Let's consider these factors:
- Attributes don't affect ranking or transparency. Statements do.
- Planetarian wants to be focused on the level of compliance with the standard which served as base for the certificate being issued.
Certification as a statement could lead to
certification wars based on:
- quantity of certificates - a product with 1 certificate would be ranked lower than a product with 2 certificates, etc. The situation would drive numbers of certificates, but not actual efforts on sustainability.
- quality of certificates - is certificate A better than certificate B?
This is why we've decided to make certification an attribute. It is then you (as a customer) who decides which certificate is important to you, for example when filtering search results. Our vision for the future, hopefully not distant, is that users/makers/providers/auditors will introduce standards behind various certificates as
statements.
