“I would like to thank all of our partners again and to assure them of our commitment to the success of our current and future cooperation projects.”1 With this conclusion, the Tunisian Minister of Industry, Mines, and Energy (MIME), Fatma Thabet Chiboub, inaugurated the two new Tunisian-German projects “Strengthening the quality infrastructure for a sustainable economic development in Tunisia” (IQ.DED) and “Strengthening the quality infrastructure for green hydrogen in Tunisia” (IQ.H2V). During the following 1.5 days, the PTB project team used this occasion to discuss the strategic planning of the IQ.DED project together with its political and implementing partners.
With her speech, the minister concluded the opening ceremony, during which project coordinator Franziska Schindler had presented the scope of the projects. PTB can look back on a long-standing history of commitment in the Maghreb including Tunisia. The new projects are conceived in a way that they can directly build on the achievements of the previous projects “Developing expertise in quality assurance for the export sector I+II” (2014-2024) and “Strengthening the quality infrastructure for photovoltaics I+II” (2016-2024).
In addition, they conform with the guidelines of the national industry and innovation strategy as well as the strategy for generating green hydrogen of Tunisia, as the representatives responsible of the Direction Générale de l’Infrastructure Industrielle et Technologique (DGIIT) and the Direction Générale de l’Electricité et de la Transition Energétique (DGETE) emphasized. Especially in the field of green hydrogen, Belhassen Chiboub, Director General of the DGETE, is expecting initial challenges that can only be met with an efficient national quality infrastructure. This offers great opportunities for the Tunisian economy and its workforce. Ourida Chalwati, representative of the DGIIT, considers the quality infrastructure an important foundation for sustainable economic growth in Tunisia.
Samuel Germain, Deputy Head of Cooperation at the German Embassy in Tunis, and the Tunisian Minister of Industry, Mines, and Energy also took the opportunity to express their thanks about the long-standing and close Tunisian-German cooperation. The minister also emphasized her gratefulness for the long strategic partnership with PTB.
In order to turn words into actions, the project team started to go into the strategic planning of the IQ.DED project directly afterwards. The first important steps were to get a joint understanding of the steering and impact structure as well as to clarify essential questions concerning the overall project and its objectives. In addition, the assembled partner institutions pooled their ideas and found new ways to implement the project components. By the end of the QI workshop, the participants had agreed upon the next important steps.
We would like to thank the organization team and all participants for their strong commitment as well as Mourad Turki for his professional moderation.
Cover image © Henrik Berberich
