The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

AT least $2 million has been secured for the construction of a Bahamas Bureau of Standards (BBS) building and for equipment, the bureau’s acting director said yesterday.

Speaking at the Rotary Club of West Nassau yesterday, Dr Renae Ferguson-Bufford noted that a preliminary location for the bureau had been identified and that nine persons would be employed with the bureau in the first phase.

Dr Ferguson-Bufford noted that various sources have pledged funding to the proposed Bahamas Bureau of Standards through grants to assist in mobilisation efforts. Total funding is expected to come from various projects and grants.

“We have not had standards in The Bahamas on a national level,” Dr Ferguson-Bufford said.

“The bureau will provide that and benefit the country on a national level. We have to question a lot of the substandard products that we have seen enter The Bahamas.”

The Government is moving to establish standards across a variety of industries.

The initiative will require companies joining technical committees to look at how the Bahamas can establish what will eventually become legally-enforced standards relating to issues such as production processes, packaging and more.

“We will have national standards that will either be implemented or adopted by The Bahamas Bureau of Standards,” said Dr Ferguson-Bufford, noting that the bureau will be a statutory body made up of five divisions and governed by a national standards council. That council will be made up of both public and private sector members.

Dr Ferguson-Bufford noted that the bureau was moving ahead with the creation of technical committees such as one to focus on bottled water standards in The Bahamas, in the form of a code of hygiene for handling water and labeling.

The BBS has now taken its standards campaign to the Family Islands.