ADDIS ABABA – National Accreditation Office called on stakeholders to pay due attention for accreditation and advancing the system for quality assurance.
This was disclosed when the office celebrated the World Accreditation Day yesterday themed: ‘Accreditation: Adding Value to Supply Chains.’ At the event, Office Director General Araya Fesseha said that his office is working with similar continental and international organizations to advance its system and set up to date accreditation parameters that go along with today’s world.
As to him, the office has international recognition to accredit product and services in Ethiopia that serve/validate across the globe. According to Araya, his office is undertaking various activities to apply accreditation services so that local products will have long expired date and better quality.
Most people far from accrediting their knowledge and product outputs due to the complex nature in the accrediting procedures therefore the office is working to automate its system, thereby encouraging customers to get effective services. Currently the office is working on recruitment of possible partners to the automation process, he disclosed.
Morover, he said the automation system will be applied mainly to the document transaction procedures. “Personal appearance of experts in testing and witnessing is inevitable to accredit the institutions”.
However, he said there is low public awareness that is why institutions do not contact the office to get accreditation. Consequently, the knowledge and product they provide is not valuable at international level. Due to this, the country today is facing various problems related to return of export products.
Among the negative impacts of absence of accreditation are poor quality of production, harvesting and storing agricultural products. This year the country has lost huge amount of foreign currency due to the return of meat, honey and grain faulty export products, said Yared Befikadu, Import and Export Product Quality Inspection Director at the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
He noted that the country is also facing various problems in importing low quality products including electronics, vehicles and textile products. The major problem is lack of advanced accreditation parameters , he noted.
Since its establishment, the National Accreditation Office has given accreditation to 80 institutions. It also received 20 certificates from various institutions.
The Ethiopian Herald, June 11/2019
BY YOHANES JEMANEH
