MINSK, 28 August (BelTA) — Belarus and Uzbekistan will prepare an action plan to remove current barriers in mutual trade. This decision was made following a meeting of a working group on eliminating technical barriers in Belarus-Uzbekistan trade held on the sidelines of the second Belarus-Uzbekistan Women's Business Forum in Tashkent, BelTA learned from the State Committee for Standardization.
The meeting was led by Yelena Morgunova, Chairperson of the State Committee for Standardization, and Abdurauf Abdukaiumov, First Deputy Director of the Uzbek Agency for Technical Regulation.
The parties discussed conformity assessment of Belarus’ industrial products supplied to Uzbekistan. Currently, Uzbekistan is reforming mandatory requirements for products, including energy efficiency indicators. However, there is still only one laboratory in Uzbekistan authorized to conduct tests on these indicators. This increases the time needed to receive confirmation documents. Uzbekistan is also revising the requirements and mechanisms for conformity assessment of elevators, due to which obtaining documents on conformity assessment for them has been suspended. Settlement of these issues requires involvement of a number of Uzbekistan authorized agencies, not only the Uzbek Agency for Technical Regulation.
Considering the agreements between the State Committee for Standardization and the Uzbek Agency for Technical Regulation on joint work on mutual supplies of products, it was decided to prepare a detailed action plan aimed at removing barriers taking into consideration the legislation of Uzbekistan and the interests of Belarusian manufacturers.
The parties also briefed each other about the current state of bilateral cooperation and cooperation with the CIS and the EAEU. Proposals to expand the legal framework to establish ties in metrology are planned to be approved in the near future.
The delegation of the State Committee for Standardization led by Yelena Morgunova got acquainted with the infrastructure of the Uzbek National Institute of Metrology and some laboratories of the Uzbekistan Scientific Testing and Quality Control Center (UzTest).