Basseterre, St. Kitts, October 12, 2021 (SKNBS): Several stakeholder workshops are currently being held virtually to daft a National Quality Policy (NQP) for St. Kitts and Nevis.
The various stakeholders being engaged include Fisheries, Tourism and Transport, Light Manufacturing and Regulators.
Sadie-Ann Sisnett, who is the Project Manager from CROSQ, said that these workshops will aid in the development of the NQP implementation roadmap.
The workshops are also an effort to strengthen the policy and regulatory framework in support of the development of a National Quality Infrastructure (NQI) in St. Kitts and Nevis.
“This would mean that St. Kitts and Nevis would join many of the CARICOM Member States in the development of its Quality Infrastructure,” she said.
She explained that the National Quality Policy is the basic government instrument that sets out the objectives of the QI infrastructure in relation to Metrology, Standardization, Accreditation and Conformity Assessment to build the foundation for effective trade.
“It is expected to address the identified weaknesses in the QI of Member States so that they would be able to take advantage of opportunities resulting in enhanced regional and extra-regional trade,” she said.
Ms. Sisnett noted that these stakeholder workshops are considered best practices because they will learn from the best in these areas of expertise, the best examples of it being done correctly, and the lessons learned having gone through this process before.
She said that stakeholders would also learn how to put into practice what is taught in the workshops.
“We will also learn with a little tweaking from the individual country how to make it stick and not remain in theory and paper, but how to best put it into practice,” she said. “Having incorporated what we will learn from these workshops the NQP of St. Kitts and Nevis is therefore expected to serve as an instrument to contribute to the production of additional goods and services, meeting international standards, increase trade, higher levels of productivity, innovation, competitiveness and consumer health and environmental protection over the next 10 years, while at the same time creating a quality culture that supports a diversified, resilient and competitive sustainable economy.”
The St. Kitts and Nevis Bureau of Standards successfully applied for support under the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), the CARICOM Regional Organizations for Standards and Quality Project to develop an NQP under the Strengthening of the Regional Quality Infrastructure Programme.
