Quality and certifications for the platforms and biological resource centres are beneficial for both the Unit’s teams and for outside users. Great thought is also given to minimizing the environmental impacts of our operations.

The Unit is therefore decidedly committed to this through the strategic objectives of its Quality-Safety-Environment Policy declaration, which notably sets out to:

• Provide efficient means and methods in the laboratories
• Facilitate joint operation through better circulation of information
• Prevent health and environmental risks.

All the efforts made under this policy have enabled the following certification:

• ISO 9001 : 2008 for three CIRAD platforms: genotyping, bioinformatics and PHIV (plant histocytology and cell imaging)
• NF S96 900 for two Biological Resource Centres in Montpellier and the French West Indies.

Other platforms, such as biochemistry or ecophysiology at Lavalette, which do not have any need of certification yet, have set in place a quality management system and have launched a metrological process to monitor equipment, along with document management by the Alfresco tool. This tool is made available to the research teams, which can thus share and store their documents.