Quality (business) and those of competitors (the quality gap). In the past two decades this quality gap has been gradually decreasing between competitive products and services. This is partly due to the contracting (also called outsourcing) of manufacturing to countries like China and India, as well internationalization of trade and competition. These countries, among many others, have raised their own standards of quality in order to meet international standards and customer demands. The ISO 9000 series of standards are probably the best known international standards for quality management, though specialized standards such as ISO 15189 (for medical laboratories) and ISO 14001 (for
State Committee for Standards and Product Quality Management for Standardization"; the "Committee for Standards, Metrology, and Measuring Instruments"; the "State Committee for Standards"; the "State Committee for Standards and Product Quality Management". The agency received its nickname, "Gosstandart", in 1970. After the dissolution of the USSR, "Gosstandart" was merged with "Gosstandart Rossii" and today its name is Rostekhregulirovaniye. In Ukraine, Gosstandart became Derzhstandart, an abbreviation for "Derzhavnyy standart". State Committee for Standards and Product Quality Management Gosstandart () was the Soviet government agency responsible for standardization, metrology, and quality management. The name is an abbreviation for "Gosudarstvennyy standart" (‘State Standard’). Established in 1925 as a committee for standardization