DOCUMENTS Country Report Expertise Centre COUNTRY REPORT 2006 - 2007

1.3    Testing, certification and inspection

The number of Turkish conformity assessment bodies is steadily increasing. There are a large number of public laboratories in Turkey and the Ministries often have their own inspectorates in the 81 provinces of Turkey. These public services have become very important in establishing the Turkish market surveillance system. A lot of testing laboratories also exist in the private sector. Manufacturers working on the export market often have in-house laboratories. TSE continues to play a dominant role in product testing and certification, although the total number of test reports issued by TSE has been decreasing over the last years due to removal of mandatory standards.

The System Certification market in Turkey has grown rapidly over the last years, now reaching 110 certification bodies and around 20 000 certificates, however, still with confidence problems.

Product certification is limited in Turkey with TSE as the major supplier. After the implementation of the CPD, Construction products directive, the Ministry of Public Works and Settlement will introduce a G-mark (G standing for safety in Turkish) as a product certification mark for standards not requiring CE-marking.

There are only 3 organisations in Turkey accredited by TÜRKAK for certification of persons, amongst which TSE contributes to a rapidly growing market.

Turkey needs Notified Bodies, NBs, to achieve an efficient market in line with the EU principles. The process towards Turkish NBs has been problematic and slow, but has recently started to give results. TSE, Turkish Cement Manufacturers’ Association (TCMB) and Türk Loydu have been accepted by the EU Commission and granted their NB numbers. Further potential NBs are awaiting the outcome of their applications. The lists of potential NBs show totally 16 organisations listed as competent. If the process is successful, these will cover a total scope of 17 directives. For most directives the Turkish potential seems promising, especially considering that NBs do not need to have their own testing facilities.

The databases on conformity assessment bodies that have been started should be finalised and combined to simplify an overview and to provide assistance to the market.

Turkish conformity assessment bodies are getting organised to protect their rights and interests. UDDer has been set up as an association to set policy and vision on the overall quality infrastructure and will replace the Conformity Assessment Board as a non-governmental organisation (NGO) representing all stakeholders in the Turkish quality infrastructure both in private and public sectors. It will have members from conformity assessment bodies, representatives from TÜRKAK, representatives from TSE and from metrology institutions. TURKLAB continues to grow in both the number of members and range of activities. Both organisations need to strengthen their role and position in the Turkish quality infrastructure.

Turkey has made a good start on its market surveillance activities. However, there are differences between ministries on how far they have developed their market surveillance and there is still a lot to be done. The volume of market surveillance has increased substantially from 2004 till 2006 and the number of non-compliant products has decreased. Turkey has still not got full access to information through the RAPEX system, but uses information openly available over Internet.

Products under the implemented EU directives, with CE marking and a manufacturer’s declaration, have free access to the Turkish market. The technical files are checked for imported products with specific Turkish requirements. The market surveillance activities are at the moment concentrated to products with certain safety risks. One problem that does not seem to be solved yet is the entry of products from third countries without CE marking into the Turkish market through EU member ports, with a transit certificate. The rules of the EU system do not allow Turkey to prevent those products entering its market as this would go against the free circulation of goods. Turkey’s only chance is to detect these during market surveillance. It is recommended that this problem is solved through bilateral mechanisms between competent authorities of Turkey and involved EU countries. It is also important that importers take their responsibility in stopping non-compliant products from entering Turkey.

DTM is implementing the EU documents under its umbrella responsibility. Most of these are in place and others, such as Council Directive no. 2001/95 on General Product Safety, in progress. The Market Surveillance Coordination Board has set up an action plan and its members are connected to an information network. The responsible authorities have put their regulations in place.

The Law on Consumer Protection was amended in June 2003 and consumer organisations are represented in a council under the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MIT), General Directorate for Protection of consumers and competition. The progress in the work of consumer organisations during the last years includes mandatory information on consumer rights in schools and on TV.

Further awareness campaigns are needed to improve both manufacturers’ and consumers’ knowledge on CE-marking, the need of domestic CE-marking and to eliminate the misunderstanding of CE-marking as a quality mark.