Republic of Congo: New Conformity Assessment Program (PCEC) for products

 

It has been announced that a new Conformity Assessment Program (PCEC) for products was introduced In the Republic of Congo (not to confuse with the Democratic Republic of Kongo.

The programme started on the 1 May 2022 and is being rolled out in cooperation with the agency Cotecna.  It was designated for that purpose by the Congolese Agence Congolaise de Normalisation et de Qualité (ACONOQ).

Basically, all products imported into Congo are regulated and will require a Certificate of Conformity.  This certificate is issued by Cotecna before the importation based on different compliance documents (existing product certificates, test reports, etc.).

The testing agency is in charge of providing the necessary instructions to the involved parties (inspector, laboratory and auditor) and verifies that the parties are able to carry out the required tasks. This could involve the following actions:

• Sampling
• Laboratory analyses (internal or partner)
• Factory audit
• Pre-shipment inspection

Pre-export verification of conformity programs (PVoC) are widespread in developing countries. These countries delegate the conformity assessment of imported products to external companies accredited by the governments (like Cotecna in this case but also Bureau Veritas, Intertek, etc.). The structure of PVoC programs is in most cases very similar. The regulated goods are subject to a pre-export inspection and require a Certificate of Conformity issued by the accredited agency for each shipment.

The certificates show that products comply with the applicable national standards, technical regulations, approved international standards or manufacturer’s specifications. Here, however, the challenge is that the detailed requirements (i.e. what standards must be met, what kind of documentation must be provided, etc.) for respective part categories are normally not publicly defined by the accredited agencies. They are rather communicated in a bilateral contact which makes the importation process a little bit obscure.