The Ghana Standards Authority (GSA), and the Food Drugs Authority (FDA) have harmonised their certification processes to fast track approvals for businesses.

The move is part of efforts to reduce challenges faced by businesses in the process of securing approvals and certification for their products and services.

The Director General of the GSA, Prof. Alex Dodoo disclosed this on PM Express Business edition on April 11, 2024 with host George Wiafe.

The two institutions are expected to issue a press release in the coming days outlining details of the process.

“By this one-stop shop, the two institutions are avoiding the repetition that businesses have to go through in securing the required certification”, Professor Dodoo said.

“We want to make sure that the struggles that enterprises go through in getting the needed certification are reduced”, he added.

He pointed out that the purpose is to simplify the processes for businesses to save time.

“At the Food and Drugs Authority level, it will be called progressive licensing, while at the Standards Authority, we will call it graduated certification”.

Reducing time for certification

Professor Dodoo is optimistic businesses will embrace the new processes when launched since it will provide a relatively short period to complete.

“In the past, it used to take about four to six weeks, but that process has been reduced to about four days”.

He disclosed that the GSA is building more laboratories to deal with the pressure that may come as a result of the new process.

“Industries are always worried about delays because it impacts on their cost of doing business and we are working hard to deal with that”.

Prof. Dodoo stated that the Ghana Standards Authority has also tried to simplify the process by recognising certificates from other test laboratories in the country and abroad.

Dealing with fake certificates

Touching on issues of fake certificates, Prof. Dodoo assured that the system is robust enough to detect such documents.

“We have seen a lot of instances where businesses and industries present fake certificates when it comes to securing standard approvals from outside.”

He stated that the authority has appointed 300 trading standard inspectors who have been deployed on the market to help enforce the standards laws.

“We are working with the Association of Ghana Industries when it comes to compliance and standard enforcement for those in the manufacturing sector”.

Professor Dodoo added that a lot of business groups and associations have approached the authority to help improve standards and enforce the regulations.