For Old JIS Marks Certified Factories and Business Entities Intending to Obtain Certification Afresh

Points

The New JIS Mark Certification Scheme started on October 1, 2005.
In order to use new JIS certified marks, JIS factories under the Old Industrial Standardization Act (hereinafter referred to as “old certified JIS factories”) are also required to newly obtain certification from an accredited certification body.
For Q&A regarding Transition, see this (PDF3,063KB).
Pamphlet “New JIS Mark Scheme” is available here （PDF4,498KB）.

1. Certification under the New JIS Mark Certification Scheme

(1) It is only business entities (manufacturers set forth in (4) below) certified by a certification body accredited by the government that can affix JIS marks to their products.
For procedures for acquiring respective certification, make inquires at accredited certification bodies that provide certification services. Information on accredited certification bodies is available from the List of the Accredited Certification Bodies.

(2) Accredited certification bodies carry out examinations based on the “applicable JIS,” the “Ministerial Ordinance of the Industrial Standardization Act” specified by the government, and the separately established original “certification procedures specified by accredited certification body.”

(3) Accredited certification bodies establish and publicize their original “certification procedures.” The government specifies basic requirements to be met by accredited certification bodies when establishing their original certification procedures and publicizes them as the “Ministerial Ordinance of the Industrial Standardization Act.”

(4) The scheme covers manufacturers or processors (domestic and foreign), importers (domestic), retailers (domestic), and exporters (foreign).

(5) In order to ensure the credibility of the scheme, the government requires accredited certification bodies to take procedures to renew their accreditation periodically (every four years), conducts their accreditation through collecting reports and carrying out on-site inspections, issues orders to make improvements to their certification service, and rescinds accreditation as necessary.
Accredited certification bodies carry out periodical certification maintenance examinations on each certified business entity (at least once every three years) and also carry out occasional certification maintenance examinations as necessary. The government collects reports from each certified business entity or conducts on-site inspections as needed, and when any problems are detected with regard to product quality, etc., it takes measures such as “removal or deletion of labeling” or “suspension of sales.” However, each designated certification body is authorized to rescind certification.

2. Notes for Old JIS Factories

(1) Old JIS factories are allowed to continue affixing old JIS marks to their products, etc. but only during the period of transitional measures.
The period of transitional measures is three years from October 1, 2005 to September 30, 2008. After this period elapses, the act of affixing an old JIS mark to any product will constitute a violation of the Industrial Standardization Act.

(2) The Industrial Standardization Act does not prohibit business entities who had continued to hold the certification up until September 30, 2008, from shipping, even after October 1, their products that had been manufactured up until September 30, 2008, and that had been certified as conforming to the applicable JIS but were left as inventory.

(3) Old JIS factories that declined certification during the period of transitional measures are not allowed to ship any products affixed with old JIS marks on and after the date of declination, as in the same manner as before.