Strengthening regional accreditation in Africa
The SADC Regional Laboratory Association (SRLA), which is a “Non Profit Company” (NPC) whose goal is to improve the reliability of testing and calibration results supplied by conformity assessment bodies (CABs) in the SADC region, has been admitted as a Stakeholder Member of the African Accreditation Cooperation (AFRAC), a Pan-African Quality Infrastructure (PAQI) member. AFRAC is one of the 4 pillars of PAQI and facilitates the use of accreditation as a tool to support trade and industrial development and to build confidence in African products and services. AFRAC Stakeholder Members are able to designate a representative to the General Assembly (GA) and participate in GA meetings and activities of the committees or sub-committees.
UNIDO, through its “Sustainable Quality Infrastructure for SADC (SQIS) project”, funded by the Government of Finland, has been supporting 12 out of the 16 SADC Member States (MS) within the SRLA, who have formally established independent national laboratory associations (NLAs), and now perform an active role supporting laboratory activities within the respective countries.
The SQIS project activities are mainly geared towards:
- Strengthening the SRLA to provide strategic support to Member State NLAs;
- Supporting Member State NLAs to offer sustainable services for their members; and,
- Strengthening testing laboratories’ capacities.
The SRLA is an important stakeholder in the testing of products, using harmonized conformity assessment procedures compliant with the World Trade Organization’s Technical Barriers to Trade (WTO TBT) agreement, and meeting the higher demands of external markets and consumers. The SRLA supports trade, given the increasing reliance on accredited testing and calibration.
Click here for information on the SRLA
Click here to read about SQIS project.
For more information, please contact: Juan Pablo Davila (J.Davila [at] unido.org)
