The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) wants the National Assembly to support its quest to establish more laboratories in the country to expand its testing capacity.
Director-General, SON, Mallam Farouk Salim made the appeal in Lagos, during a facility tour with some Federal lawmakers visiting the agency on an oversight function.
Mallam Salim said the call for more laboratories became pertinent to enable SON perform its function maximally, stressing that the agency was inundated with so many goods to certify, monitor and test.
Mallam Salim said presently, Nigerian industries were disadvantaged in exporting, following the agency’s inadequate capacity to test, monitor and certify local products.
He noted that developing the nation’s testing capacity would address unscrupulous elements who would want to use the trade pact to make Nigeria a dumping ground.
Mallam Farouk Salim affirmed that SON would increase its collaboration with the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) especially in the nation’s oil and gas sector.
He explained that the Standards body had recently launched a more secured certification process to address issues of faking and forging of its certificate.
Earlier, the Chairman, House committee on industry, Mr Dolapo Badru, maintained that the absence of SON at the ports was responsible for the nation becoming a dumping ground for substandard goods.
Badru explained that the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) was doing a good job, but did not have the capacity to test and ascertain the quality of goods at the entry point.
He said the standards body’s physical examination of imported goods at the ports remained one sure way to address the influx of substandard goods into the country.
RN