership credential — and implement the UNTP anti-counterfeiting mechanism, they add robust anti-fraud protection and preserve the value of their sustainability investments.

UNTP confidentiality measures allow supply chain actors to selectively redact upstream credentials before passing them downstream, enabling ESG evidence to be shared without exposing commercially sensitive information.

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Brands & Retailers

Summary: UNTP gives brands and retailers a platform-neutral way to verify supplier ESG claims, meet due diligence obligations, issue consumer-facing product passports, and protect against counterfeiting — all without locking their supply chain into a specific software system.

Consumer-market sales are heavily regulated in most developed economies, and other economies are introducing digital product passport requirements to support informed consumer choice and improve circularity. The threat of reputational damage and high fines motivates brands and retailers to embed sustainable practices throughout their operations and their entire supply chain.

1. When brands and retailers verify UNTP credentials linked to shipments from upstream suppliers, they can meet their due diligence obligations with confidence and obtain the verifiable information needed to issue consumer-centric digital product passports required under domestic regulations. UNTP is designed to complement, not conflict with, local laws. When international brands and retailers issue UNTP product passports, conformity credentials, and traceability events across all markets, they give consumers a consistent way to discover and verify ESG performance, establishing a strong framework for compliance with current and emerging regulations.

2. When brands and retailers request UNTP credentials from their upstream suppliers, they avoid imposing specific traceability software on their supply chain. They request conformance with a common standard, irrespective of software platform. Brands and retailers that have already invested in global identifier schemes can use the UNTP global identifier scheme binding to build on and reuse those existing assets.

3. When brands and retailers link their issuer identity to a strong identity credential — such as a government business registration or trademark ownership credential — and implement the UNTP anti-counterfeiting mechanism, they add robust anti-fraud protection and preserve the value of their sustainability investments.

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Regulators

Summary: UNTP lets regulators issue verifiable digital identity and compliance credentials that reduce border friction for trusted traders, enable automated ESG compliance checks, and lower compliance costs for domestic industry — while improving the integrity of enforcement.

Regulators set rules, issue permissions, and manage compliance. UNTP enhances the value of the permissions they issue and the efficiency and integrity of compliance operations.

When regulators issue digital, verifiable identity credentials under UNTP, they enable trading businesses to attach strong, verifiable identity to their supply chain transactions. A verifiable identity can facilitate green-lane pre-clearance at the import border, allowing trusted traders with a good compliance record to clear customs more quickly and with less scrutiny — which increases lending confidence among financial institutions. When ESG permits and certificates are issued digitally, traders can attach that evidence to their transactions. Regulators acting as digital trust anchors improve their trade balance by expanding export market access and trade finance for their traders.

• By verifying increasingly transparent supply chain data, regulators can automate compliance assessments for most trade transactions rather than relying on unverifiable claims in regulatory reports audited at high cost. This leaves a much smaller volume of trade for manual enforcement.

National regulators developing environmental initiatives — such as consumer-centric digital product passports — should base those initiatives on UNTP. Alignment with UNTP draws on a tested body of work and significantly reduces compliance costs for domestic industry.

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Financial Institutions

Summary: UNTP product passports and conformity credentials give banks the digital ESG evidence they need to release trade finance payments with confidence and to link operational sustainability data directly to IFRS-based investment decisions.

Financial institutions face increasing pressure from regulators and investors to offer favourable terms to sustainable businesses. Just as financial transactions — bills, invoices, payments — aggregate into profit-and-loss statements and balance sheets, corporate sustainability metrics are derived from operational data, including UNTP digital product passports. At the consignment level, trade finance instruments such as documentary letters of credit typically require compliance documentation before payment is released. Where goods are held at the border for non-compliance with ESG regulations, financial institutions require evidence of ESG compliance before releasing funds.

• UNTP product passports and conformity credentials enable banks to digitally verify ESG compliance for shipments covered by letters of credit, allowing payments to be released with greater confidence.
• When banks provide investment capital based on sustainability criteria, a direct link between UNTP-based operational processes and IFRS-based corporate ESG performance reduces the financial risk of the investment.

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Accreditation & Certification Organisations

Summary: UNTP makes the chain of trust behind conformity certificates digitally verifiable — strengthening the value of accreditation credentials and making certifiers who issue UNTP-standard digital credentials preferred over those who do not.

A global conformity assessment framework has operated for over 50 years. Independent third parties (certifiers) assess products against recognised standards and issue conformity certificates. A global network of mutually recognised national accreditation authorities assesses those certifiers, ensuring that qualified organisations issue the certificates.

UNTP increases the verifiability of claims and disclosures through multiple verification mechanisms, ensuring that claims rest on reliable, verifiable evidence covering the integrity, provenance, and legitimacy of both the claims and the entities making or supporting them:

• Any assessments used to support a claim — such as certification — are conducted by parties holding appropriate authorisation and accreditation.
• Any certificate provided in support of a claim can be reliably linked to the product in question and has not been altered since issuance.

UNTP does not require every product claim to be third-party assessed, nor every third-party certifier to be formally accredited. It does make the chain of trust visible where it exists, and recognises less formal but still valuable chains of trust. A farmer's environmental land management claims, for instance, might be verified by a community organisation endorsed by a well-known global environmental body.

• When national accreditation authorities issue their accreditations as UNTP standard digital credentials, they create a digital identity anchor that enables verifiers of ESG conformity certificates to determine whether a given certificate can be trusted. Implementing UNTP enhances the value of both the certification and the accreditation authority's trust mark.
• When certifiers issue their ESG certificates as UNTP-standard digital credentials, they enable verifiers to confirm authenticity, integrity, and validity. A digital conformity certificate that links to the accreditation credential establishes the entire digital chain of trust. Conformity assessment bodies that issue UNTP-standard digital credentials will be preferred over those that do not.

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ESG Standards Organisations

Summary: The key task for standards authorities under UNTP is to publish their ESG criteria as machine-readable vocabularies — enabling digital verification of conformity credentials and making those credentials unambiguous and auditable.

Standards organisations — national and international authorities and industry-led bodies — govern arrangements that determine the legitimacy and value of published standards. Unlike regulators, standards bodies do not manage compliance, which can be self-assessed or third-party audited. Hundreds of organisations collectively issue thousands of ESG standards, most published as PDF documents.

• When ESG standards organisations publish their criteria as a machine-readable vocabulary, they enable certifiers to issue digital conformity credentials that unambiguously reference the scope of conformity claims. Those credentials can then be digitally verified, improving the efficiency and reliability of the entire process.

Standards authorities generally do not issue, receive, or verify digital credentials. However, when they also accredit third-party certifiers conducting conformity assessments, they become issuers of accreditation credentials.

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Industry Associations

Summary: UNTP gives industry associations a concrete way to support members through industry-specific implementation profiles and training services, while also creating a new tool to combat fraud and protect the integrity of their sector.

More than 100,000 industry associations operate worldwide, most representing specific sectors within particular jurisdictions. They advocate for members, provide best-practice guidance, and often establish quality standards and branding that differentiate members' products — such as genuine Manuka honey. They help members navigate domestic and international ESG standards and, by addressing fraudulent practices promptly, protect the industry's reputation.

• Associations can develop industry-specific UNTP profiles offering targeted implementation guidance that addresses the unique needs of each industry and jurisdiction.
• Associations can create training and implementation services in partnership with local service providers, generating revenue while ensuring members are equipped to meet ESG standards.
• Associations may also serve as trusted independent quota managers to combat mass balance fraud. Accreditation by a national accreditation authority or a global environmental or humanitarian organisation would strengthen the independence and integrity of this service.

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Environmental & Human Welfare Organisations

Summary: When influential ESG trust marks issue UNTP accreditation credentials, they become identity anchors in the digital trust ecosystem — extending their brand power into the verification infrastructure that underpins sustainable trade.

Many national and international non-profit organisations promote environmental and human welfare. Some trust marks, such as WWF's, carry significant global brand recognition. Although these organisations lack regulatory enforcement powers, they can strongly influence market success. A product carrying the WWF logo is likely to attract more environmentally conscious consumers. Conversely, revoking a trust mark over unsustainable practices can reduce sales.

When influential ESG trust marks establish well-governed accreditation frameworks and issue or revoke UNTP accreditation credentials, they become key players in the digital trust ecosystem — trusted entities that vouch for the authenticity and sustainability of products or practices, leveraging their brand power to promote sustainable production.

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Circular Performance

Summary: UNTP supports recyclers and remanufacturers by making recycled-content claims verifiable — enabling manufacturers to meet mandatory recycled-content thresholds and giving recyclers a way to demonstrate the value of their output.

Recyclers reprocess end-of-use-cycle products into secondary raw materials for new manufacturing. Refurbishers, repairers, and remanufacturers restore damaged or broken products for additional use cycles. As regulators enforce minimum recycled-content requirements, the current linear model — produce, use, dispose — will require significant changes. UNTP supports circular economies by including verifiable recycled-content information in product passports and incentivising manufacturers to design for recyclability.

• When manufacturers design for recyclability and share that information through UNTP passports, they enhance the end-of-use-cycle value of their products. This enables recyclers — especially for high-value items like electric vehicle batteries — to improve the efficiency of their recycling processes.
• When recyclers issue UNTP passports for recycled-material shipments, they enable manufacturers to make verifiable claims about recycled content, reducing due diligence burden and compliance risk. Consumers can verify recycled-content claims on products with confidence.

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Transport & Logistics Providers

Summary: UNTP makes transport-related ESG credentials discoverable through consignment identifiers, giving logistics providers a way to demonstrate and monetise their sustainability performance as shippers increasingly factor emissions into procurement decisions.

Cargo movement by sea, air, and land accounts for approximately 10% of global emissions and is projected to represent the largest share of global emissions by 2050 if the sector does not decarbonise.

Just as UNTP makes ESG credentials discoverable through product batch identifiers, it enables discovery of ESG credentials for transport services through consignment identifiers such as waybill numbers. Responsibility for including transportation in an ESG footprint is assigned by INCOTERMS — whoever pays for transportation is accountable. This prevents gaps and double-counting and aligns incentives correctly.

When transport and logistics providers issue UNTP transport credentials and link them to consignment identifiers, they give customers quantifiable, verifiable transport-related ESG metrics. As producers, manufacturers, brands, and retailers work to improve their sustainability performance, they will choose low-emission transport services — increasing the value of sustainable transport per tonne-kilometre.

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Consumers

Summary: UNTP lets consumers verify sustainability claims and product authenticity by scanning a barcode — shifting purchasing power toward products with credible ESG performance and away from greenwashing.

Consumer sentiment around sustainable production is strong, with more than 70% of consumers in some economies actively choosing sustainable goods. Rising concerns about greenwashing are undermining the value of sustainability claims. As UNTP and national regulations gain adoption, consumers will become familiar with product passports and ESG verification.

• When consumers can verify a product's sustainability performance by scanning barcodes, QR codes, or RFID tags, they are more likely to choose products with verifiable ESG qualities over those making unverifiable claims.
• When products carry UNTP anti-counterfeiting measures, consumers can verify both ESG performance and product authenticity, ensuring counterfeits do not devalue genuine sustainability investments.

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Software Developers

Summary: UNTP is a new capability requirement across ERP, ESG management, and traceability platforms — developers who implement it early will serve a market that is growing with regulatory demand.

Software developers provide the tools needed to issue UNTP credentials and consume data from credentials that are discovered and verified. UNTP implementation scales to organisation size: large companies with highly customised systems may tailor it to specific needs; smaller organisations will likely treat UNTP compliance as a new feature on their release roadmap.

• ERP systems are the primary issuers of UNTP product passports and recorders of traceability events, managing the financial and logistical operations behind manufacturing, sales, and shipment.
• ESG management systems contribute data — such as carbon intensity — included in UNTP product passports alongside conformity credentials.
• Traceability platforms map the upstream supply chain, enabling data collection via verifiable linked data trails without requiring direct enrolment of upstream participants.

These three system types may exist as standalone products or as part of integrated solutions. ERP systems will likely evolve — through native features, acquisitions, or partnerships — to offer this integrated capability to their customers.

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Service Providers

Summary: UNTP adoption by large and medium-sized businesses will require implementation support — service providers and system integrators that build UNTP skills now will have a competitive advantage in a rapidly growing market.

Hundreds of millions of micro and small businesses will adopt UNTP as a standard feature of their chosen business software. Tens of millions of medium- and large-sized businesses, however, will require substantial business analysis and systems integration, and will turn to experienced service providers for support. Service providers that invest in UNTP implementation skills can offer compelling packages to existing clients and use those skills to reach new customer bases and markets.