The second download included below is the press release
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Ministry of Industry and Commerce is mandated with the responsibility of formulating and administering policies that promote industrialization, trade promotion, consumer protection, standards and quality assurance development as well as entrepreneurship for social-economic development. To achieve its mandate of ensuring standards and quality assurance development, the Ministry has a Department of Standard and Quality Assurance responsible for these aspects. This Department works with other internal and external stakeholders who include: Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA), Standards Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ), Bureau Veritas.
The Government of Zimbabwe embarked on the Consignment Based Conformity Assessment (CBCA) programme, through Statutory Instrument (SI) 132 of 2015. Bureau Veritas was appointed by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce (MIC) to implement the CBCA programme. The programme entails assessment of quality of goods imported into the country against national standards and other international standards. The types of products assessed under the CBCA programme include, food and agriculture implements, building material, packaging material, electrical goods, body and health care products, automotive and transportation, clothing and textile, engineering equipment and toys.
My audit was motivated by media reports as well as the pre-study results which highlighted the shortcomings in the monitoring of the quality of imported and proliferation of smuggled inferior products in the country.
