ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER

Our newsletter is intended as a platform for an exchange of information for all EUROLAB members. It aims at providing news on developments within the European laboratory community, their interaction with partner organisations (and other so-called "stakeholders"), on recent activities of EUROLAB as well as on relevant technical and political documents. We would like to invite you, especially the national secretariats, to contribute any useful information important for all of us.

Both meetings will kindly be organised by EUROLAB Slovakia and EUROLAB-CZ.

Workshop "Testing and the Conformity Assessment in Enlarged Europe: manufacturers and End Products Users` Expectations" (25 October 2004)
With the enlargement of Europe and the reinforced globalisation process also the conditions for conformity assessment have changed fundamentally. The workshop shall provide a platform for an open debate on these developments and future perspectives. It will focus on the implementation of New Approach Directives and the creation of networks as well as on market surveillance and consumers' expectations. We are looking forward to a stimulating exchange of experiences and will report the results in the next edition of the EUROLAB Newsletter.

Bratislava

National Members Meeting on 26 October 2004 - now with a newly structured agenda
The agenda of the coming Meeting has been modified to allow for a more open structure. Three fora are intended as an opportunity for an intensified dialogue between EUROLAB members on current topics. Short introductory presentations should stimulate the discussions. They will consider
• international developments in the fields of proficiency testing and reference materials,
• the co-operation with accreditation bodies in particular within the PLG,
• the added value of EUROLAB for its members.

Accreditation certificates and ISO 9001 - a result of the co-operation with the accreditation bodies
The discussion on the reference to ISO 9001 on accreditation certificates (we have already reported in our EUROLAB Newsletter July 2004) was revived during the last meeting of the EA / EUROLAB / EURACHEM Permanent Liaison Group (PLG) on 1 -2 June 2004. The reason was the importance of such a confirmation of fulfilment of ISO 9001 for the laboratories. EUROLAB had asked the accreditation bodies for an explanatory letter as an intermediate solution for laboratories to present to their customers until the publication of the amended ISO/IEC 17025. The PLG agreed on an English version for such a letter which has now been confirmed by the EA General Assembly.

EA members will provide accredited laboratories with such a letter which explains the relation between the quality system of a laboratory according to ISO/IEC 17025 and the principles of ISO 9001. EUROLAB appreciates this decision, but underlines that from the laboratories' point of view this is only a temporary solution. After publication of the amended standard ISO/IEC 17025 the reference to ISO 9001 must be included again in the accreditation certificates.

Refusal of additional requirement for laboratories
Another important compromise was reached during the PLG meeting concerning the character of EA documents. There was an internal debate in EA about the binding character of EA documents on e.g.§ analytical chemistry,§ microbiology,§ non destructive testing,§ sensory testing etc. EUROLAB could clarify that these documents are not mandatory for accredited laboratories but guidance defining recommended examples how to fulfil the requirements of the applicable standards. Thus additional requirements beyond the relevant conformity assessment standards (ISO 17000 series) could be avoided.

Engagement and progress in the debate on the accreditation of RM producers and PT providers
As to the international debate on the accreditation of reference materials (RM) producers and of proficiency test (PT) providers EUROLAB advocated the restriction of accreditation to conformity assessment bodies as it is foreseen e.g. in ISO/IEC 17011. EUROLAB does not support the accreditation of non-technical organisations as RM producers or PT providers, if they only act as co-ordinators of the certification process or as organisers of the PT scheme, respectively, without engaging in any technical activities. Consequently the accreditation should be based on one of the international conformity assessment standards (e.g. ISO/IEC 17020 or ISO/IEC 17025) and should additionally take into account the specific technical requirements of ISO Guide 34 or ISO Guide 43, respectively.

EUROLAB's position has been strongly supported in a letter of the European Commission, DG Enterprise, sent recently to EA. It stated that PT providers and RM producers should only be accredited if they carry out conformity assessment tasks themselves.

EUROLAB had submitted an own proposal to the ILAC General Assembly for a resolution. In line with this proposal ILAC took the following decision:

"The General Assembly resolved that accreditation of technically competent bodies producing reference materials with assigned values will be conducted against harmonized criteria based on ISO Guide 34 and ISO/IEC 17025 in combination."

EUROLAB survey on accreditation of PT providers, Sept. 2004.
Numbers of answers received per country.

In August/September 2004 EUROLAB asked the European PT providers listed in the EPTIS database (www.eptis.bam.de) for their status and form of the accreditation, their experiences and their expectations referring to future developments in this field. More than 110 questionnaires were returned (response rate 35%).

A first preliminary evaluation of the answers reveal:
•		About half of the PT providers do not plan to apply for accreditation specifically as PT provider. The majority of them is already   accredited as laboratory according to ISO/IEC 17025.
•		There is an increasing interest of the clients in accreditation, but not specifically concerning the PT organisation.
•		As to the perception of the majority of the PT providers this demand is mainly caused by the accreditation bodies.
•		The majority of PT providers do experience or expect an increase of the participation fees because of accreditation, but no   improvement regarding the quality of their PT schemes.

The final results will be published as a EUROLAB Technical Report and will be used in the future discussion with the accreditation bodies.

Status of accreditation of the PT providers

We thank our colleagues from the various national secretariats for the following information:

Austrolab
On October 20th 2004 a workshop "Cost and benefit of accreditation" was held in Vienna by Austrolab. Speakers from accreditation bodies, industry, clients and several conformity assessment bodies dealt with the increasing costs and requirements in accreditation and the low name recognition of accreditation on the market. Clients' view was an important point, especially with respect to the costs. There was also a contribution dealing with alternatives to accreditation.

EUROLAB/EURACHEM SverigeIn
May EUROLAB/EURACHEM Sverige hold a members meeting at SWEDAC's office in Stockholm (SWEDAC - The Swedish Accreditation Body). In response to an initiative of the EUROLAB/EURACHEM members SWEDAC is once a year invited to participate in a members meeting to offer the members the possibility to informally discuss common problems with SWEDAC and among the members. SWEDAC informed about its role as the Swedish accreditation body and presented ideas on how to be more efficient and to meet the customers' demands in a better way.In November the next members' meeting will take place at one of the members, IFP Research (the leading Nordic Institute for composites, fibres and textile, plastics and rubber), connected with the possibility to visit this Institute and its laboratories. At this meeting the members will have the possibility to discuss problems relevant or similar for them and current information from EUROLAB.As a result of the recruit campain in spring 2004 EUROLAB/EURACHEM Sverige has this far obtained 4 new members.

FELAB
FELAB is initiating the "Iberian Net Food and Agriculture laboratories (REDILABA)" in collaborationwith RELACRE. For the 18 November FELAB is organising the "II. Symposium FELAB, Problematic of Food and Agriculture Laboratories". Just under preparation is also the "III Laboratory Iberoamerican Congress, Cooperate for compete" that will be held on 16 and 17 March 2005 in Bilbao. The organisers are getting in touch with European and Latin American personalities.

2004-10-27	2004-10-28	Joint EA-EUROLAB-EURACHEM Working Group "Proficiency Testing in Accreditation Procedures" (EEE-PT), Berlin
2004-11-03		EUROLAB Technical Committee on Quality Assurance in Testing; Berlin
2004-11-03		Conformity Assessment Network within the EA Advisory Board, Brussels
2004-11-04		EA Advisory Board, Brussels
2004-11-24	2004-11-25	EA General Assembly, Zagreb
2004-11-25	2004-11-26	EA- EUROLAB - EURACHEM -EUROMET Permanent Liaison Group (PLG), Zagreb
2005-03-15		EURACHEM / EUROLAB /CITAC Working Group (WG) on Uncertainty from Sampling, Berlin
2005-03-16	2005-03-17	"III Laboratory Iberoamerican Congress, Cooperate for compete", organised by FELAB, Bilbao
2005-03-18		EUROLAB General Assembly, Bilbao
2005-04-07		EUROLAB Working Group on Measurement Uncertainty, Berlin

New documents available
The following documents are now available for members in the protected area of the EUROLAB Website. Please note that the first two documents may only be used as working documents for EUROLAB members when commenting on these drafts. They must not be distributed further!

•		Draft International Vocabulary of Basic and General Terms in Metrology (VIM) - 3rd Edition (April 2004)
•		ISO/IEC FDIS 17025 "General Requirements for the Competence of Testing and Calibration Laboratories" (full draft text including the amendments to facilitate the work)
•		Brochure "EA - confidence in competence"

Coming workshops
Workshop "Teaching Metrology in Analytical Chemistry", on 16-17 November 2004 in Stockholm.
This workshop - organised by the Analytical Division of the Swedish Chemical Society and Eurachem/Eurolab Sweden - addresses mainly to people teaching in this field. Topics that will be covered are for instance quality assurance, ISO 17025, traceability, validation of analytical methods, measurement uncertainty and interlaboratory tests.
http://www.chemsoc.se/sidor/KK/measurement/measurementquality.htm.

Final Project Workshop "Comparability of the Operation and Evaluation Protocols of European Proficiency Testing Schemes (COEPT)", on 8 February 2005 in 6167 LM Ede, The Netherlands.
A first circular had been sent out by the organisers - the COEPT team in cooperation with LGC and NMI -and is available at the EUROLAB website. The aim of the workshop is to discuss and disseminate the work carried out by COEPT. This European Union's 5th Framework-funded project has been designed to compare the way that PT schemes in four major disciplines within analytical chemistry (water, soil, food, occupational hygiene) operate and how they evaluate data. The outputs and conclusions from the COEPT project will be of significant value to laboratories, regulators, accreditation bodies and PT scheme providers

Third AOAC Europe -Eurachem Symposium "Legal limits on the road to food safety: establishing sound criteria for compliance decisions", on March 3 and 4, 2005, Brussels, Belgium
The symposium is intended for an audience of food and feed analysts, quality assurance managers, administrators and academia. Critical issues addressed by this symposium are: regulatory issuesand requirements, assessment of compliance, sampling and its uncertainty, use of different types of methods of analysis, qualityissues in analysis and measurement uncertainty and data tracking and tracing as part of quality control.Please note, that the deadline for submission of all abstracts will be 1 December 2004.
See http://www.eurachem.ul.pt/eventinformation/3rd_AOAC_Europe_Eurachem_Symp.pdf

CEN-STAR Policy Workshop on 'Standardisation-Related Research' on 29th November 2004, (12-5pm), at CEN, Brussels, Belgium
Sponsored by the European Commission (DG Research), the workshop has three principal objectives:
•		Provide an executive briefing on the results and conclusions of a two year project www.maxiquest.net that has been exploring barriers to integration between the research and standardisation communities
•		Allow each participating country to share and debate their experience of standardisation related research
•		Assess national interest in a proposed trans-national project to create sustainable links between the national research programmes and the CEN Technical Committees

The Policy Workshop is open to members of CEN-STAR, representatives from National Standardisation Bodies, National Research Programme Managers and European policy experts in the field.

If you would like to attend, please send your details as requested below to Fiona Robbie by fax (+44 1355 272 556) or email     mailto: workshop@maxiquest.net. Details required: Name; Job; Title; Organisation; Address; Email and Phone number