Promoting quality & enhancing safety and competitiveness By Moses Kirui A certification mark certifies the nature or origin of the goods or services to which it has been applied. This includes, for example, region or location or origin, materials of construction, method or mode of manufacture or provision, quality assurance, accuracy of the goods or services or any definable characteristic of the goods or services. It can also certify manufacture or provision of services by members of a union or other organization to certain standards. Rwanda Bureau of Standards (RBS) offers both product and systems certification services. The product certification marks include the Standardization Mark and the Mark of Excellence whereas the system certification includes Quality Management System, the Environmental Management Systems, and the Food Safety Management Systems marks. In this regard, the Bureau unveils marks that are used to testify certification of a given system or product. On November 19th, 2010 RBS officially launching Quality Marks including: the Quality Management Systems, the Environmental Management Systems, the Food Safety Management Systems and the Standardization Mark. Among these marks is the incredible Standardization mark, the mark is currently a voluntary mark in Rwanda. It can be applied on locally manufactured products complying with the relevant standards. A manufacture can acquire a standardization mark on application, once it is established that the product complies with the relevant standards, and that the manufacturing process can consistently manufacture similar products. This is confirmed through different interval audits conducted at the producers’ premises. The standardization mark indicates: The existence of a legal follow-up or product certification agreement between the manufacturer of a product and an organization with national accreditation for both testing and certification, Evidence that the product was successfully tested in accordance with a nationally accredited standard, Assurance that the accredited certification organization (Rwanda Bureau of Standards) has ensured that the item that was successfully tested is identical to that which is being offered for sale, Assurance that the successful test has resulted in a certification listing, which is considered public information, which sets out the tolerances and conditions of use for the certified product, to enable compliance with the law through listing and approval use and compliance, An assurance that the manufacturer is being regularly audited by the certification organization to ensure the maintenance of the original process standard that was employed in the manufacture of the test specimen that passed the test. The Rwanda Bureau of Standards plays an integral role in facilitation various companies to obtain the mark and to a greater extend boosting their market doing marketing. With the standardization mark, there is a decrease in product failure to get the required market. Standardization also eases the cross- boarder trade peculiarities due the regional recognized mark. The standardization mark is worth adoption by each and every business entity because of immense benefits attached to it.
