Privacy policy

The Federation of European Rice Millers (FERM) understands the importance of privacy to our members, delegates of our Convention, and other users of our websites and applications. We are committed to protecting and personally identifiable information we hold and fulfilling our obligations under the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and other applicable data protection and privacy legislation.

This Privacy Policy describes what personal information we collect, how and why we use this information, and the safeguards we put in place to protect personal data. It also describes the options we provide for you to access, update or request erasure of the information we hold about you.

Who we are

The Federation of European Rice Millers (FERM) represents the interests of the European rice industry towards European institutions, international organisations and stakeholders in the rice supply chain. FERM acts as the data controller of personal data we collect from you.

We are responsible for your personal data, and control the ways your personal data is collected and the purposes for which it is used.

Personal data that we collect

We strongly believe in minimizing the data we collect only to that which is necessary to deliver our services to our members, delegates of our Convention, and users of our websites and applications.

Personal data we may collect and hold about about you includes:

your name
your business address
your email address
your telephone number
your position
records of your communication with us (i.e. emails and phone calls)
your dietary preferences/requirements
details of your previous interactions with FERM
personal data provided by you within any forms or surveys you complete
personal data that is about you but does not directly identify you, such as photos of group events
information about your internet connection, the equipment you use to access our websites and applications, and usage details. This may include personally identifying information like your Internet Protocol (IP) address.

Purposes for which we process your personal data

The purposes for which we collect and hold your information are to:

perform our relevant functions and the services expected of us by our members and Convention delegate
process Convention bookings
manage the Convention, including planning Convention sessions, excursions and meals
organise hotel accommodation for Convention delegates
send you information related to the services we provide, or notify you of any changes to these services
respond to any communication from you, and provide you with information that you request from us
present our website and other applications to you, and facilitate access to member only resources and functions
promote our organisation
detect any misuse of our services, applications and systems
comply with any court order, law enforcement, or legal process, including to respond to any government or regulatory request.
In the event that we collect any of your personal data for purposes besides those listed above, these purposes will be disclosed to you when you provide your information.

Processing activities are lawful on the basis of their necessity to contractual performance, or in serving legitimate interests pursued for FERM and its members.

Who has access to your personal data?

Personal data that you provide is only accessed by the FERM Secretariat and trusted third parties appointed to process your data on our behalf (who act as ‘sub-processors’ of this data e.g. website management company and Convention management company).

We only share your personal data with third parties as necessary to fulfil the purposes set out within this document. Any third parties with whom we share your data act only in accordance with our documented instructions and are prohibited from utilizing, sharing or retaining your personal data for any purposes besides those which they have been specifically contracted for. We make every effort to ensure any third party sub-processers we use have implemented controls necessary for keeping personal data secure and confidential, and are compliant with GDPR and other applicable data protection and privacy legislation.

The suitability of third party sub-processors is reviewed on an ongoing basis taking into account:

The level of risk the third party presents
The third party’s data protection procedures and adherence with established standards
Known incidents related to the third party’s services
Security within the third party’s supply chain
Disaster recovery and contingency arrangements

FERM may, at its sole discretion, disclose your personal data to meet legal obligations or respond to any valid government or regulatory request; prevent or mitigate fraud to technical issues; protect against imminent harm to the rights, property or safety of FERM, its members, and/or the wider community; or to prevent or stop any activity we consider to be illegal or unethical.

We will not sell or rent your information to third parties or share your information with third parties for their own marketing purposes.

How long do we keep your personal data for?

FERM will retain your personal data only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which the information has been collected, and thereafter for as long as retention serves our legitimate interest, legal or business purposes. This might include retaining personal data:

when mandated by law, contract or similar obligations applicable to our business operations for preserving, resolving, defending or enforcing our legal/contractual rights necessary for maintaining adequate and accurate business and financial records.

Personal data held is regularly reviewed to ensure its continued accuracy and necessity to our purposes. Inaccurate or redundant data is updated or deleted as appropriate.

Where do we process your personal data?

Your personal data will only be held and processed within the EEA, and outside of the EEA in countries deemed by the European Commission to be providing adequate protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects in connection with the processing of personal data (‘adequate juridisctions’).

How do we keep your personal data secure?

We implement all necessary technical and organisational measures to ensure personal data you provide to us is held and treated securely, and to mitigate the risk or loss, misuse or alteration of this data.

Where you have been assigned (or chosen) a password to access certain parts of our website of applications, you are responsible for keeping this confidential.

Cookies

This website uses cookies, which are strings of information placed on your device that your device provides to the website or application each time you return. We use two types of cookies within our applications: functionality cookies and performance cookies.

We use functionality cookies in order identify and track your usage and website access preferences. Information collected may include the pages you visit; your interactions with features, functionality, content and links; your language preferences; the operating system and web browser you use; and your network and IP information.

We use performance cookies in order to gather anonymous data that help us improve our services. Performance cookies are generally placed by third party analytics companies (e.g. Google Analytics) who gather this data on our behalf. Data gathered through third party performance cookies does not contain any personally identifiable information.

If you do not wish to have cookies placed on your browser, or wish to delete your existing cookies, you can do this from your browser preferences. You should be aware that if you delete or disallow cookies, many websites will not work properly, and you will lose some functionality. We therefore do not recommend turning cookies off when using this website.

Your rights as a data subject

Under the GDPR, you have the following rights in respect of your personal data:

Right of access – you have the right to request a copy of information we hold about you.
Right of rectification – you have a right to correct information that we hold about you that is inaccurate or incomplete.
Right to be forgotten – in certain circumstances you can ask for the information we hold about you to be erased from our records.
Right to restriction of processing – where certain conditions apply you have a right to restrict the processing.
Right of portability – you have the right to have the information we hold about you transferred to another organisation.
Right to object – you have the right to object to certain types of processing such as direct marketing.
If you wish to request access to, rectification or erasure of personal data we hold about you, or you wish to raise an objection to our processing activities, you can do so at any time by contacting us via the methods below.

Tel: +32 2 773 15 07

Email: ferm@ferm-eu.org

Post: The Federation of European Rice Millers, Avenue de Tervueren 188A – Bte 4, 1150 Brussels, BELGIUM

Requests for erasure of personal data will only be honoured to the extent that it is no longer necessary for us to hold in order to provide services to you or meet our legal and contractual record keeping requirements. We reserve the right to refuse to change or erase data if doing so would violate any law or legal requirement, or cause the information to be incorrect. In the event that FERM refuses a request made by you, we will provide you with a reason why, which you have the right to legally challenge.

You also have the right to make a complaint about our processing activities with the supervisory authority responsible for the protection of personal data in the country where you live, or in which you think a breach of data protection laws might have taken place. The majority of FERM processing activities take place in Belgium, and so our lead supervisory authority is:

Commission de Protection de la vie privée

Rue de la Presse 35

1000 Bruxelles|

Tel: + 32 2 274 48 00

Fax: + 32 2 274 48 10
Email: commission@privacycommission.be

Website: www.privacycommission.be

Questions about this privacy policy

If you have questions, concerns or complaints about our Privacy Policy, the personal data we collect and hold, or the purposes for which this data is used, you may contact us by emailing ferm@ferm-eu.org

Changes to this privacy policy

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time. If we make changes to this Privacy Policy, the updated version will be made available via this website, at www.fermconvention.com.

The date that this policy was last revised is included at the top of the page.