GSO signs a technical cooperation program with the KTR to support laboratories in member States
The GCC Standardization Organization (GSO) has signed a technical cooperation program with the Korea Testing and Research Institute (KTR) for a period of three years (2023-2025).
At the signing ceremony, His Excellency the President of GSO, Saud bin Nasser Al-Khusaibi, stressed the importance of the existing cooperation with KTR, with the aim of strengthening the quality infrastructure, and contributing to removing technical barriers to trade between the member states of GSO and the Republic of Korea.
His Excellency affirmed that GSO is working with its partners in the Republic of Korea to harmonize standards, technical regulations and conformity assessment procedures, which are indispensable to ensuring the safety of products, services, operations and quality of life owing to the fact that laboratories come as one of the most important elements of quality infrastructure, to enhance industries, and the accuracy of test results for goods, products and services, in the framework of the strategic relations and partnerships between the GCC States and the Republic of Korea to enhance trade exchange and provide for investment opportunities.
His Excellency also reviewed the efforts of GSO in developing the quality infrastructure system in cooperation with the member states. GSO has formed the GCC Laboratories Forum GCClab, which is an open network of laboratories and the supporting companies operating in the member states, which comes in line with GSO strategic vision for 2025. GSO attaches prime importance to laboratories because of the pivotal role they play in developing the Gulf infrastructure for quality.
GSO has also worked to support this objective through the recently formed Gulf Technical Committee for Laboratories, inter-comparison programs, peer evaluation programs, proficiency testing programs that are provided free of charge to laboratories, qualifying training programs for laboratories and holding specialized conferences, the latest of which was the Fifth Gulf Conference on Laboratory Competence, which was held in Riyadh in October 2022 under the patronage of His Excellency the Minister of Commerce in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, with wide participation of international and regional organizations, elite experts, and more than 400 participants.
His Excellency added that the technical cooperation program between the two sides includes supporting the infrastructure of laboratories in the member States in the field of proficiency testing programs and the production of reference materials for laboratories. It also includes capacity-building programs to qualify and develop human capabilities and provide technical support to laboratories operating in the member States, with a view to contribute to raising the efficiency of their work and the reliability of their results and preparing them for accreditation.
It is worthwhile mentioning that KTR is one of the main certification and testing bodies accredited by the Korean government for KC certificates in South Korea, and the International Committee for Approval of Electrical Equipment (IECEE). It was founded in 1969 as the Korean Institute for Testing and Inspection of Rubber Products, and it has a number of branches abroad, including China, Vietnam, Germany and Mexico, and it is one of the notified bodies by GSO to grant the Gulf conformity mark in the field of children’s toys and low-voltage electrical appliances.
