Abu Dhabi, UAE, 03/01/2020: QCC held the virtual fourth meeting for 2020 of the Standing Technical Committee of Abu Dhabi technical standards on Thursday December 24th, 2020. The meeting was chaired by the Committee Chairman Mr. Anas Al Barguthi, Executive Director of Conformity and Standards Services Sector in presence of representatives of relevant authorities from the Government and private sectors as well as representatives of the academic sector; the committee included 36 representatives from 22 relevant entities.
Al Barguthi underscored the importance of the assessment mechanism adopted by the Council in developing the standards and the conformity programs that have been accepted by relevant authorities, and approved by the end of 2019. He said “this is the second session in which requests for standards development programs and conformity schemes are evaluated. Based on this mechanism, the Council has identified the needs of all the stakeholders in the Emirate, including the standard development programs and conformity schemes for the year 2021, and hence all the requests have been assessed to know their impact on the main five pillars associated to the emirate plan”.
To ensure the neutrality and efficiency of the assessment process, the task of assessment has been assigned to a team from the representatives of the regulatory authorities concerned with these pillars, meanwhile, the Abu Dhabi Competitiveness Office undertook the tasks of studying the impact of the schemes requests on the economic and competitiveness pillars among the target sectors; and the Environment Agency studied the expected environmental impact of implementing the projects in question. The assessment of the health impact at Abu Dhabi Public Health Centre is to show the level of effects of the schemes requests and the desired objectives associated to the public health. The social effect of the schemes requests has been studied by the Department of Community Development; while the security effect has been assessed by Abu Dhabi Police General Headquarters.
It noteworthy, that this mechanism contributes effectively in the governance of the standards’ system at the Emirate level, and it is also in line with Abu Dhabi Strategy 2030 and its objectives for achieving the highest quality standards for the community, and supporting the business sector in the emirate; it is also in line with the Executive Council Resolution No 2 for 2016 with regard to coordination with Abu Dhabi Quality and Conformity Council in all the matters connected to the standards in terms of developing the existing or creating new standards and perform the consultancy studies.
“The outcomes of the assessment process have resulted in approval of the annual plan for the standards development programs and conformity schemes to be achieved by the Council in 2021, through assessment of 36 schemes requested by the regulatory authorities, which included approval of 17 projects, including 16 projects in the field of standards and guidelines developments. The outcomes of such schemes is expected to serve many regulatory sectors such as the transport and roads infrastructure, maintaining the public health and environment and its protection against pollution, in addition to the regular updates to the guidelines of the services infrastructure standards, which is the only reference approved in the emirate in regard to the services infrastructure sectors approved by the Executive Council in 2017”. Al Barguthi added.
The development of a conformity scheme for water and wastewater service tanker drivers has also been approved according to a request submitted by the Department of Energy, as this scheme shall contribute to qualifying and enhancing the performance of workers in this field, and it aims to maintain the public health associated to the safety and quality of water, and protect the environment against pollution through avoiding the waste accumulation and preventing leaks and spills during the service implementation process. This program shall be carried out in collaboration with the relevant regulatory authorities such as the Department of Energy, the Environment Authority in Abu Dhabi, the Abu Dhabi Waste Management Center – Tadweer, the Integrated Transport Center, Abu Dhabi, the Environment Agency in Abu Dhabi, the distribution companies, in addition to the Abu Dhabi Sewerage Services Company.
The meeting has approved the manufacturers guidelines on how to make the cloth facemasks in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, according to the request of the Economic Development Department. The Guidelines directory is important for supporting the efforts of maintaining the public health to control the spread of COVID-19, and to support the local production and achieve self-sufficiency of the facemasks, to provide support to the SMEs owners to produce facemasks and contribute to providing several local and international standards in order to collect the information and data for the SMEs owners before the start of manufacturing the facemasks.
SOURCE
