Marcus Long
IAF Communications and Marketing Committee Chair

2025 is another important year for IAF and ILAC’s communication efforts. The two organisations will need to work smarter and more efficiently to be heard and seen above all the noise and visual bombardment businesses, government and consumers have.

As the new Chair of the IAF Communications and Marketing Committee, there are three priorities for us with communications in 2025:

• Continuing to push the value of accreditation and accredited conformity assessment
• IAF and ILAC working ever closer together
• At the appropriate time, introducing the new body

As the majority of the accreditation communication activity comes from the IAF members and Regional Accreditation Groups (RAGs), it is vital that there is a strong partnership between IAF, its members and the RAGs. This partnership will be built further with the following supportive actions:

• More focus on the RAGs at the six-monthly IAF/ILAC Communications Network meetings, including sharing of communications actions, content and plans.
• I am delighted that the Chairs of the AFRAC Marketing and Communication Committee Mutetei Mutisya and the APAC Communication and Promotion Committee Aparna Dhawan will be the new Vice Chairs of the IAF CMC. They will be great assets in driving the involvement of the RAGs and members in IAF communication and in the sharing of their work.
• IAF and ILAC looking at how much more we can do collectively.

As well as Mutetei and Aparna, working closely with ILAC Marketing and Communications Committee Chair Verónica Ramirez and the IAF/ILAC Secretariat communications team of Krista Eager, Karla Sánchez and Belinda Mort will be key to all our communications effort in 2025.

The first IAF/ILAC Communications Network meetings of 2025 are 11 and 13 February, bringing us together to help us all communicate the way forward.