Certifications for sustainable procurement

Please note that some certifications displayed on our platform may require Unite to hold a specific certification or complete a certification process. We reserve the right to delay displaying such certifications until the necessary verification or certification has been completed. This process may take some time.

Implementing into the catalogue (BMEcat 1.2)

Sustainability certifications are assigned to an item within <ARTICLE_FEATURES>. Here’s an example:

Example:
<ARTICLE_FEATURES>
<FEATURE>
<FNAME>Certificate</FNAME>
<FVALUE>Blue Angel</FVALUE>
<FORDER>1</FORDER>
</FEATURE>
<FEATURE>
<FNAME>Certificate</FNAME>
<FVALUE>EU Ecolabel</FVALUE>
<FORDER>2</FORDER>
</FEATURE>

Note: If a product has multiple sustainability certifications, keep the feature name (<FNAME>) unchanged.

Ensure certifications are spelled correctly. You can find the correct spelling in the sample CSV file under section 4.

If it’s not possible to include sustainability certifications in BMEcat, they can be submitted via an additional external CSV file (conditions file). We’ll cover this in more detail below.

Implementing into a Unite CSV (products file)

If you use Unite’s catalogue templates for the catalogue creation, enter the sustainability information in the products file in the columns FNAME1, FVALUE1, FNAME2, FVALUE2 etc. For more information, go to the the Unite-CSV_Products support page.

If these columns are already filled with other attributes, start from the next available FVALUE column. If no more space is available for this, you can provide the sustainability information via an additional CSV file, as explained in the next section.

Using an external CSV file (conditions file)

As an alternative to catalogue integration, sustainability information can be transferred to our system using an external CSV file.

Note: If a CSV file (conditions file) is already activated for your catalogue, you can add the extra columns there and transfer the updated file via SFTP as usual.

CSV structure

This is what the structure looks like in Excel:

Here’s a sample CSV for download: 

Explanations:
SUPPLIER_AID – item number
FEATURE_NAME1004 – Attribute name ‘certification’
FEATURE_VALUE1004 – certification or label, e.g. EU Ecolabel

Please note that the italicised values must be provided by you.

Save the Excel table as a CSV file. Select the file type CSV UTF-8 (separated by separators) (*.csv).

CSV file naming convention

To ensure the file is automatically recognised and processed by our systems, use the following naming format:

• catalogue ID_label.csv

• Example: P1234_label.csv

Transmitting your files to Unite

If you provide the sustainability information directly in the catalogue, please upload the updated file to the corresponding catalogue directory via SFTP as usual.

If you’re using an additional CSV file, name it following the naming conventions (outlined above) and upload it to the SFTP directory associated with the catalogue. After the first upload, there may be a delay as the file needs to be activated in our system.

If you would like us to review your file first, please send it to support@unite.eu. We’ll review it and activate it in our system if everything looks good. You’ll receive feedback and further instructions afterwards.

Once the activation is complete, we’ll automatically send an email to the address stored in the catalogue management tool.