EMPERICAL ANALYSIS OF THE QUALITY INFRASTRUCTURE IN TRADE FACILITATION WITHIN THE AFRICAN CONTINENTAL FREE TRADE

Authors

  • Jailos Mrisho Nzumile College of Business Education (CBE)
  • Ismail W Taifa UDSM

Keywords:

Quality infrastructure, Sustainable development, Standardisation, Trade

Abstract

This study mainly focused on exploring the roles of standardisation and quality infrastructure systems in aiding trade and sustainable development within the African continental free trade area. This is a conceptual study. It was established that facilitating trade and sustainable development lead to attaining economic growth of any developing country. Several factors are involved in facilitating trade and sustainable development, including quality infrastructure and standardisation. These two factors foster free trade area establishment by eliminating trade barriers within the African countries. The factors can also assist speeding up the delivery time, reducing goods rejection at crossing borders, environmental protection by adhering to the ISO 14000 series of standards, add competitive advantages and many more. Despite all these benefits, African countries still are challenged regarding effective metrology institutes. To be able to foster a free trade area within African countries, each country needs to establish an influential metrology institute for carrying out all metrological activities which would provide assurance and global recognition to their products and services.

References

REFERENCES

BIPM. (2004), “What is metrology?â€, International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM, Bureau International des Poids et Mesures), available at: http://www.bipm.org/en/convention/wmd/2004/ (accessed 13 September 2020).

Bottero, M., Cornforth, J., Dodds, F., Lingan, J., Schneeberger, K., Shaw, A., Smith, N., et al. (2011), A Pocket Guide to Sustainable Development Governance, edited by Cruickshank, E.W., Schneeberger, K. and Smith, N., 2nd ed., The Commonwealth Secretariat, Stakeholder Forum, available at: https://www.circleofblue.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/PocketGuidetoSDGEdition2webfinal–Stakeholder-Forum.pdf.

Brodhag, C. and Talière, S. (2006), “Sustainable development strategies: Tools for policy coherenceâ€, Natural Resources Forum, Vol. 30 No. 2, pp. 136–145.

Capacity4dev. (2017), “Quality Infrastructureâ€, available at: https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/new-tbtprogramme-new/wiki/quality-infrastructure-1#:~:text=Quality infrastructure (QI) refers to,testing%2C laboratory and product certification.&text=QI facilities%2C such as laboratories,expensive to develop and operate. (accessed 17 September 2020).

Cerin, P. (2006), “Bringing economic opportunity into line with environmental influence: A discussion on the Coase theorem and the Porter and van der Linde hypothesisâ€, Ecological Economics, Vol. 56 No. 2, pp. 209–225.

Diekmann, U. (2006), “Metrology Standards Testing Quality: Relevance of a National Quality Infrastructureâ€, PTB Practical Experience in Capacity Building, Boao Forum for Asia 26-27 June 2006, Hainan, China.

ECA. (2020), Identifying Priority Products and Value Chains for Standards Harmonization in Africa - Technical Study, Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), United Nations, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Gathii, J.T., Burnett, K., Nshimbi, C.C. and Dommen, C. (2017), The Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) in Africa – A Human Rights Perspective, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Gutenberg Beuys Feindruckerei GmbH, Germany, available at: http://www.fes-globalization.org/geneva/documents/2017/2017_07_CFTA_HRIA_Publication.pdf.

Giangrande, N., White, R.M., East, M., Jackson, R., Clarke, T., Coste, M.S. and Penha-Lopes, G. (2019), “A competency framework to assess and activate education for sustainable development: Addressing the UN Sustainable Development Goals 4.7 challengeâ€, Sustainability, Vol. 11 No. 2832, pp. 1–16.

Hope, A. (2020), AfCFTA and the Digital Reality of Trade Today, Tralac Trade Law Centre NPC, Western Cape, South Africa, available at: https://www.tralac.org/publications/article/14400-afcfta-and-the-digital-reality-of-trade-today.html.

ISO Central Secretariat. (2009), Environmental Management: The ISO 14000 Family of International Standards, Geneva, Switzerland, available at: https://www.iso.org/files/live/sites/isoorg/files/archive/pdf/en/theiso14000family_2009.pdf.

Jovanovic, M. (1998), International Economic Integration, 2nd ed., Routledge, London, UK, available at:https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203019894.

Lin, W., Hong, C. and Zhou, Y. (2020), “Multi-scale evaluation of Suzhou city’s sustainable development level based on the sustainable development goals frameworkâ€, Sustainability, Vol. 12 No. 976, pp. 2–28.

Maliszewska, M. and Ruta, M. (2020), The African Continental Free Trade Area: Economic and Distributional Effects, Washington, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / The World Bank, available at:https://doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-1559-1.

Moore, J.E., Mascarenhas, A., Bain, J. and Straus, S.E. (2017), “Developing a comprehensive definition of sustainabilityâ€, Implementation Science, Implementation Science, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 1–8.

Morelli, J. (2011), “Environmental Sustainability: A Definition for Environmental Professionalsâ€, Journal of Environmental Sustainability, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 1–9.

Ng, J. and Mumford, D. (2017), “The TFTA and intra-regional trade in Africaâ€, Maritz Publishing CC, available at: https://www.howwemadeitinafrica.com/tfta-intra-regional-trade-africa/ (accessed 16 September 2020).

Nzumile, J.M. (2020), “Competitiveness of a product based on its package: a case study of Tanzanian local consumer productsâ€, Business Education Journal, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 1–11.

Nzumile, J.M. and Taifa, I.W.R. (2019), “Assessing the awareness of local consumer’s product producers towards packaging standards in Tanzaniaâ€, International Journal of Research in Industrial Engineering, Vol. 8 No. 1, pp. 40–52.

OECD. (2005), “Standards and conformity assessment in trade: minimising barriers and maximising benefitsâ€, The Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Federal Ministry of Economics and Labour and Inwent (Capacity Building International, Germany), Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Berlin, Germany, available at: http://www.oecd.org/trade/non-tariffmeasures/36223999.pdf.

Okrepilov, V. V. (2015), “Role of standardization in the sustainable development of communitiesâ€, Studies on Russian Economic Development, Vol. 26 No. 1, pp. 1–6.

Onwuegbuzie, A.J. and Leech, N.L. (2007), “Sampling Designs in Qualitative Research: Making the Sampling Process more Publicâ€, The Qualitative Report, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 238–254.

Patón-Romero, J.D., Baldassarre, M.T., Rodríguez, M. and Piattini, M. (2019), “Application of ISO 14000 to Information Technology Governance and Managementâ€, Computer Standards and Interfaces, Vol. 65, pp. 180–202.

Ramachala, N. (2013), National Quality Infrastructure: The Golden Key for Competitiveness and Sustainable Development.

Ramutsindela, M. and Mickler, D. (2020), Africa and the Sustainable Development Goals, Sustainable Development Goals Series, Springer, Cham, available at:https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14857-7.

Taifa, I.W. and Desai, D.A. (2017), “User requirements customization and attractive quality creation for design improvement attributesâ€, International Journal for Quality Research, Vol. 11 No. 1, pp. 131–148.

Taifa, I.W.R., Desai, D.A. and Bulsara, N.M. (2019), “The development of an ergonomically designed product through an integrated product team approachâ€, International Journal of Occupational Safety and Ergonomics, pp. 1–19.

Taifa, I.W.R., Hayes, S.G. and Stalker, I.D. (2020a), “Development of the critical success decision criteria for an equitable order sharing in an extended enterpriseâ€, The TQM Journal, available at:https://doi.org/10.1108/tqm-05-2019-0138.

Taifa, I.W.R., Hayes, S.G. and Stalker, I.D. (2020b), “Computer modelling and simulation of an equitable order distribution in manufacturing through the Industry 4.0 frameworkâ€, 2nd International Conference on Electrical, Communication and Computer Engineering (ICECCE), 12-13 June 2020, IEEE, Istanbul, Turkey, pp. 1–6.

The World Bank. (2018), “Quality Infrastructureâ€, The World Bank Group, available at: https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/competitiveness/brief/qi (accessed 17 September 2020).

Tralac Trade Law Centre. (2018), “News One Africa One Market – The role of standardisation in attaining sustainable development within the context of regional integrationâ€, Tralac Trade Law Centre NPC, Western Cape, South Africa, available at: https://www.tralac.org/news/article/13169-one-africa- (accessed 18 September 2020).

UNCTAD. (2015), The Continental Free Trade Area: Making It Work for Africa, United Nations Conference On Trade And Development (UNCTAD), available at: https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/presspb2015d18_en.pdf.

UNIDO. (2014), Terminal Evaluation Joint UNIDO WTO Trade Capacity Building Programme Framework for Zambia, United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), available at: https://www.unido.org/sites/default/files/2014-02/Joint_UNIDO-WTO_TCB_PF_Zambia_Final_Report.dox_0.pdf.

UNIDO. (2016), Quality Infrastructure: Building Trust for Trade, The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), Vienna, Austria, available at: https://www.unido.org/sites/default/files/2016-05/UNIDO_Quality_system_0.pdf.

Downloads

Published

2021-08-11

How to Cite

Nzumile, J. M., & Taifa, I. W. (2021). EMPERICAL ANALYSIS OF THE QUALITY INFRASTRUCTURE IN TRADE FACILITATION WITHIN THE AFRICAN CONTINENTAL FREE TRADE. Business Education Journal, 7(1). Retrieved from https://bej.cbe.ac.tz/index.php/bej/article/view/236

Issue

Section

Metrology