Technical legislation round-table meeting held

The round-table entitled “Regulatory framework for technical legislation in Serbia and its practical implementation” was held yesterday, whereas it was organised by the Serbian Chamber of Commerce (PKS) in cooperation with the Ministry of Economy (ME), Accreditation Body of Serbia (ATS), Institute for Standardization of Serbia (ISS) and Directorate of Measures and Precious Metals (DMDM). A need for increased engagement of PKS, competent authorities and quality infrastructure institutions was stressed given that our business community should be timely informed about technical regulations and standards and their coherent implementation as this was the key factor for attainment of increased level of competitiveness of the Serbian economy.

Director of the PKS Economic System Sector, Ljubiša Dimitrijević, said that it was necessary to pay special attention to harmonisation and product compliance evaluation process. This aims at informing participants about general and specific fields of the technical legislation. It is important to raise awareness of the business community as regards the importance of the application of the technical legislation in technological processes and importance of providing adequate certificates of conformity since these are the conditions for both marketing of safe and complied products and for increasing the economy competitiveness level.

Jelena Popović MSc, Assistant Minister (ME), pointed out the importance of having Serbian economy competitiveness level raised and successful marketing of quality and safe Serbian products in the EU. For Serbia to become an export-oriented country it will be necessary to transpose technical legislation into our legal system. Moreover, she emphasised that it was really necessary to speed up the adoption of concrete directives such as the Construction Products Directive. In addition to harmonisation of the legislation, it is important to have coherent implementation thereof, whereas it has to be stressed that economic operators need to learn about all novelties in the legal system and improve capacities for their practical implementation.

Lidija Stojanović, Assistant Minister (Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications) and Chief Market Inspector, stressed that it was necessary to upgrade the knowledge in the field of technical legislation, and to upgrade the competences of inspectors.

Activities and scope of work of the Accreditation Body of Serbia were presented by Milica Lukešević, ATS Acting Director, whereas Radivoje Nikoličić, Special Adviser to the ATS Director (Quality Manager), gave a lecture on the subject of “Importance of Accredited Reports and Certificates for Companies in the Republic of Serbia”.

Vida Živković MSc, Director of the Directorate of Measures and Precious Metals, informed the delegates that all EU regulations had been transposed into our metrology legislation, whereas coherent application thereof remained the most important issue. 

Snježana Pupavac MSc, Chair of the Association of Accredited Conformity Assessment Bodies, presented the work of this Association as the youngest one within the Serbian Chamber of Commerce.

Nikola Mirković, Head of the Department for Technical Legislation and Conformity Assessment, ME, highlighted on this occasion that product quality and safety were a precondition for competitiveness and hence it was important to raise the awareness of the business community as regards the importance of standardisation.

A long debate that was part of the round-table meeting was attended by the representatives of technical services of different PKS business associations, regional PKS offices, ministries and organisations preparing and drafting technical legislation and monitoring their practical implementation, including the representatives of the market surveillance authorities. It was concluded that it would be necessary to increase the engagement of PKS that would be supported by the competent authorities and quality infrastructure institutions in oder to timely inform our business community about technical product-related regulations, CABs and necessary certificates.

For more information, please visit: http://www.pks.rs/Vesti.aspx?IDVestiDogadjaji=15983

M. Lukešević, ATS, J. Popović MSc, ME, Lj. Dimitrijević, PKS, L. Stojanović, MTTT

Round-table meeting participants