Bureaus search for common Community standards

DAILY NEWS Reporter in Arusha

AS Bureaux of Standards in Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and Tanzania work to harmonize their benchmark measures, the heads of these organs who recently met in Arusha feel it’s time to involve their respective customs authorities.

“Just as we are working to harmonize standards of goods to ease its movements across the six East African Community Member states and eliminate non-tariff barriers to trade, the efforts will still be useless if Bureaux of Standards do not work closely with our customs authorities because our tasks are closely linked,” says Ms Patricia Ejalu, chairperson of the East African Standards Committee.
Ms Ejalu who is also the Deputy Executive Directorfor Uganda’s National Bureau of Standards pointed out that their counterparts in Tanzania, Rwanda, Kenya, Burundi and Uganda had since harmonized nearly 2000 standards, calling on the customs authorities across the EAC to follow suit.
Mr Lazaro Henry Msasalaga from TBS told the regional annual committee meeting in Arusha that the standard bodies had laid the groundwork for future joint meetings with heads of customs authorities to speed up integration through harmonized tariffs in tandem with the EAC Customs Union laid out since 2005.
The newcomer to the Community, South Sudan, was not represented during the 2018 Standards Committee meeting in Arusha.
However, the South Sudan National Bureau of Standards is undertaking a series of training programmes from Kenya after the two institutions signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to that effect late last year.
The deal which was facilitated by TradeMark East Africa targets to promote cooperation in standardization and would provide frameworks for bilateral cooperation.