Events

EA made a decision to recognize Serbian Accreditation

Accreditation Board of Serbia (ATS) will become one of the members - signatories of bilateral agreements (BLA) of the European Organisation for Accreditation (EA) on the recognition of accreditation.

ATS has been, in a very demanding three-year process evaluation by the EA, assessed as competent and reliable partner to the EA, and at the EA Multi-Lateral Agreement Council meeting, attended by assistant minister Jelena Popović, and Dejan Krnjaić, director of the ATS, on18^th and 19^th of April 2012, in Copenhagen, Denmark, based on the ‘peer assessment’ report analysis, a decision has been reached on signing the Bilateral  Agreement (BLA) on recognition of accreditation between ATS and EA, for the following scope of accreditation: testing laboratories, medical laboratories, calibration laboratories, control bodies and certification bodies for product certification.

 In the past three years, ATS together with great support from Ministry of Economy and Regional Development, has implemented a number of joint activities that have led to signing of this Agreement, from promulgating the Law on Accreditation to the improvement of the accreditation process by adoption of new editions and amendments to the management system documents in order to establish a system with effective and expeditious procedures that facilitate the work of ATS and accredited conformity assessment bodies.

The signing of the Agreement enables mutual trust and acceptance of reports and certificates issued by accredited conformity assessment bodies in Serbia (testing laboratories, medical laboratories, calibration laboratories, control bodies and certification bodies for product certification) and it makes the accreditation system, established in Serbia equivalent with those of other signatories of bilateral/multilateral (BLA/MLA) EA agreements on recognition of accreditation.

The signing of the Agreement will take place in May 2012, during the 28^th EA General Assembly meeting in Madrid. On behalf of the ATS and the Republic of Serbia the Agreement will sign Dr Dejan Krnjaić, the director of ATS. Having in mind that in December 2011, Republic of Serbia gained candidate status for EU accession, the ATS will, at the same session of the General Assembly of the EA, in accordance with the EA document, change the membership status in this organization, and from associate member it will become a full member of EA, and accordingly the bilateral agreement with the EA will be replaced with multilateral.

By signing the Agreement between ATS and the EA, Serbian economy gains access not only to a million European market but also to the world market for products and services tested and certified by our accredited bodies, ensuring confidence in the quality and safety of Serbian products and services and provides a very important technical support to the Serbian economy in achieving competitiveness on the European market. By connecting the accreditation system in Serbia with the European and international accreditation systems, the acceptance of the results of conformity assessment carried out in Serbia is ensured.

BLA/MLA recognition agreements of accreditation (are distinguished by the status of membership in the EA), allow the removal of trade barriers in the way that people, products and services cross the European and global boundaries. Accreditation delivers confidence in the services of accredited laboratories, certification and control bodies, which provides to products, services and people an "international passport to trade", precisely because the BLA/MLA agreements are recognized on an international level by international accreditation organizations - the International Organization for Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC) and International Accreditation Forum (IAF).

In the period from June 27^th to July 1^st2011, ATS was the subject of "peer assessment" by team of assessors of EA in order to verify compliance of the established system of accreditation in Serbia with the requirements of ISO / IEC 17011, relevant requirements of European legislation (Regulation (EC) 768/2008), as well as policies and guidelines of international organizations for accreditation. The team of peer assessors formed an opinion that Serbia has the necessary legal basis for the work of the Accreditation body - ATS has adequate procedures for continuous improvement, the administrative staff and leading evaluators are dedicated to their work, and technical assessors and experts are competent.