Workshop on Quality Systems in National Metrology Institutes

Distinguished Participants
Ladies and Gentlemen

It is a great pleasure for me to speak at the opening of this APEC Workshop on Quality Systems in National Metrology Institutes. On behalf of the APEC Secretariat, I would like to express our appreciation to Mr. Jesus Motoomull, the project overseer, as well as the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) National Measurement Laboratory of Australia, and the National Association of Testing Authorities of Australia, for their efforts that made this Workshop possible. My thanks also goes to the Singapore Productivity and Standards Board for their hosting the event. To all the experts participating in this Workshop I would like to extend my warm welcome.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

To achieve open and free trade and investment in Asia-Pacific region by 2010/2020 is a goal set by APEC leaders in Bogor, 1994. Over the years, APEC member economies have made important efforts to promote trade and investment liberalization and facilitation with a view to create necessary condition for achieving this goal. They have identified fifteen areas to work on Standards and conformance is one of them. Since its founding, the Sub-Committee on Standards and Conformance (SCSC) has undertaken many meaningful work, such as encouraging alignment of APEC member economies' standards with international standards; promoting mutual recognition among APEC member economies of conformity and assessment in regulated and voluntary sectors; promoting cooperation for technical infrastructure development in order to facilitate broad participation in mutual recognition arrangements in both regulated and voluntary sectors; and ensuring the transparency of the standards and conformity assessment of APEC member economies.

The Workshop we are having today is another concrete effort made by member economies to advance our work and cooperation in this area. I am of the view that this Workshop is timely and important. The reasons are obvious.

Firstly, to remove the technical barriers is regarded as an increasingly urgent task in the efforts to further expend trade in the region. With this in mind, APEC leaders when they met in Brunei last month once again stressed the importance of trade facilitation and instructed Ministers to continue work on simplifying and harmonizing standards and conformance and customs procedures as two priority areas. This Workshop can be seen as an immediate follow-up in response to leaders instruction.

Secondly, at the present, many APEC national metrology institutes, particular those in developing economies still lack quality systems that would satisfy international criteria and therefore are disadvantaged in acceding to the global Mutual Recognition Arrangements. This workshop aims at assisting respective national metrology institutes in APEC member economies to build up their capacity in meeting the quality system requirements of the "Global Mutual Recognition Arrangements (MRA)" which went into effect in October 1999. It will address the urgent need of creating a foundation for development of quality systems in member economies to a level suitable for international recognition and promoting international acceptance of the calibration certificates issued by APEC national metrology institutes, thus to eliminate the technical barriers to trade in the APEC region.

Thirdly, metrology and calibration constitutes the foundation for other activities in the areas of standards and conformance, such as inspection and testing, certification of products and quality systems, and standards development. Therefore, building the capacity of national metrology institutes of APEC member economies would contribute to improving performance not only in the area of metrology and calibration, but also in the whole spectrum of standards and conformance.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

In the next few days, the Workshop is going to undertake a series of activities, including discussions, training and study tour. It will offer you a good opportunity to exchange your experiences, identify gap against the quality system requirements and develop individual plans for improving your respective national metrology institutes' quality systems. Apart from this, I hope that the Workshop will also produce sound recommendations for the future action of Sub-Committee on Standards and Conformance.

In conclusion, I wish you all the best in your deliberation and wish the Workshop a success.

Thank you.