Participated by government entities and a number of manufacturers and suppliers TRA holds a training workshop on TAR

Mobilk - The General Authority for Regulating the Telecommunications Sector (TRA) held a training workshop on the Telecommunications Equipment Type Approval Regime (TAR) with participation of government entities and a number of telecommunications equipment manufacturers and suppliers, during which they were introduced to TAR and types of telecommunications equipment overall. This workshop comes under a series of on-going workshops throughout the year, as organized by the TRA in order to spread awareness on the importance of telecommunications equipment type approval.

Engineers at the Technology Development Affairs Department have shed light on the changes made to TAR according to telecom sector requirements in general, and the telecom equipment market in particular.

Commenting on this workshop, Eng. Saif bin Ghelaita, Executive Director of TRAs Technology Development Affairs Department, said: "This initiative comes as part of TRAs efforts to provide best and prompt services, and since these services are accessed by smart devices used by customers, the TRA is keen to have them meet the highest global standards in effect, in terms of use safety and performance quality. Accordingly, the TRA is regularly developing the Type Approval Regime to keep pace with developments in the telecom equipment industry, in line with the significant development in telecommunications and smart technologies."

The workshops delved into the details of the TAR, TA processes and services, corporate and vendor registration, equipment registration/testing/approval, customs clearance and market inspection campaigns.

During the workshops, participants were introduced to the key changes of TAR, including service fees, approval cards, equipment specifications and initial approval, to name a few.

The workshops touched on types of telecommunications equipment and the negative impact of randomly using some such as radio devices, which often lead to interference issues. The TAR ensures that the market-available equipment do not harm the public or staff of public telecommunications networks.

The workshops also addressed the difference between prohibited and restricted equipment, where prohibited equipment were defined as equipment banned from being imported for use in the UAE, whereas restricted equipment are those requiring special permits to be used.

The TRA has called on telecom equipment outlets to be wary of the risk of using and selling unapproved or unlicensed devices in the country, and to make sure that the equipment approval sticker is labelled by vendors prior to sale. Further, the TRA has cautioned about the risks of using, selling, or linking unlicensed telecom devices with telecom networks in the UAE, unless approved by the TRA, given the risk they may pose on user safety, telecom networks, health, environment and community.

The type approval regime for radios and telecom peripherals ensures conformity of imported or UAE-manufactured devices with required technical qualities and ensures they are registered and licensed by the TRA prior to putting them on sale on the market, in addition to ensuring that they pose no harm to the public, telecom network staff or other network-connected devices.