The Director-General of the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Osita Aboloma has urged Nigerians in the agricultural sector to incorporate Quality Management System (QMS) and standardisation in all the stages of their agricultural practices.
This is to enable Nigeria’s agricultural products to compete favourably in the global marketplace.
Aboloma made the call on Thursday in Lokoja during a general sensitisation on ISO 9001 Quality Management on new Agro-allied Standards organised for stakeholders in the North Central Zone.
Represented by a SON Deputy Director, Dr Marline Waziri, Aboloma noted that the implementation of QMS in the agricultural sector is a useful tool in adding quality and credibility to goods and services that will meet the expectations of internal and external customers.
He said the workshop was in furtherance of the collaboration of SON with stakeholders in ensuring that production, manufacturing, sales and distribution of products and services are done in line with national and international best practices to ensure continuous customer satisfaction, environmental friendliness and safeguard lives and properties.
According to him, with the focus of the present administration on diversification into agriculture, there was the need for all the players in the sector to continue to improve on the quality of their products to gain international acceptance.
Earlier in a welcome address, Kogi State Coordinator of SON, Engr. Olalekan Omoniyi said in view of the competition in the international market, there was need for Nigerian industrialists and operators in both the organised private sector and public institutions to carry out their transactions smoothly by deploying the instrumentality of Quality Management System, which ensures that all requirements are identified and incorporated into production.
He said the essence of the awareness workshop was to acquaint the participants with knowledge of global best practices and ensure a paradigm shift from the old ways of doing things so that Nigeria would become an “irresistible and prominent global market player” in the sector.