Standards without enforcement equals empty promises

GSA official locking up a facility that sold substandard products

Last year, the government, through Cabinet and Parliament, approved the National Quality Policy (NQP) and passed the Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) Bill, which received presidential assent within weeks, and is now fully operational.

While the NQP, is aimed at ensuring that goods traded in the country are designed, manufactured and supplied to respond to the needs, expectations, and requirements of consumers, the Ghana Standards Authority Act, 2022 (Act 1076) establishes the GSA as the authority responsible for the creation and promulgation of standards and its enforcement in the country.

For many in the standards community, these two achievements in a year were unprecedented, clothing the GSA with the powers to deter the trade in substandard goods and encourage quality to directly impact consumer interests.

But standards and legislation alone are not enough. Bold and vigilant enforcement of standards is critical.

That’s the only way to raise quality consciousness among manufacturers, importers and consumers to help maintain a quality culture in public life throughout society.

It is the strict enforcement of standards, hinging on inspection and issuance of citations for violations, and application of penalties that drives compliance in many places.

Periodic rituals
Over the years, the GSA has been conducting pre-market inspections where they offer testing services and carry out conformity assessments to ensure that goods comply with laid down standards before they are made available in consumer markets.

Locally manufactured goods are inspected and certified as meeting required standards.

Certificates of conformity are issued to enable the use of standard marks on certified products to demonstrate that they meet the required standards.

GSA also conducts destination inspections of high-risk goods imported into the country to ensure that they meet the required standards for Ghanaian consumer markets.

Periodically, the authority also conducts market surveillance, including site visits to observe whether market practices are consistent with regulatory requirements.

Yet one needs no orientation to know that our markets are inundated with substandard goods, putting consumers and the economy at risk.

Certificates of conformity are issued to enable the use of standard marks on certified products to demonstrate that they meet the required standards.

GSA also conducts destination inspections of high-risk goods imported into the country to ensure that they meet the required standards for Ghanaian consumer markets.

Periodically, the authority also conducts market surveillance, including site visits to observe whether market practices are consistent with regulatory requirements.

Yet one needs no orientation to know that our markets are inundated with substandard goods, putting consumers and the economy at risk.

In 2017, a nationwide surveillance conducted by the GSA revealed that more than 70 per cent of all imported electrical cable brands on the market were substandard and could cause fires.

This was after several reports broke that in a scheme to rake in profits, several importers of electrical cables were flooding the market with fake products that do not meet critical safety requirements.

Out of 22 electrical cable brands sampled for laboratory testing, only two, which were manufactured locally, passed the critical safety requirement test for conductor resistance at the GSA Cable Laboratory in Accra.

The test showed that 20 of the brands, all imported products, were not designed or test-approved to meet the requirements in safety standards.

Substandard productions
Five years later, the trade in substandard electrical cables has reached an alarming dimension, with makeshift factories in the country manufacturing the fake products locally, with fake labelling to portray the products as coming from abroad.

This is a departure from what was the case five years ago, when almost all fake electrical cables on the market were imported.

On Wednesday, May 10 this year, officials from the GSA and the Ghana Police Service conducted a swoop on one of these cable manufacturing companies within the Nigo-Prampram District based on a tip-off.

The company, Fenice Metal Technology Limited, was manufacturing electrical cables without the required GSA licence and certification.

The company of origin of the packaged products, included Turkey, China and Nigeria although the products where produced locally on the blind side of authorities.

Seven Chinese and a Nigerian, who are workers at the factory, were arrested by the police to assist in the investigation. (Daily Graphic, May 11, 2023, back page).

Take action
Many are still baffled about the thriving trade in substandard goods in the country, despite its negative impact on consumers and the economy, and fingers always point to the seemingly lack of rigorous enforcement of standards to punish non-compliance, as the main incentive that fuels the bad trading practice.

The power to seize and destroy goods which do not meet approved standards is one that has not been exploited enough.

The GSA has the power to, for instance, confiscate improperly labelled products when carrying out its market surveillance activities, and could recall substandard products and ask the producers to carry out remedial actions for the products to meet the requisite standards.

Such products may be forfeited and disposed of under the Ghana Standard (Food Drugs and Other Goods) General Labelling Rules 1992.

The authority could also use administrative fines to drive enforcement.

It can levy administrative fines for regulatory offences committed by non-complying traders or manufacturers.

It can also raise enforcement actions against non-complying traders in court as trade in substandard goods could attract criminal sanctions like fines and imprisonment.

Collective support
So, the legislation may be elaborate and available for deterrence, but if the value of enforcement is zero or close to zero, real change is impossible.

The GSA must be supported by the government to advance its recently revamped enforcement drive, to hopefully rid the markets of substandard goods.

That is a prerequisite for achieving the dreams of building a robust economy and protecting the true interest of consumers.

But in order for enforcement activities to deliver their expected results, they need to be properly resourced – which means that risk-based strategic planning must be conducted to ensure that sufficient resources are available to address key risks.

Fortunately, the GSA seem to have the open support of the Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) and the Traders Advocacy Group, Ghana (TAGG), two vibrant umbrella organisations pushing for the interest of traders, to strictly enforce standards.

It’s as if the GSA has found a way of bringing these rather ‘difficult’ groups on board its stakeholder engagements and finally found in them a strong supporter and partner of its enforcement drive.

It’s a social mark scored that must be utilised before the sacredness hovering over this important partnership runs out, and we return to square one.

In the final analysis, enforcement is everything.