NIGERIA – The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) has developed a standard specification for dry beans following numerous rejections at the international market, reports This Day.
SON is looking to aid in acceptance of the commodity based on international standards by developing new ones, reviewing of existing ones, and adoption of international, continental and regional standards.
The agency has also developed codes and guidelines across the value-chain to allow Nigeria be competitive and relevant in the global trade.
“We have developed a standard specification for dry beans, and we did not stop there because specification is just a document because along the value chain, things have to be done well for us to get the end product acceptable anywhere in the world,” said Director-General, SON, Osita Aboloma.
“We have developed codes and guidelines for planting beans and that entails the kind of soil to use to plant beans and agricultural chemicals that need to be applied, and how they should be applied.
We have also developed standards for harvesting and transportation in order not to get their products contaminated.”
The UK rejected vegetables and other edibles exported from Nigeria due to failure to meet up with international procedures.
Similar incidences were witnessed when some consignment of yam exported to the United States, were also rejected due to poor quality.
According to Director, Standards Development, Chinyere Egwuonwu, SON has developed over 500 standards that have been approved for use in industry and commerce within Nigeria and the international community.
The standards cut across various economic sectors with a lot focus on the agro and allied sector, manufacturing, processing, African traditional medicine, human resources management, tourism to mention a few.
“Most recently, SON governing council approved another set of 339 standards for use in Nigeria.
Of this number, 85 were newly developed, 31 were existing standards that were reviewed while the rest 223 were adopted international, continental and regional standards as Nigeria Industrial Standards,” he said.
