Besides carrying out all technical and chemical testing within the limits provided for by rules and regulations to be enforced by the Chambers of Commerce, Commodity Chemical Laboratories, also test products for compliance with the law (rules, regulations and specifications).

Said laboratories carry out significant activities upon the request of public and private actors. When they are mandated by others, the costs of the relevant technical tests and certification operations are covered by principals. Chambers Lab fees are defined based on national chemists’ official rates.

Since the turn of the century, Chamber Labs have been growing both quantitatively and qualitatively. Today, there are 28 Chamber commodity chemical laboratories, which are complemented by 4 sample collection desks. They perform a wide range of tests for businesses and consumers, in the agricultural and food area, and well as in the environmental, industrial and jewellery fields.

As to the agricultural and food industry, the following products and goods are mainly tested:
cereals, flours, semolina, pasta, bread and fodder;
preserved vegetables, syrups, fruit juices and drinks;
oils and food fat;
alcohol, wine and vinegar;
milk, butter and diary produce.

Some laboratories located within specific markets have highly specialised. This is the case for the Labs of the Chambers of Commerce of Trieste, Vercelli, Messina and Udine, which specialised for coffee, rice, citrus fruit essential oils, and furniture and chairs respectively.

The laboratories located in Arezzo and Vicenza are specialised in the jewellery area, while the Milan Chamber of Commerce’s lab focuses on precious stones and pearls. Chamber Laboratories also issue additional certificates and product certificates for applicant jewellery enterprises.

Most labs are managed by the Chambers of Commerce, through ad hoc Aziende speciali. They are networked throughout the Italian territory, thus being able to provide “customer businesses” not only with single lab test results, but also with the results of the tests carried out by other network member laboratories. This way, customers who need their tests to be performed by multiple laboratories, have them done by simply contacting and interacting with one lab, which is also the responsible for the final results.

Moreover, the aforementioned network aims at disseminating technical regulation-related information, working alongside Uni (Italian National Standardisation Agency) and Sicert (National System for Certification Agency Accreditation).