Bureau of Standards
What is The Bureau of Standards?
The Antigua and Barbuda Bureau of Standards (ABBS) is the agency authorized by law (The Standards Act) to establish and maintain the national quality infrastructure (NQI – standards, testing, metrology – measurement services, certification and accreditation) in Antigua and Barbuda.
The services provided under the ambit of the NQI are aimed at ensuring and protecting the health and safety of the consumer and the environment, and promoting fair trading practices, in the production, import and export of goods and services.
What are Standards?
Standards are “...documents that provide requirements, specifications, guidelines or characteristics that can be used consistently to ensure that materials, products, processes and services are fit for their purpose. “[Ref: iso.org/standards.html]
These take the form of technical specifications or codes of practice for the goods and services produced. Stakeholders' compliance with all standards is voluntary.
Why do we need Standards?
Standards- form the basis of trade, enhance and encourage trade;
- provide opportunity for developing countries to compete on the world trade stage by removing technical barriers to trade;
- form a platform for ensuring the quality of a product;
- allow manufacturers to provide consistent and reliable quality, avoiding wastage (of materials and other resources) as a result of poor quality and rejected products;
- (international standards) serve as the technical foundation for the global marketplace in order to prevent unnecessary obstacles to free flow of goods and protect consumers from the dumping of sub-standard products on their markets.
What does the Bureau do?
Standards Development- form the basis of trade, enhance and encourage trade;
- Prepares standards which are relevant to the economy of Antigua and Barbuda,
- Complies with the requirements of international trade relations
- Provides a broad base of technical advisory and monitoring services for producers and manufacturers (This will in turn benefit the consumer.)
- Facilitates presentations, training seminars and workshops to provide information about the development and use of standards in general or specific areas
- Calibration of scales and non automatic weighing instruments
- Verification of scales and non automatic weighing instruments
- Verification of fuel pumps
- Liaises with international and regional organisations
- Hosts the National Codex Contact Point (CCP) – manages a collection of Codex Standards and other FAO and WHO publications; Manages Codex activities and disseminates codex information at the national level.
- Hosts the National Enquiry Point (NEP) for the WTO TBT Agreement.
- Facilitates standards and standards-related awareness activities
The Bureau is also
- A member of the CARICOM Regional Organisation for Standards and Quality - CROSQ
- A Subscriber member of the International Organization for Standardization - ISO
- An Affiliate member of the International Electrotechnical Commission - IEC
- A member of the Inter-American Metrology System - SIM
- A member of the Codex Alimentarius Commission
Dates we celebrate
The Bureau joins annually with standards organisations and other affiliates worldwide to recognize the following dates:- World Metrology Day - May 20th
- World Accreditation Day - June 9th
- World Standards Day - October 14th
- World Quality Day - November (2nd Thursday)
- World Consumer Rights Day - March 15th
- World Health Day - April 7th
- World Food Day - October 16th
- International Day of Persons with Disabilities - December 3rd
