Dnata's drive for quality and its endeavours in maintaining the leading position that Dubai International Airport occupies in the Middle East and West Asia will be maintained through vision, planning and hard work, said Chairman of Dnata Shaikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum on the occasion of the award of a certificate of Dnata Airport Services' compliance with the newest version of ISO 9001 standards.

The certificate was presented to Shaikh Ahmed at a lunch for Dnata's airline customers.

"First in the industry to gain the ISO 9001 year 2000 version, Dnata Airport Services faced the challenge of implementing the standards across a large organisation with 4,000 staff and a wide range of passenger care, ground handling and technical support functions," said Dnata In his remarks, Shaikh Ahmed said: "Dubai International Airport is recognised as the major transportation hub for the Middle East and West Asia region. We must now maintain that lead the same way that we have built it - through vision, planning and hard work.

"The drive for quality is part of the process. I am sure that the ISO 9001 certification marks the start of a new era in Dnata's services to its customers."

The certificate was presented to Shaikh Ahmed by Tony Mouawad, regional chief executive, Bureau Veritas Quality International (BVQI).

"This certificate is a challenge for the future to not only maintain standards but to continually improve them," said Mouawad.

Ismail Ali Al Banna, director of Dnata Airport Services, said the 18-month process of implementing ISO 9001 was a huge undertaking including creating awareness, mapping processes and procedures, training of volunteers in internal quality audits, setting targets and objectives and training all 4,000 staff in quality concepts and the new standard operating procedures.