From 20th to 22nd February, 2017, Rwanda Hosts the African Organization for Standardization (ARSO) 2nd Meeting of the Conformity Assessment Committee (ARSO CACO).

Conformity Assessment refers to the services of Quality Testing, Certification and Quality Assurance for inland and cross-border trade, and the meeting has brought together participants from different countries across Africa to conduct follow up on recommendations of ARSO CACO launch meeting that was held from 19th-22nd September 2016 in Nairobi, Kenya.

Speaking at the official opening of the meeting, Mr. Raymond Murenzi Director General of Rwanda Standards Board welcomed the participants to Rwanda, “the land of 1000 hills” and expressed the gratitude for continued collaboration in standardization and accrued benefits for RSB and ARSO in particular, and between other Standards Bodies on the African continent:

“Standardization has vast benefits for our governments and individual consumers up to our next generations in aspects related to safety, but above all, it has enhanced networking effects. Standards amplify compatibility and interoperability between products, allowing free flow of information to be shared within larger networks, thus motivating innovations and further enhancing network effects.

Standardization enhances rapid introduction of new products and ability to more closely meet individual customer’s needs. World over, individuals and companies that actively participate in standardization have proven to excel in implementation of standards and they also have stronger benefits face rare market rejects” .

Dr Hermogene Nsengimana reminded that macro-economic growth cannot be achieved in today’s world without involvement of standards. He noted that the burden of disease arising from food-borne illness has been on World Health Organization agenda, thus African countries should focus on product safety to create safe haven for their people, tourists and thus boost their economies. He stressed that that meeting among others will consider the comments that were received on ARSO Conformity Assessment Program documents and also impart participants with the knowledge on ISO standards that form the bassis for conformity assessment.