THE BUREAU of Standards' National Quality Awards (NQA), which aims to recognise businesses that demonstrate excellence in the production of their goods, was launched earlier this week in Kingston.
Through the award programme, manufacturers will benefit due to the acknowledgement and encouragement of efforts to ensure proper quality systems are in place in their companies.
The NQA ceremony will be held on October 14, this year, which will be celebrated as World Standards Day.
The focus of the programme is to create a national medium of business excellence, sensitising companies to the merits of quality systems, and motivating companies to achieve and maintain high standards.
Large manufacturers with more than 100 employees, small and medium enterprises with between 25 and 100 persons, as well as cottage industries employing less than 25 employees, can vie for the award. For the cottage industry category, 50 per cent of a company's raw material must be indigenous to Jamaica.
The NQA programme will emphasise organisational, customer and human resource focuses, as well as process management and business results.
Speaking at the launch yesterday, Dr. Omer Thomas, executive director of the Bureau of Standards, said the launch of the NQA is an expression of the relationship the agency continues to nurture as it discharges its responsibilities. He added that the agency was heartened that private sector companies now realise that the Bureau of Standards was in partnership with them to maintain standards and promote excellence.
"No company can predicate its viability on production for the local market by paying scant attention to price, quality, efficiency, health and safety considerations, as well as the demands of an increasingly knowledgeable and discerning consumer," Mr. Thomas said.
Also making his address, Reginald Budhan, director of policy in the Ministry of Commerce, Science, and Technology, who represented Minister Phillip Paulwell, said the Ministry recognises that sustained growth and development can be realised only with continued improvements in efficiency and productivity levels in the Jamaican economy.
"In the context of the rapid changes taking place in today's highly competitive global markets, only innovators will survive," he said. "Those who compete solely on the basis of price are more likely to fail."
Mr. Budhan said the only basis for achieving and sustaining business competitiveness is continuous innovation and change. He added that the development of creative, competitive industries will form the basis to diversify Jamaica's economy from the current dominance of a few
sectors.
