Govt should cap charges of product testing under quality control order

Gtri report

The government should cap testing charges for routine industrial products as high costs to comply with quality control orders (QCOs) may impact the country's manufacturing and small importers, think tank GTRI said on Tuesday.

While the QCO policy aims to improve product quality and consumer safety, the pace of expansion is putting pressure on testing infrastructure and has created significant compliance bottlenecks for MSMEs, the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) said.

"India's expanding quality control regime is imposing such high testing and certification costs that many MSME importers may be pushed out of business, leaving the market increasingly dominated by large importers," GTRI Founder Ajay Srivastava said.

The charges arise under the Foreign Manufacturers Certification Scheme (FMCS) of the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), under which foreign manufacturers of products covered by India's Quality Control Orders have to obtain BIS certification before exporting to India.