Dr. Mary Gordon, the CEO of National Bureau of Standards. Photo credit: NBS

The Chief Executive Officer of South Sudan National Bureau of Standards has complained to the Vice President for Economic Cluster Dr. James Wani Igga that her institution is being underfunded since its establishment.

This, Dr. Mary Gordon says poses a threat to its mandate including protecting consumers from the intake of substandard products.

In this year’s budget the Bureau was allocated 133, 288,163 South Sudanese pounds which she described as insufficient.

Mrs. Gordon believes an increase in the budget provision would help in unravelling some of the encounters facing her institution.

“As an institution we are not being funded properly to do the work as we are supposed to do, for-instance in the area of standardization, quality assurance that involve inspection and testing”, Mary Gordon spoke to the media on Tuesday after meeting Dr. James Wani Igga in Juba.

“We are supposed to be given enough budget to do the work to get result, you can’t have result when you don’t have equipment”, she stated.

Last year, the body revealed that the country is feeding on substandard foods due to its inability to examine imported goods.

Mary Gordon disclosed that this has been happening because her institution lack the resources to protect South Sudan from harmful products.

The country rely entirely on Kenya and Uganda for all of its imports.

Tomatoes, onions, maize flour, rice, cooking oil, dairy products and beans are some of the food items still being imported from neighboring countries.