Egypt and the European Union are concluding a EUR 1.4 mn program aimed at supporting and strengthening the performance of the Egyptian Quality Infrastructure within the national reform priorities so that it is aligned with European and international best practices for building capability, Invest-Gate reports. The EU has funded the twinning program to support the Egyptian Organization for Standardization and Quality.

“Twinning projects open unique opportunities for peer-to-peer learning between equivalent European, Egyptian administrations and semi-public authorities,” Ambassador Ivan Surkoš, head of the EU delegation to Egypt, says during the closure event.

“We see that the relationships built during the twinning project outlast the actual project duration and often lead to continued institutional exchanges of good practices, and sharing of information in a mutually beneficial way. This is what I would call a true partnership,” he adds.

The project aims to complement the efforts that Egypt is making to negotiate the Agreement on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products with the EU.

The project has focused in particular on strengthening the Egyptian Organization for Standardization and Quality by further improving its role in the development of the regulatory framework governing the Egyptian Quality Infrastructure and the drafting of technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures.

The project started in March 2015 and was being implemented over a period of two years by a consortium which is led by the French Association for Standardisation (AFNOR), the United Kingdom British Standards Institution (BSI) and the Spanish Asociacion Espanola de Normalizacion (AENOR) as junior partners.