EA organised a 2-days training on accreditation of Reference Material Producers (RMP) against ISO 17034 on 13-14 November 2019, in Roissy, France with 20 participants from 18 EA National Accreditation Bodies (NABs). The training was co-convened by J. Ruddle (UKAS, the UK NAB) and Henk Deckers (RvA, the Netherlands NAB).
The training was aimed at improving understanding of and harmonisation of assessments of ISO 17034 accredited organisations across the EA members.
Trainees ranged in expertise from those with lots of experience in the accreditation of RMPs to those who are just now looking to set up ISO/IEC 17034 accreditation programmes. Topics covered included areas such as:
- Homogeneity and Stability Testing
- Scopes of Accreditation
- Traceability
- Requirements for Certified Reference Materials (CRMs) and RMs
The training was really appreciated by trainees, who participated actively to the discussions and exercises. “From my point of view, the training was very useful, insightful and interactive. Presentations were interesting, slides and group exercises kept us all engaged. A nice refresh of key points that need to be done by NABs that accredit RMPs was made and ‘hot’ issues as differences among CRMs and RMs, metrological traceability and definitions of scopes, were extensively discussed, to reach common views. A great thanks to our trainers for their excellent work and commitment.” declared one of the participants.
Working together and sharing knowledge with a view to improve competence and achieve harmonization is one of the best ways to ensure robustness of the EA peer evaluation process and MLA.
By the end of 2018, around 57 Reference Material Producers were accredited (see EA MLA Report 2018).
EA launched the new scope of the EA MLA for the accreditation of Reference Material Producers in June. Now, there are 8 MLA signatories to RMP: ACCREDIA (Italy), CAI (Czech Republic), DakkS (Germany), ENAC (Spain), INAB (Ireland), RvA (The Netherlands), TURKAK (Turkey) and UKAS (UK).
The EA Multilateral Agreement (EA MLA) is a signed agreement between the EA Members whereby the signatories recognize and accept the equivalence of the accreditation systems operated by the signing members, and also the reliability of the conformity assessment results provided by Conformity Assessment Bodies (CABs) accredited by the signing members. It makes the objective ‘Accredited once, accepted everywhere’ effective.