The eastern coastal city of Qingdao, Shandong province has been ramping up efforts to boost its certification and inspection industry to facilitate the modern industrial economy.

The city has accelerated the construction of a national-level industry cluster for testing and certification services as part of its efforts to bolster international cooperation in promoting mutual recognition of standards to reduce repetition in testing and certification of products and services.

Design effect drawing of the Qingdao International Inspection and Testing Certification Center [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The Qingdao International Inspection and Testing Certification Center plans to build an industrial park for rail transit, automobile manufacturing, electronic information, precision machinery inspection and testing in its western zone so as to facilitate the industrial development of the Qingdao National High-tech Industrial Development Zone.

It will also build a park for inspection and testing of new materials, biomedicine, pesticides, energy conservation and environmental protection, and light industrial products in the central area to boost the development of related industries. In the eastern zone, a food and agricultural products inspection and testing park will be built.

The center is presently home to about 236 agencies that provide testing, inspection and certification services (TIC). These agencies generate a total output value exceeding 1 billion yuan ($152.1 million).

The center has also reached cooperation agreements with more than 10 prominent global enterprises in TIC, including SGS, Bureau Veritas, Eurofins Scientific, Centre Testing International Group, Pony Testing International Group, and Su Shi Testing Group.

In addition, the Chinese Institute of Inspection and Quarantine, the National Institute of Metrology, the National Institute of Standardization, the National Center of Ocean Standards and Metrology and other national-level institutes have opened branches at the center.

The center will continue its efforts to promote international exchanges and cooperation in certification and testing so as to facilitate trade and help achieve universal recognition of standards and certification.

It will work to attract more international leading providers of testing and inspection services to increase the efficiency of imports and exports, reduce business operational costs and enable a deeper cooperation and development for international trade.