PTB organizes a seminar "The role of metrology in economic and social development"

Only countries with an efficient infrastructure, in particular in the field of metrology and testing, can benefit from the increasing globalization of international relations by trade, division of labor, and investments in the production and tertiary sectors. Reliable measurements are a prerequisite for quality assurance, certification of product properties, environmental protection and the safe application of technology in all fields of everyday life. Globalization, however, also implies new challenges to those responsible for metrology, above all in developing countries and countries on the threshold of market economy.

On the PTB's initiative and in cooperation with the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM), the International Organization of Legal Metrology (OIML) and the International Metrology Confederation (IMEKO), the seminar "The role of metrology in economic and social development" will take place in Braunschweig from June 16 to 18, 1998.

Target groups of the seminar, which will be opened by a representative of the Federal Ministry of Economics (BMWi), are representatives of ministries and metrology institutes who are responsible for national metrology.

Dr. Klaus Töpfer, Executive Director of the UN Environmental Program UNEK, and representatives of the World Trade Organization, WTO, and the UN Conference on Trade and Development, UNCTAD, will report on the global programs. In other meetings, the international metrology organizations will present their working programs by which they intend to confront the global challenges. Representatives of countries which already offer adequate metrological services to their national economy or which have developed promising solutions, have been invited to report on their experience. The exchange of information and know-how can be intensified in special discussion groups. Representatives of international, regional and national donor organizations have been invited to report on their programs and to explain them by posters. The seminar will be rounded off by visits to PTB laboratories, to verification and calibration laboratories and to industrial companies in Braunschweig and its surroundings. Manufacturers of measuring instruments will show their products in the course of the seminar at the Stadthalle of Braunschweig.

The registrations received up to now - both from industry and developing countries - clearly show the great interest in this subject.

In addition to other sponsors, the event is supported by the the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.