Sino-German Working Group on Product Safety Convened for the 3rd Time in Shanghai

On 6 June 2013, the Sino-German Working Group on Product Safety convened its 3rd annual plenary meeting in Shanghai to review its achievements over the past year and map out future plan of cooperative projects for strengthening cooperation in the field of product safety between China and Germany. The meeting was jointly hosted by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology of the Federal Republic of Germany (BMWi) on the German side, and the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People’s Republic of China (AQSIQ) and the Certification and Accreditation Administration of the People’s Republic of China (CNCA) on the Chinese side. The meeting was attended by government and industry representatives from both sides, and supported by GIZ, Shanghai Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau (Shanghai CIQ) and Chinese Academy of Inspection and Quarantine (CAIQ).

The morning session of the annual meeting, dedicated to market surveillance and product safety issues and jointly headed by Dr. Sven Halldorn, Director General, Technology Policy, BMWi and Mr. Wang Xin, Director General, Supervision on Inspection, AQSIQ, reviewed the results of the expert workshop of the Working Group, which took place in Beijing in March 2013, as well as the Five-Year Work Plan of the Working Group. The meeting also gave space for a brief introduction to China’s automobile recall system.

The afternoon session, jointly headed by Dr. Sven Halldorn, Director General, Technology Policy, BMWi and Mr. Liu Weijun, Chief Technical Supervisor, CNCA, mainly addressed the issues of certification and accreditation related to bilateral trade. Particular attention was given to voluntary certification both in Germany and China. More remarkably, a prospective Sino-German Quality Infrastructure Program, with different focuses of market surveillance and product safety as well as conformity assessment, was presented to the Working Group in both morning and afternoon sessions, which laid the ground for more sophisticated planning of the program. The program aims to harmonize quality infrastructure between Germany and China in order to eliminate technical barrier to trade, and improve the safety of products exported to each other. Commissioned by and on behalf of BMWi, GIZ will implement the program together with Chinese side.

The significant outcome of the annual meeting is that a number of project plans were approved by the Working Group, which will be implemented by GIZ, together with German and Chinese partners. In the meantime, the highlights of this event were the signing of the Five-Year Work Plan and the Sino-German Cooperation Arrangement on Certification and Accreditation. The former lays out the specific plan on organizational and implementation level under the umbrella of the Working Group for the period of next five years, which identifies a wide range of key areas for cooperation including market surveillance, safety of toy, electrical products, machinery and plant products, pressurized components in chemical facilities as well as certification and accreditation. The latter marks the official launch of cooperation mechanism on certification and accreditation between Germany and China, which will serve as the important platform for both sides to harmonize trade policy and market access measures.

The Sino-German Working Group on Product Safety was jointly founded by BMWi and AQSIQ in June 2011, aiming to strengthen the cooperation in the field of product safety between Germany and China and serving as a permanent platform for such cooperation. The implementation of projects and activities agreed by the Working Group is supported by GIZ and relevant German and Chinese partners.

The 4th annual meeting of the Working Group will be held in turn in Germany next year.