A guide published by Dotto
ISO certification: who certifies the certifiers?
In Australia, a business’s ISO certificate comes from a certification body, and that certification body may be accredited by JASANZ, the joint accreditation body that the Australian and New Zealand governments set up by treaty. JASANZ was itself peer evaluated to become a signatory to Global ACI’s Mutual Recognition Arrangement, and ISO, which publishes the standards, certifies no one.
This guide follows that chain one link at a time, from the standard to the certificate, and shows where each link can be checked.
Traceability
The chain, link by link
Calibration, in Global ACI’s words, compares what an instrument reads with “the corresponding known values provided by a reference standard”, and calls it “essential in maintaining measurement traceability”. A business certificate can be traced in a similar way. Five kinds of organisation stand behind it, and each describes a different job.
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Writes the standardISO
The International Organization for Standardization is, as at October 2026, a network of 177 national standards bodies, with only one member per country. Its members nominate experts and vote on draft standards.
Does not“ISO does not perform certification or issue certificates.”
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Adopts it for AustraliaStandards Australia
Standards Australia represents Australia at ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission. Its stated policy is to base Australian Standards on International Standards “to the maximum extent feasible”.
Does not“Regulate, enforce, or certify compliance with standards”, from its own list of what it does not do.
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Audits the businessA certification body
A certification body assesses a product, service, system or process against a standard and, where the requirements are met, issues certification as evidence of conformity. For bodies that certify management systems, ISO/IEC 17021-1 sets out requirements for their “competence, consistency and impartiality”.
Need not beaccredited. ISO notes that accreditation is “not compulsory”, and that a certification body without it may still be reputable.
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Assesses the certifiersJASANZ
JASANZ assesses organisations that certify, inspect, test and verify, to confirm that they have “the competence, impartiality, and capability” to do that work. It was established by a treaty between the Australian and New Zealand governments, signed in 1991.
Does not“JASANZ does not certify products, management systems, or individuals.” It accredits the organisations that do.
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Evaluates the accreditorsGlobal ACI
Global Accreditation Cooperation Incorporated brings accreditation bodies together. It became fully operational on 1 January 2026 and took over the roles once held by the International Accreditation Forum (IAF) and the International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC). Its Full Members are signatories to its Mutual Recognition Arrangement, which JASANZ joined after peer evaluation.
Does not“Global ACI itself does not assess and accredit conformity assessment bodies (CABs).”
So the plain answer to the question in this site’s name: in Australia and New Zealand, JASANZ, as the two countries’ joint accreditation body, assesses certifiers and does not certify products, systems or people itself, and JASANZ is in turn evaluated by its peers. The guide on certified or accredited sets the two words side by side.
Three readings
Voluntary, until something says otherwise
Whether a business needs a certificate depends on who is asking. The bodies that write and use the standards describe three different positions.
Voluntary
ISO says: “Certification to management system standards is not a requirement.” It adds that a business can benefit from using a standard without being certified to it.
Required by law
Standards Australia writes that “On their own, standards are voluntary”, but governments often refer to them in legislation, and “When this happens, these standards can become mandatory.” ISO adds that for some industries, certification is “a legal or contractual requirement”.
Required by a contract
Under the Commonwealth Procurement Rules, where a standard applies to a procurement at or above the relevant threshold, “tender responses must demonstrate the capability to meet the standard”. The guide when a tender asks for it follows that rule through to the contract.