He said the media had a wider coverage and had the power to influence people’s decisions making on issues and products, and therefore urged the media to spearhead public education to ensure that the general public consumed the right standards of products.

Mr Asolmia made the appeal in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Bolgatanga, and indicated that some of the imported goods as well as some products produced in the country did not meet the required standards and was very dangerous to human health.“The consumers need to be educated on how to identify such products and avoid using them, and the media had a very critical role to play here.”

Ghana Standards Authority is an agency that promulgates Standards, promotes Standardization and undertakes Conformity Assessment activities in the country, to ensure that products or goods and services produced in Ghana and imported, whether for local consumption or for export are safe, reliable and are of good quality and meet the International Standards Organization (ISO).

Mr Asolmia asked the media fraternity, especially the radio stations to grant the GSA some free airtime to carry out their sensitization programmes to enlighten industries, government departments and agencies, importers and exporters, Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) among others on the relevance and application of standards, packaging and labelling requirements.

“I have been to some radio stations such Ura Radio, A1 Radio and Tanga Radio on several occasions to educate the public, but humans attitudes were difficult to change overnight, hence continuous and conscious efforts was needed to achieve that, and the media was very crucial in this regard,” The Regional Officer added.

He disclosed that the GSA was operating under four pillars including; Metrology, Standards, Testing and Quality Assessment, which comprised inspection and certification to ensure that goods or products produced, or imported were of acceptable quality, promoted industrial growth, enhanced sustainable development and good public governance.

 While advising the public to diligently check the quality of products before purchasing, Mr Asolmia said consumers should examine the labelling of products, and urged producers to abide by the GSA regulations and laws to ensure that before products or goods were sold to the final consumers, all the inspections and certification were done.

Mr Asolmia pledged his outfit’s commitment to ensure that high rate of substandard goods in the Region were reduced, and reminded other standards regulators such as the Food Drugs Authority, National Petroleum Authority, Energy Commission, Environmental Protection Agency among others to reinforce laws on defaulters to serve as deterrent to others who may want to venture into the same act.

He called for stronger collaboration between the GSA and the regulators to deal with substandard products from producers, importers and exporters and ensure standardization for socio-economic development and promised to impound goods that were not certified but sold on the market in the Region.

The Regional Officer urged the public to avoid patronizing used goods particularly second hand clothing such as underwear, brassier and panties, adding that these were classified as “high risk goods” and posed health hazards to the users.