Overview
The government transformed the unaccredited National Standards Laboratory (NSL) into the Liberia Standards Authority (LiSA) in August 2022. The authority provides facilities and fee-based services such as product/chemical testing, microbiological testing, metrology, technical services, and quality standards/assurance. The lab, established under the West Africa Quality Program, is part of Liberia’s efforts to remain compliant with World Trade Organization (WTO) trade protocols. LiSA provides technical services to food producing industries in Liberia to enhance the production of safe food, and trains inspectors of various government regulatory bodies. Its mandates include establishing a reliable standards framework to facilitate trade and to enforce the criteria of the International Organization for Standardization (IOS). LiSa is also part of a regional program to strengthen quality assurance systems to support competitiveness and harmonization of technical barriers to trade (TBT) and sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures in West Africa.
Standards Testing, Inspection and Certification
Liberia accepts standards developed by U.S. standards developing organizations and generally tend to favor U.S. standards. Liberia has no mutual recognition agreements with U.S. organizations on product certification, but the government accepts product standards and certification developed by the United States and other international standard organizations. Various agencies handle certifications in Liberia, depending on the product, sector, and industry. U.S. exporters have not reported that product certification is burdensome. Bureau Veritas Liberia (BIVAC) handles customs inspections. It conducts pre-shipment inspection services including verification of quality and quantity for exports. It also performs destination inspections to verify imports including customs classification and value based on documents importers provide. Several agencies handle accreditations depending on the areas of concern. For instance, the Ministry of Health and the Liberia Medicines & Health Products Regulatory Authority (LMHRA) handle health system and product accreditation. The National Commission on Higher Education, along with the Ministry of Education (https://www.moeliberia.com/ ) and the University of Liberia (UL), manage education system accreditations. The Ministry of Commerce and Industry handles accreditations of most consumer products.
Publication of Technical Regulations
BIVAC provides pre-shipment and destination inspections (PSI and DI) services for exports and imports on behalf of the Liberian government. It has published technical regulations on PSI and DI covering the threshold value and quantity of exported and imported goods: valuation, classification, risk assessment, and categories of exemptions, prohibited products, and restricted imports. The threshold value of imported goods subject to PSI and DI is US $3,500 for ocean freight and US $1,500 for airport freight and land border posts. All vehicles are subject to inspection, regardless of price. For further information, please visit BIVAC’s webpage.
Use ePing to review proposed technical regulations and conformity assessment procedures
The ePing SPS&TBT platform (https://epingalert.org/), or “ePing”, provides access to notifications made by World Trade Organization (WTO) Members under the Agreements on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) and Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), distributed by the WTO from January 16, 1995 to present. ePing is available to all stakeholders free of charge and does not require registration unless the user wishes to receive customized e-mail alerts. Use it to browse notifications on past as well as new draft and updated product regulations, food safety and animal and plant health standards and regulations, find information on trade concerns discussed in the WTO SPS and TBT Committees, locate information on SPS/TBT Enquiry Points and notification authorities, and to follow and review current and past notifications concerning regulatory actions on products, packaging, labeling, food safety and animal and plant health measures in markets of interest.
Notify U.S., operated and maintained by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) since 2003 to distribute and provide access to notifications (and associated draft texts) made under the WTO TBT Agreement for US stakeholders, has reached its end of life. Per obligation under the TBT Agreement, each WTO Member operates a national TBT (and an SPS) Enquiry Point. National TBT Enquiry Points are authorized to accept comments and official communications from other national TBT Enquiry Points, which are NOT part of the WTO or the WTO Secretariat. All comment submissions from U.S. stakeholders, including businesses, trade associations, U.S domiciled standards development organizations and conformity assessment bodies, consumers, or U.S. government agencies on notifications to the WTO TBT Committee should be sent directly to the USA WTO TBT Inquiry Point. Refer to the comment guidance at https://tsapps.nist.gov/notifyus/data/guidance/guidance.cfm for further information. This guidance is provided to assist U.S. stakeholders in the preparation and submission of comments in response to notifications of proposed foreign technical regulations and conformity assessment procedures.