Competent certification authority
1. Member States shall appoint competent certification authorities and ensure that the necessary controls and manuals of procedures are in place, with a view to guaranteeing a minimum quality of the certified hops and hop products, the respect of the requirement laid down in Article 77(2) of Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 as well as traceability of the hops and hop products at consignment level.
2. The competent certification authority shall approve certification centres allowed to carry out certification of hops and/or hop products and allocate a code number to them in accordance with point 1 of Annex II.
Approval and control of certification centres
1. The competent certification authority shall approve certification centres, having a legal personality or sufficient legal capacity to be subject, under national legislation, to rights and obligations, and ensure that they have adequate facilities to carry out the necessary sampling, analytical, statistical and recording tasks.
2. On the basis of a risk analysis, at least once per calendar year, the competent certification authority shall carry out random on-the-spot checks of certification centres in order to verify compliance with paragraph 1. The effectiveness of risk analysis parameters used in previous years shall be assessed on an annual basis.
Withdrawal of approval
1. The competent certification authority shall withdraw the approval of a certification centre if it finds that in the preparation of hop products non-permitted components have been used, or that the components used do not conform to the entries in the certificate as provided for in Article 4(2) and (3), and if this is imputable to the certification centre concerned, or if the certification centre neglects the notification obligation referred to in Article 13 or submits incorrect notifications.
2. Approval may not be restored for a period of at least 12 months following the date of withdrawal. On request of the certification centre from which approval was withdrawn, approval may be restored after that period if the certification authority is satisfied with the remedial action taken.
