The Crucial Role of Inspection Companies in Risk Management of Grain Imports to Iran
Mr. Seyedmehdi Toliat, CEO of Cotecna Inspection Company
The pre-shipment inspection process for grains, both qualitative and quantitative, is carried out directly by the inspection company in accordance with the requirements of the National Standards Organization, and inspection companies are required to use accredited laboratories with ISO17025 standards that are members of ILAC.
Therefore, all quality documents are issued by the inspection company after receiving the results from the laboratory and comparing them with national standards, and the inspection company definitely issues the documents when the test results are within the acceptance range of national standards and the customer’s request.
Regarding the IC, which is generally required by customs and banks, He added: After the IC certificate is issued, the importer uploads the certificate to the EPL system, and the inspection company must verify the authenticity of the certificate in the system. Therefore, there is practically no possibility of fraud.
Regarding COI and other quality documents required by the National Standards Organization, it should be said that after issuing quality documents, all documents are uploaded by the inspection company into the National Standards Organization’s COC system. In this regard, there is practically no possibility of fraud in the documents.
About investigating the root cause and identifying serious discrepancies in the quality or quantity of grains, such as weight loss or contamination in the grain loading and unloading process, the CEO of Cotecna Inspection Company said: It is not the inspection company’s job to identify the root cause of the problem. As soon as the inspection company observes any discrepancy with the relevant standards or the contract between the buyer and the seller, it reports the matter to the stakeholders so that they can take the necessary corrective action. If the corrective action taken does not resolve the problem or if corrective action is not possible, the shipment will be immediately rejected and no quality certificate will be issued for the shipment.
