Strengthening the Compliance of the OIC Member States
to International Standards
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justified by the fact that harmonizing these with international standards will be acceptable and less
costly, these sectors being new to the Egyptian industry and hence starting their production and export
in compliance with EU standards since the beginning would be feasible and less resisted by
manufacturers.
6.2.2.5 Policy Implications of Egypt’s Experience
In the past seven years, Egypt has achieved major advances in the area of compliance with TBT and SPS
measures. The institutional quality framework has undergone significant improvements, with well-
established standardization, accreditation, and metrology bodies, and a progressive harmonization with
international standards. EOS has succeeded in raising exporters’ awareness of compliance with
international standards, translating them into Arabic. Local producers also benefit from a more
transparent interface through a widely accessible website.
To ensure compliance of manufactures with international standards and to increase Egyptian exports, it
is necessary that EOS obtain accreditation for ISO 17065 activities for product certification. Another
important achievement would be to reorganize the quality infrastructure in Egypt so as to avoid the
dichotomy in inspection and conformity assessment between the internal supply market and the market
for imports and exports. In this context, coordination between EOS and GOEIC should be strengthened
and rules consolidated, or conformity assessment should be placed under one authority in order to
avoid possible discrimination between domestically produced goods and imports. Finally, there could be
benefits for Egyptian producers if the obligation to assess domestic products (but not imports) on
conformity with voluntary standards were to be eliminated.
In the agricultural sector, the Agriculture Development Strategy Plan and related technical assistance
from international organizations helped raise awareness and compliance with international health and
safety standards. However, a number of domestic and external factors limit compliance of exporting
firms (especially SMEs). A closer cooperation between the Ministry of Agriculture and the private sector
is therefore needed.
Lack of compliance with international standards is caused by a number of reasons related to the nature
of the sector, the area of non-compliance, the export markets, and the internal quality infrastructure.
In the industry sector, non-compliance is often caused by internal factors. Manufacturers have little or
no experience with assuming conformity assessment responsibilities on their own. At the same time, the
quality infrastructure bodies in Egypt are reported to have little role in assisting these potential
exporters because of unavailability of export-market tailored standards. Even in the sectors where