The GMP+ Academy began as a modest platform, with an e-learning about HACCP and links to training from training partners. Four years later, it has grown into a truly dynamic and valued platform. This journey has been driven by both our mission to share essential knowledge for a safer and more sustainable feed sector, and by meaningful collaboration with more than a dozen training institutes and partners around the world.
Until now the GMP+ Academy has focused on sharing knowledge with companies in the feed chain. Our next step will be to make specific training available to auditors from Certification Bodies (CBs) who are essential to ensuring safe and sustainable feed, worldwide.
A highly valued initiative
At the heart of the GMP+ Academy is the idea that safety and sustainability knowledge should not be competitive. As Advisory Board member Carl Ijzerman puts it, “Producing safe feed starts with people behaving responsibly. If people do not know about their responsibilities, you can never expect them to live up to their responsibilities. Feed safety is a joint interest and shouldn’t be part of the competition.”
This philosophy has served us well. The GMP+ Academy has been visited more than 30,000 times and has 4,500+ registered users with access to 300+ learning modules. It has earned an overall user rating of 9.5/10, and last year was ranked the most relevant GMP+ International initiative by our stakeholders.
As the platform has grown so have the number of languages we support, with a range of training offers and e-learning modules are available in multiple languages, included several in Brazilian Portuguese. What’s more is that to give users a clearer overview of the available training material, we’ve expanded the number of languages used for platform itself. You can now access the GMP+ Academy in English, German, Italian, Dutch, Polish, Spanish, and our latest Portuguese.
Building on this success, the Collective Knowledge Programme (CKP) has become a key contributor to the Academy’s growing content library. This unique initiative brings together experts from leading companies in the feed industry to develop practical and accessible training materials for the entire sector. In addition to modules created by private training providers, the GMP+ Academy now offers a wide range of free and low-cost e-learning modules, many developed through the CKP in collaboration with GMP+ International. Topics include supplier assessment and management, and feed safety culture, with a new subject expected in early 2026: ‘How to create a Supplier Audit Plan.’
Changing how we support auditors
The next step for the GMP+ Academy coincides with an important moment. The GMP+ Feed Certification (GMP+ FC) scheme has now fully moved from a rules-focused to an outcomes-focused scheme. This makes the job of an auditor less about minimum compliance, and more about whether the appropriate steps are being made to achieve the goal of safe and sustainable feed in the given context. In line with the Academy’s mission, we are developing training offers for more stakeholders and professionals in the feed chain to help achieve these outcomes.
For example, alongside updates to our auditor examination process, coordinators will receive materials to be used during harmonisation meetings, such as on annual scheme changes and deep-dives into relevant topics. And these materials will be made available as e-learning on the GMP+ Academy for harmonisation meetings.
Continuous professional development
These new materials will contribute further towards auditors’ continuous professional development. E-learning can be undertaken anytime, anywhere, making it ideal for our auditor community, and all this will be included as standard in a CB’s membership with GMP+ International.
The depth of the knowledge on the GMP+ Academy continues to grow. And from next year, sharing scheme changes and deep dive e-learning modules for auditors will help reinforce a truly outcomes-focused, and global, scheme to ensure safe and sustainable feed, worldwide.
In the meantime, the GMP+ Academy is free to register for everyone. A large, and growing, library of modules is available at your fingertips. You, your teams, and the wider community can already start your learning journey online anywhere, and any time. So why not now?