Uganda National Bureau of Standards (UNBS) has said the new digital conformity marking programme, now under pilot, will be key in providing a track-and-trace mechanism to distinguish between genuinely certified and substandard commodities in the supply chain.

The programme, UNBS said in a statement, aligns with its agenda of facilitating trade, enforcing standards, and protecting public health, safety, and the environment from hazardous and substandard products.

“The digital conformity marking programme leverages on technology that allows the public to … verify if a product is genuinely certified by UNBS. The programme also facilitates trade and rids the market of unfair competition by eliminating the misuse of the UNBS [QMark] by uncertified manufacturers and ensuring that only certified goods access the market,” the statement reads in part.

In May, UNBS started piloting the programme among beauty and personal care products manufacturers, one of the most impacted regarding the manufacture of substandard products.

UNBS has previously banned and withdrawn several beauty and personal care products from the market, some of which are linked to cancer.

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