"We forwarded the Nepal Accreditation Development Committee Formation Order to the cabinet a couple of days ago for approval," Yam Kumari Khatiwada, spokesperson of MoI, told Republica.[break]
Once endorsed, she said the ministry would speed up the process to constitute the board. It will certify laboratories, which is expected to facilitate Nepali exporters a great deal. So far, no laboratory in the country has international accreditation and exporters are forced to rely on overseas labs, mainly Indian ones, to assure buyers of the quality standards of the product.
Initially, MoI had taken initiatives to form the ´laboratory certification authority´ through enactment of a separate bill. However, it later chose to move the plan through Formation Order - a fast-track way - after International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC), the world governing body for world standard certification, made it mandatory to enforce laws that govern the establishment and regulation of international standard labs.
Under ILAC rule, any private sector lab, government lab or internationally accredited firm operating in Nepal need to have certification and license from the National Accreditation Board for issuing standardization certificate to exportable products.
The Formation Order forwarded to the cabinet envisages setting up of different sub-committees under the Accreditation Board to issue certification on different subjects and sectors.
The proposed 15-member board will have experts from different sectors including agriculture and health.
Likewise, the formation order envisages creation of Nepal Accreditation Development Committee, which will be authorized to issue licenses to laboratory examiners who are experts in quality testing and will be responsible to certify the quality of goods tested in the recognized laboratories.
The committee will be funded by the government for initial three years until it becomes self-sustaining from its own income sources including licenses fees and other royalties.
The proposed formation order provisions penalties of Rs 50,000 to any laboratories issuing quality certification without receiving license from the board. The penalty would be doubled if such breaches are repeated. The board can even scrap the license in case of violation of provisions.
To make lab examiners more responsible, the order has provisions to slap a fine of Rs 25,000 if they fail to fulfill their duty sincerely and a penalty of Rs 50,000 if they repeat the mistakes.
Exporters of agriculture produce, handicraft and silver products have been facing problems in getting international standardization, hindering their exports to overseas markets in the absences of world standard labs in the country.
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