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Editor’s Note: Washington Laboratories and American TCB organized the first Conformity Assessment Conference in October 2007 in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. The conference series, co-organized with The Vietnam Directorate for Standards and Quality and attended by 250 people, focused on the status and outlook of Vietnamese standards for Foods and Electrical/Electronics equipment. A future conference is planned for Spring 2008.

Did you sneeze? Why do I ask?

Because they’re talking about you.

That’s what they say in Hanoi, anyway, when someone is talking about you, or, as we say: “Were your ears burning?” And Vietnam is talking about the world, or rather the world markets. In particular, they’re talking about trade with the United States and the market for Vietnamese goods. And they’re talking a lot. With an economy that’s growing at a rate upwards of nine percent per annum, expansion affects all sectors (benefiting most), from the development of infrastructure and an improvement in the many citizens’ standard of living, to the production of electronics to tourism. And, with all this talk is how to get products into American and international markets. And that involves meeting some criteria, specifications and requirements (Read: standards).

This article summarizes the status of the Vietnamese conformity assessment regimen and standards. There are plenty of native Vietnamese standards, too, numbering around 6000, apparently. I haven’t had the chance to read all of them. In fact, I would have a hard time understanding the titles, honestly, since my command of that rich language is about a dB above the noise floor (I know, I know, it’s impossible to expunge the “engineerese” from the engineer). But I am pleased to report that they do have familiar “standardese” embedded in the references.

Peruse the standards they are referencing: IEC, ISO 17025, ISO 65, ISO 17011. Sound familiar? They should, and this is why: Vietnam is pursuing a standards-based conformity assessment system as they become more active in international trade. For the next few moments of your time, I’d like to offer the perspective of an interested party who is straddling East and West, trying to see where the common ground might be. For all parties concerned, there is common ground in the work of product evaluation, certification and testing. And that’s good, because common ground leads to shared (shall we say “integrated”) interest, and this leads to connectedness, and this leads to common pursuits. And, in the end, this is how problems are solved.

As a country, Vietnam is developing its conformity assessment systems to be in line with much of the world, but with their own twist. The process will undoubtedly have its own “local flavor” because much of the work is being done by the government, with apparently limited participation from the private sector. The reasons for this are both historical (from their political heritage) and natural (within the context of the country’s development). There are a few reasons to explore this topic, namely, it is a study in the development of the country, and it is a topic that can be discussed against the broad framework of the conformity assessment system that has already been well-established in the developed world. We’ll examine a few of the issues and pressures that are forming this system and discuss some outlook for the Vietnamese conformity assessment system.

To develop our view of the situation in Vietnam, I propose staking out four corners of the discussion. First, let’s introduce the players in this part of the world. Second, we’ll examine what is driving the vision in the standards-setting process there. Then, something about the direction things are heading, and finally some observations about the reality of the market and the implementation of the process. Granted, like any sample, these comments are only a minor reflection of what we’ve gathered in our trips and discussions there, but what the heck, it’s going to change again in a half a year anyway (which gives us a chance to go back).

The Players
Vietnam is an integral member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which has the stated goal of accelerating trade and growth in a region that boasts a combined population of 500 million souls (roughly 25% more than the expanded European Union). Among its many other activities, ASEAN facilitates standards negotiations between the ten member countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Myanmar, Brunei and Cambodia). The goal is to have a regional common market by the year 2011.

Within the negotiations that are furthering the trade are conformity assessment processes based on standards. These standards are, at the ASEAN level, increasingly harmonized with the IEC (most notably). Vietnam will adopt the ASEAN regimen and, by default, the IEC standards. Riding on top of this regional catalyst is the influence exerted by the World Trade Organization (WTO). Vietnam’s implementation of international standards is an integral requirement of their admission into the WTO just last year. To fully comply with membership in the WTO, it is necessary that technical barriers to trade be removed so that the Vietnamese market is open and accessible. We’ll discuss a little more about that in a following section.

At this juncture, it is worth mentioning Vietnam’s goliath neighbor to the north. Without China’s rapid development (rapid is a tepid description for what is more aptly-described as revolutionary), Vietnam would most likely be in a state of much slower growth. (It’s not hard to recognize when someone in your neighborhood has a new car, and it is human nature to work harder to trade in your high mileage sedan for a new set of wheels.)

But Vietnam is not China (80+ million people compared to China’s population of 1.5 billion). Vietnam is not nearly as ethnically diverse, she has a legacy of colonialism (French) that has imparted a certain je ne sais quoi in the population (particularly in the north), and she appears (at least from this observer’s admittedly light experience) to be more measured in the implementation of development. Without any hard statistics to back up this claim, I can only suggest that the “go-go-go,” “do-it-any-cost,” “let’s-make-a-deal” attitude appears to be more restrained in Vietnam. This may change rapidly, however, as foreign direct investment continues to expand at a healthy pace, and the clamoring for project dollars increases.

Anyway, back to the players. As is common in many of these standards-making processes, there are numerous committees and groups that meet to discuss the implementation of standards in the member economies. The upshot is that the Vietnam standards-making body, the Directorate for Standards and Quality (STAMEQ), is the national authority that is charged with the responsibility of implementing the conformity assessment process. Operating under the Ministry of Science and Technology and headquartered in Hanoi with the rest of the federal agencies, STAMEQ has several organizations under its aegis, namely:

Vietnam Standards and Quality Centre (VSQC)
Quality Assurance and Testing Centre with three regional centers:
QUATEST1, QUATEST2 and QUATEST3
Vietnam Certification Centre (QUACERT)

Each of these has different roles in the development of the country’s conformity assessment system. For example, VSQC oversees the standards process and there are two types of standards that are recognized in the system: TCVNs, which are national standards (akin to ANSI, maybe) and TCCS, which are local standards issued by organizations (akin to ASTM). At the regulatory level, there are, again, two levels of regulations: national technical regulations (QCVN) and local technical regulations (QCPP).

The Vision
The vision that is driving Vietnam is illuminated by a couple of influences. Obviously, the promotion of trade and investment is paramount, and when you go there you are struck by a couple of marked and obvious conditions. First, the economy is still struggling as a developing nation, with infrastructure problems, poverty, a chaotic transportation system and a large disparity between rich and poor.

The second thing that is striking, however, is the energy that is driving people to make business happen. This is most obvious as you drive in the cities. There are small businesses everywhere and everyone seems to be busy and entrepreneurial. It’s really quite astounding, and one can observe every kind of business, from mom-and-pop office supply stores to first-rate boutiques entertainment and service businesses. So within this framework the drive to expand beyond the country is like molecules in Brownian motion in a heated teapot.

So the need to expand is there and the energy is there. The vision is easy to understand and see, particularly where there is so much manufacturing. And the key to a well-developed manufacturing sector is the availability and transparency of standards in the product development cycle. So, the need is there to update Vietnamese standards to a workable and monitored and useful system. And the people who are working on it are embedded in many different areas, most notably in STAMEQ.

The vision, as stated by STAMEQ, is to develop a conformity assessment system that conforms with the necessary provisions of the WTO. With just twenty percent of Vietnamese standards now harmonized, this leaves few precious years to get a workable number of standards in place to reduce the technical barriers to trade. Any student of what the European Union pulled off in the last 20 years is no stranger to the success that this type of regional harmonization can produce in creating a free-market system. The success of the CE marking regimen is an example of this. To be mindful of the requirements of the WTO, it is not necessary for a member nation to have fully-harmonized standards (i.e., it is acceptable to have local variations in the standards), as long as the variations can be justified, are transparent, and do not impose an unreasonable restriction on access.

The concept of Certification Bodies, based on ISO Guide 65 Accreditation, has already been implemented. Laboratories are to be accredited and nominated to the ASEAN ASEE as part of the requirement to be a national laboratory.

A curious sidebar to Vietnam’s drive to standardize their processes is imbedded in “Decision 144/2006,” under which all management offices at the state and central level must meet the requirements of ISO 9001 by the year 2010. The certificates will be issued by STAMEQ. So, not only is there a pervasive product certification drive, there is process-certification that is occurring as well.

Direction
All this gets blended together into a conformity assessment system that has the following recognizable elements:

Testing
Calibration
Verification
Declaration to standards and technical regulations
Certification
Accreditation

The notion of the conformity assessment system is to split products into two groups, labeled (naturally enough) “Group 1” and “Group 2.” Group 1 products are those that are viewed as generally non-hazardous. These products can either be “Certified” or “Self-Declared” to the standard to which they comply.

Group 2 products have some element of hazard (either from a safety point of view, or a public interest point of view) and would require certification. The objective of the structure of the program is a preventive approach to product approvals that allows manufacturers to show conformance, rather than a heavy-handed approvals regimen. This is pretty much in line with the rest of the world, so it is no surprise that this generally successful approach is to be adopted in the Vietnam conformity assessment system.

The stated end-goals of the Vietnamese conformity assessment system architects are as follows:

Remove TBTs and create a transparent, open process;
Develop production capabilities to enhance the capability of the Conformity Assessment Bodies;
Promote conformity within the context of market requirements;
Promote exports;
Integrate with international treaties;
Harmonization of customs procedures;
Optimize processes, develop clean technologies, minimizing waste and utilizing byproducts.

Currently, there are five Certification Bodies operating under STAMEQ. There are very few foreign certification bodies.

Currently, there are something on the order of 400 Certificates issued, so one can see that this is a very new process. The top two groups of “Certified” products are construction products, with the most certificates issued, followed by electrical products.

Realities
The Vietnam conformity assessment system is developing in an open manner. If you’re interested in the ongoing process in detail, it would behoove you to attend a few ASEAN meetings. (They’re held in places that may be far away, but are not hard to visit and explore, such as Bangkok, Hanoi, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, to name a few.)

Private certification bodies are unlikely in the near future. However, the discussion of Mutual Recognition Agreements (MRAs) does appear in the rhetoric. The reality of an MRA being adopted is pretty thin at this point, at least in the near future. Of course, Vietnam’s involvement under an APEC MRA bears watching, too.

For organizations that are interested in engaging in this process, opportunities, such as the Vietnam Conformity Assessment Conferences, are a good place to start. The goals of these kinds of meetings are to open up the dialogue, participate in the process, and exchange ideas of how to make the conformity assessment process beneficial for all the stakeholders. From our point of view, the market for testing and certification, although rather thin at this point, has the benefit of growing from the expansion of opportunities afforded by the government’s attention, as well as the natural growth in the overall market. However, to say that it would be easy would be a misstatement of the some of the daily difficulties of doing business in Asia.

Summary
The direction of the Vietnamese conformity assessment process is generally positive, with predictable step-by-step development of a system that is overseen by the Government. This is pretty much the China model, wherein the product certification process is strictly the domain of the government. (As a sidenote, it’s always a bit ironic to view the progress of developing nations from zero process to a fully-regulated process, that is, going from nothing to a fairly strict set of requirements).

The Vietnamese conformity assessment system vision is a fully standards-based system based on international standards via the ASEAN agreements. The Vietnamese government has to balance pressures from its WTO obligations, market forces and societal transformation while it works to mold a fair and transparent system. It’ll take time, most certainly, but the view is that the model that it has in place will eventually yield a reasonably open and transparent process. Further visits to the region are necessary and warranted.

Oh, by the way Gesundheit! Or, as they say in Vietnam… (I have to find out). n

Mike Violette is president of Washington Laboratories and director of American TCB. He can be reached at mikev@wll.com.