NIGERIA – The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) has launched a free nationwide calibration program for industries in order to guarantee equity and fairness in measurement and provide Nigerian goods a chance to compete on the international market.
Director-General of SON, Mallam Farouk Salim, opened the free calibration exercise in Kano by stating that the exercise would make sure that weights and measures were properly taken into account in product certification and standardization to encourage international sales.
He claimed that SON has acquired cutting-edge machinery to carry out the mobile exercise across the country and calibrate all industries at their doorsteps.
According to him, the activity would also aid in loss prevention and guarantee that consumers weren’t taken advantage of.
The free nationwide calibration exercise was flagged off at the Gerawa Rice Mills in Kano.
“Looking at the way standardization is going on across the globe, and considering the situation of our industries in the country, prompted the need to have these calibration machines in a mobile laboratory to ensure that all companies have an accurate measurement of their products,” Salim said.
Mr. Albert Wilberforce, the Regional Director of SON for Kano State, stated that the exercise was launched to boost the morale of indigenous companies to achieve greater heights.
There are five main SON laboratories spread out across the nation. These comprise the Electrical/Electronic Laboratory, the Food Technology Laboratories, and the Chemical Technology Laboratories, all of which are situated in Lekki, Lagos State.
The goal of the exercise, according to the SON Director General, was to make sure that equipment used by manufacturers and MSMEs were calibrated in accordance with industry standards.
Stakeholders in the manufacturing sector present during the launch called on the federal government to empower SON to establish more testing laboratories across the country to raise the standard of Made in Nigeria products.
They claimed that the labs in Lagos, Kano, Enugu, and Kaduna do not provide the industry with enough support.
Alhaji Isa Gerawa, Group Managing Director of the Gerawa Rice Milling Company, stated that adding more SON laboratories to the country would make it simpler for people to test items, which would boost the economy of the country.
In order to carve out a niche on the shelves both domestically and abroad, he contended that SON needs more labs to enable it to analyze a bigger proportion of Nigerian items.
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