Development of the quality infrastructure, in line with the provisions of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) and the creation of an enabling environment to strengthen the international competitiveness of BiH and to improve its economy, is the objective of the Project “Strengthening of the BiH Accreditation System” launched in October 2009. The amount of 1 million euro was provided by the European Union through the IPA pre-accession funds. The main programme and objectives of the Project, whose beneficiary is the Institute for Accreditation of Bosnia and Herzegovina – BATA, were presented at the kick-off meeting, held on 4 November 2009 at the premises of the EC Delegation to BiH.
Johann Hesse, Head of Section for Economic Development, Trade and Natural Resources within the European Commission Delegation to BiH, reflected on the importance of the Project in his opening speech and spoke of the “limited progress made by Bosnia and Herzegovina in the area of accrediation ».
«The Progress Report recommends that Bosnia and Herzegovina needs to further establish the conditions for the future international recognition of its tests, calibration results and certifications and prepare the country’s Accreditation Institute for signing multilateral agreements with the European cooperation for Accreditation», stated Hesse. He emphasised that the integration of BiH into the European quality infrastructure regimes is important to help enterprises develop international competitiveness, an export market and support economic growth.
«The strengthening of the accreditation system plays an important part in improving BiH’s quality infrastructure and ensures that conformity assessment bodies conduct their work in conformity with European standards and directives. The gradual conformity with the European technical directives, standardisation, metrology, accreditation and conformity assessment procedures is emphasised, among others, in the principles, priorities and conditions contained in the European Partnership and in the SAA. Accreditation systems, which work according to the international standards and requirements, are an important building block in breaking down technical barriers to trade as they enable faster and cost effective trade of goods and services in the market and ensure better protection and confidence of consumers in respect to quality of goods and services» – concluded Hesse, and expressed belief that the project would guide BiH on its way to the EU in this specific field and help the industry of BiH rise its exports to the EU and worldwide.
Žarko Petrović, Director of the Institute for Accreditation of Bosnia and Herzegovina – BATA, thanked the European Commission for the continuous assistance to the Institute for Accreditation of BiH and expressed readiness to fulfill all the necessary requirements. Mr Refik Salihović, Head of Accreditation Department at the Institute for Accreditation of BiH, presented the Institute, its work and system structure.
The Project will be implemented by the Consortium consisting of the members of the international accreditation bodies such as BAM (Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing with HQ in Berlin), the Danish Accreditation and Metrology Fund – DANAK , DGA (German Accreditation Association), ICON (International Consulting) and LA (Lithuanian Association). Their work was presented by Gisela Bischoff from BAM, while Hans-Ulrich Mittmann, BAM expert on accreditation issues, spoke of the methods for the international recognition of BiH accreditation system and emphasised that the intensity of the fulfilment of the conditions and signing of the Multilateral Agreement depended on the Institute for Accreditation in BiH and its readiness to fulfil the necessary European standards and requirements.
Due to an increasing level of recognising the importance of the accreditation for the EU economic infrastructure, the European Commission created the Regulation EU 765/2008 which sets out requirements for the accreditation and market surveillance. This Regulation, for the first time, gives a legal framework for the accreditation services in the whole of Europe.
