Kinshasa, May 22nd, 2021 (CPA).– The president of the Association for the Promotion of Metrology and Standardization (APROMEN), Bertin Ntumba, indicated on the occasion of the World Metrology Day celebrated on May 20 of each year, that there are shortcomings in the metrology sector in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
He cited in particular the existence of incomplete legislation characterized by outdated texts namely the Royal Decree of 1910 and other outdated texts It also denounces a very weak and inconsistent practice given the current challenges of economic integration, modernization and emergence characterized in particular by: The use in everyday trade of inadequate tools and references such: Sakombi; Mupiku, Ekolo, Turbo, Sac. Mr Bertin Ntumba also alluded to the almost generalized flat-rate invoicing of basic foodstuffs such as water and electricity, before adding that the proposal for the Law on Metrology and Standardization adopted by the Senate since 2014 is still pending at the National Assembly.
For this expert in Metrology, this situation tarnishes the image of national trade and constitutes a source of conflict and a brake on national, regional and international integration as well as sustainable development. To overcome this, APROMEN has decided several years ago to organize training on the fundamentals of Metrology and Standardization in Kinshasa with the ambition of extending it to the interior of the country. According to him, this day is placed this year under the theme « Measuring for health » and also marks the anniversary of the signing of the Meter Convention in 1875, he said, specifying that metrology, considered to be the science of measurement and its applications, it enables any manufacturer or any company to master the measurement process.
For Mr. Bertin Ntumba, the objective pursued by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures « BIPM » and the International Organization of Legal Metrology « OIML » in choosing this theme is to make the international community aware of the important role that measurement plays. in the health, and therefore in the well-being of each of us. For him, any measurement carried out in relation to health obeys predefined methods both for common cases such as the temperature of the human body, heart rate, arterial pressure and the dosage of the active principle in drugs as well as more complex ones such as determination of x-ray doses, medical imaging devices, vaccine reliability, etc. « No one can imagine a world without a balance to evaluate the masses, without a thermometer to measure the temperature, without laboratories, without measuring instruments in industries to ensure the quality of work and products », declared the president of the ‘Apromen. ACP/