IT and ICT Standardization in

Pakistan

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 Pakistan Standards & Quality Control Authority

Conformity assessment (i.e., testing, calibration, inspection, system certification and product certification) is any activity
related to the verification of conformance to a standard. Standardization refers to both standards development and conformity assessment activities.
 Introduction
• Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority, under the Ministry
of Science and Technology, is the national standardization body.
• It develops Pakistan Standards in the areas of Food, Agriculture,
Chemical, Civil Engineering, Electronics, Electro-technical,
Mechanical, Textile, Weights and Measures, and Information
Technology.
• PSQCA is not-for-profit and self-sustained organization
• The main function of the Authority is to foster and promote
standards and conformity assessment as a means of advancing the
national economy, promoting industrial efficiency and development,
ensuring the health and safety of the public, protecting the consumers,
facilitating domestic and international trade and furthering
international co-operation in relation to standards and conformity
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assessment.
 What is standard?
• Document, established by consensus and
approved by a recognized body, that provides,
for common and repeated use, rules,
guidelines or characteristics for activities or
their results, aimed at the achievement of the
optimum degree of order in a given context.
(From ISO/IEC Guide 2:2004 Standardization
and related activities-General Vocabulary)
 Who develops the Standards?
National Standards Committees and Technical Standards
Committees of experts from a wide range of
representative interest groups work to formulate or
revise standards.
Committee members represent:
- Consumer and end-user interests;
- Government: Federal and Provincial;
- Commercial and retail interests;
- Research, academic and testing organizations;
- Professional bodies;
- Manufacturers and industry.
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 National Standard Committees of SDC, PSQCA

1. Agriculture
2. Foods
3. Civil Engineering.
4. Chemical.
5. Electronics
6. Electrotechnical.
7. Mechanical.
8. Textile.
9. Weights and Measures.
10. Information/Communication Technology
11. Hospitals and Healthcare Facilities
 How are the Standards developed?
- Committee discuss and debate, towards consensus
- 70% agreement is required
- PSQCA is a neutral facilitator
- PSQCA has no power to influence or vote

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ISO and IEC Standards Development
ISO: 162 Members: 107 Member
Bodies (full voting rights on any
PSQCA is Pakistan’s member of the technical committee and policy
committee of ISO), 45 Correspondent
International Organization for Members, 10 Subscriber members
Standardization (ISO) and the IEC: Full Members 60, Associate
members 21)
International Electrotechnical Commission
(IEC).
1 vote
1 vote
Development Phases
• Preliminary stage :Study
: items for future work)
 Proposal stage : Vote on proposal for new work
 Preparatory stage: Drafting
D work by experts in a WG
 Committee stage: Reconciling national consensus 1 vote
positions
 Enquiry stage: DIS vote – public enquiry
ISO Technical Committees: 263
 Approval stage: FDIS vote on text edited by ISO (disbanded approx 42)
 Publication stage P member: 23
O member: 147 8
IEC : TCs 95
 Extent of ISO System (cont.)
S S
U U
G G

S
U S
G U
G
S
U
G

SUPPLIERS
Users
Government
& Academia
One Country: One Vote
 Trade Associations
Trade associations and professional societies typically bring together companies and
individuals who are like-minded, who have the same product or engineering interest,
or are involved in the same profession. Participation in standards development
through a trade association can helps to:
• Support and enhance your industry or profession
• Educate industry and government stakeholders
• Provide customers with better products and services
• Improve the bottom-line – standards participation is a business tool
• Influence the content and manage the impact of a standard
• Improve Pakistani industry competitiveness by sharing new standards technology with
the industry
• Open international markets to Pakistani industry by participating in international
standardization
• meetings where ISO, IEC, ASTM standards are being drafted.

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Risk of Non-participation
Benefits of Early Participation
 PROCESS OF PAKISTAN STANDARD

Proposal Technical
Accepted Committee
Pakistan Standard
Circulation
National
Standards of Draft
Committee PSS
Comments published

Evaluation Standard
Technical
Approved
Committee
PSQCA
Director
Final Draft General
Proposal National
Standards Standard
Committee Finalized
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 Drafting Pakistan Standards in accordance with ISO/IEC
Directives and Guides
 ISO/IEC Directive part I and II
 ISO/IEC Guide 37, Instructions for use of products of consumer interest
 ISO/IEC Guide 51, Safety aspects — Guidelines for their inclusion in standards
 ISO Guide 64, Guide for addressing environmental issues in product standards
 ISO/IEC Guide 59. Code of Good Practice for Standardization
 ISO/IEC Guide 21-1 Regional or national adoption of International Standards and other
 International Deliverables —Part 1: Adoption of International Standards
 ISO/IEC Guide 21-1Regional or national adoption of International Standards and other International
Deliverables — Part 2: Adoption of International Deliverables other than International Standards
 ISO Guide 76, Development of service standards — Recommendations for addressing consumer
issues
 ISO/IEC Guide 72, Guidelines for the justification and development of management system
standards
• ISO/IEC Guide 74 Graphical symbols — Technical guidelines for the consideration of consumers'
needs
ISO/IEC Guide 21-Adoption of ISO Deliverables

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ISO/IEC Guide 21 Content

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Adopted Standards-Degree of correspondence

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Adopted Standards Numbering

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Adopted Standards Dating

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 ISO/IEC JTC 1
Information Technology Standards


JTC 1 is the standards development environment where
experts come together to develop worldwide Information
and Communication Technologies (ICT) standards for
business and consumer applications. Additionally, JTC 1
provides the standards approval environment for
integrating diverse and complex ICT technologies.

There are 2527 published JTC1 standards developed by
some 2100 technical experts.
Way Forward: If you want to get involved in the work of JTC1
you must contact with PSQCA.
 ISO/IEC Information Technology
Task Force (ITTF)
• The ITTF is responsible for the day-to-day
planning and coordination of the technical
work of JTC 1 relative to IEC and ISO, and
supervises the application of the ISO and IEC
Statutes and Rules of procedure.
Scope:

Standardization in the field of information technology.

Total number of published ISO standards related to the TC and its SCs (number includes updates): 2527

Number of published ISO standards under the direct responsibility of JTC 1 (number includes
341
updates):

Participating countries: 37

Observing countries: 54

ISO committees in liaison:

TC 37, TC 46, TC 46/SC 4, TC 68/SC 2, TC 154, TC 171, TC 184, TC 204

Total: 08

IEC committees in liaison:

IEC/TC 45, IEC/TC 100

Total: 02
JTC 1 - Information technology
Subcommittees/Working Groups:

Subcommittee/Working Group Title

Planning
JTC 1/SWG 3
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

SWG - Directives
JTC 1/SWG 2
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Accessibility (SWG-A)
JTC 1/SWG 1
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Tools
JTC 1/AHG 3
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Structure
JTC 1/AHG 2
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Incubator
JTC 1/AHG 1
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Corporate Governance of IT
JTC 1/WG 6
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

Sensor networks
JTC 1/WG 7
The convener can be reached through the secretariat

JTC 1/SC 2 Coded character sets

JTC 1/SC 6 Telecommunications and information exchange between systems

JTC 1/SC 7 Software and systems engineering

JTC 1/SC 17 Cards and personal identification

Programming languages, their environments and system software

JTC 1/SC 22
interfaces
JTC 1/SC 23 Digitally Recorded Media for Information Interchange and Storage

JTC 1/SC 24 Computer graphics, image processing and environmental data representation

JTC 1/SC 25 Interconnection of information technology equipment

JTC 1/SC 27 IT Security techniques

JTC 1/SC 28 Office equipment

JTC 1/SC 29 Coding of audio, picture, multimedia and hypermedia information

JTC 1/SC 31 Automatic identification and data capture techniques

JTC 1/SC 32 Data management and interchange

JTC 1/SC 34 Document description and processing languages

JTC 1/SC 35 User interfaces

JTC 1/SC 36 Information technology for learning, education and training

JTC 1/SC 37 Biometrics

JTC 1/SC 38 Distributed application platforms and services (DAPS)

JTC 1/SC 39 Sustainability for and by Information Technology

 National Mirror Committee
National Mirror committee— mirror group to
the ISO/IEC/OIML/CAC work

 Comment on Working Draft (WD) and Committee Draft (CD) of International

Standards;
 Vote on proposal from International Standards; DIS and
FDIS
 Forward proposals to national interested parties and collect their comments
 Nominate the national delegation to Technical Committee
/ Sub-committee / working group meeting
 National Mirror Committee
How National Mirror Committee in Pakistan can link to International
Standards Development Process

Chairman
Chairman
Secretariat
Secretariat
Test houses
FF BR
BR
R International
International
Consumer R Standards
s D Standards ZA
D Development ZA
SS Development
Process
Process
Pakistan
Pakistan ??
?? CA
CA
Industry at
atISO/IEC/
ISO/IEC/
OIML/CAC
OIML/CAC
IT
IT Technical JP
JP
Authorities Technical
Committee
Committee
NL
NL SS
NGO:s Other EE
IND
IND IL
s GB
GB IL
 Way Forward for NSC-
Technical Committees
• Automatic Data Capture TC
• Biometric TC
• Cards & Personal Identification TC
• Construction Industry IT Standards TC
• eFinancial Services TC
• Green Information Technology TC
• Health Informatics TC
• Information Exchange TC
• IT Governance TC
• Intelligent Transport Systems TC
• Learning Standards TC
• Multimedia Representation TC
• Security and Privacy Standards TC
 Automatic Data Capture Technical
Committee (ADCTC)
• Scope
• Automatic Identification & Data Capture
(AIDC) standards, in particular bar codes and
radio frequency identification (RFID) related
to item identification and progressing.
 IT Governance Technical Committee (ITGTC)

• Scope
• The aim of the new IT Governance TC is to
advance the development of, generate
awareness in, encourage the adoption of and
contribute to IT Governance Standards, with
the aim of establishing Singapore as a
practice-leader in effective IT Governance
directed to enhancing business value of IT
 What is regulation?
Document, providing binding legislative rules,
that is adopted by an authority. ((From
ISO/IEC Guide 2:2004 Standardization and
related activities-General Vocabulary)
 Methods of Incorporating Standards
into Law
Standards may be incorporated into law in several ways:
➤ incorporated directly into statutes (i.e. the statute
reproduces the wording of the standard)
➤ incorporated by reference into statutes (i.e. the statute
refers to a particular standard, but does not reproduce the
wording of the standard)
➤ reproduced directly in regulations (e.g. building codes)
➤ incorporated by reference into regulations (e.g. PSQCA
SROs on Mandatory items, the Transportation Standards by
reference numerous domestic and international standards)
➤ used as guidelines to elaborate rules found in statutes or
regulations.
 PSQCA
AND
REGIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

1. SAARC Regional Standards Organization (SARSO).

2. Regional Institute for Standards, Conformity, Accreditation and Metrology
(RISCAM) under ECO.

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 PSQCA’s GLOBAL AFFILIATION
The PSQCA has signed various MOU’s & MRA’s with several international organizations for
cooperation in the fields of Science & Technology, Standardization, Quality
Assurance/Management, Product Certification and exchange of technical information,
human resource development and capacity building:
• Islamic Republic of Pakistan and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
• PSQCA and Turkish Standards Institution (TSE).
• MoU signed between PSQCA and ASTM International, USA.
• MoU signed between PSQCA and ANSI.
• MoU signed between PSQCA and DiN Germany
• MoU between PSQCA and Bangladesh Standards and Testing Institution (BSTI)
• MoU between PSQCA and Yeman Authority for Specification, Standardization and
Quality Control
• MoU between PSQCA and Sultanate Oman Standards Authority (Approved by
PSQCA’s BoD)
• MoU between PSQCA and Institute of Standards and Industrial Research (Approved by
PSQCA’s BOD and Cabinet)
• South Asian Regional Standards Organization of SAARC (MRA)
• Regional Institute of Standards, Conformity Assessment and Accreditation of ECO
member States (MRA)
• MoU between PSQCA and SIRIM Malaysia (In progress)
 Pakistan Standards Strategy
• Wider adoption of Pakistan Standards in
technical regulations
• Development of sector-specific strategies responding
to market and social needs
• Ensuring Stakeholder participation and support for
standardization at regional, international and country
levels
• International Standardization
• Timely delivery of Pakistan Standards that meet the
current and future needs of stakeholders
• Awareness and usage of Pakistan Standards
Questions?

Interested
Contact me:
e-mail [email protected]
[email protected]
Phone: 0333 4368092 35