Moldovan Parliament passed in the first reading the draft Law on Market Surveillance and Product Compliance to implement EU norms in this area.
In particular, the list of non-food products subject to technical regulations under the EU legislation will be expanded. Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Economic Development and Digitalization Dumitru Alaiba said earlier that this is a very important bill aimed at protecting the rights of consumers, and national legislation in the field of market surveillance will be brought into line with EU legislation. The document will improve the functioning of the market and strengthen the supervision of the market. The new law will ensure that only compliant products that meet the requirements and provide an increased level of protection of public interests, such as health and safety at work, consumer protection, protection of the environment and public safety and any other public interests protected by the relevant legislation, will have access to the market. The draft law provides tools to ensure compliance of manufactured non-food products, including in the Internet trade, expands the list of economic agents (manufacturer, importer, authorized representative) responsible for the release of products on the market. In addition, the document also provides for the expansion of market surveillance from 27 to 55 areas/categories of products (product categories). According to the draft law, the State Inspectorate for Supervision over Non-Food Products and Consumer Protection will be defined as a single liaison office that will facilitate administrative assistance and cooperation between market surveillance authorities. A framework for cooperation with economic operators is envisaged; implementation of a national information and communication system for market surveillance to collect, process and store information on all market surveillance activities. In particular, in order to obtain more efficient assistance and cooperation with economic operators, a national digital portal will be developed, which will facilitate online access to information, administrative procedures and support services for citizens and economic operators in Moldova. The portal will provide access to the "Your Europe" platform (Europa ta), managed by the European Commission. The document also stipulates that a national market surveillance program will be drawn up every 8 years. // 26.05.2023 - InfoMarket.
