Legislative News

Jovan Petrovic: Standards facilitate business

Jovan Petrovic, Acting Assistant Minister of Economy, was a guest of the RTS Morning Program, on February 2nd, 2016

"Serbia is obliged to take over a large number of directives and regulations of the European Union relating to the quality infrastructure and products safety, within the EU accession process” said Jovan Petrovic Assistant Minister for quality infrastructure and products safety on the market, for the RTS Morning Program.

"All these Directives, which are followed by a certain set of standards, we transferred into the national regulations that contribute to the improvement of competitiveness of our enterprises and to more safety products on the market and in use," he stressed.

"Regulations relating to product safety are mandatory for all manufacturers and importers, while the standards are voluntary", explained the Assistant Minister.

"The standards relating to the requirements for products, processes and services are not mandatory, but it is useful to implement them because they greatly facilitate business and affect the improvement of competitiveness" said Petrovic.

Regardless of the fact that the implementation of the QM standard costs the company, Mr. Petrović explained that the certified quality management system does not increase the cost of services or products. On the contrary, the global research and statistics show that the implementation of standards reduces operating costs by 15 percent.

"Serbia has transposed 97 percent of standards, and about 75 percent of the technical regulations in the field of quality infrastructure. Although the process of harmonization is still ongoing, the quality infrastructure area was rated as one of the most harmonized in the negotiating process. New laws and regulations in this area are currently under preparations for the adoption", said the Assistant Minister.