Towards greater inclusiveness in standardisation: The start of a journey

ECOS welcomes the preliminary outcomes of a recent CEN-CENELEC Workshop on the participation of societal stakeholders’ organisations in standardisation, held in Brussels on 8 March.

This Workshop was organised in response to a joint letter of ECOS, ETUC, and ANEC to the governance bodies of the European Standardisation Organisations (ESOs), CEN, CENELEC and ETSI, of September 2015. In this letter, ECOS, ANEC and ETUC called, among others, for:

• The establishment of a distinct category of partnership for societal stakeholders in the ESOs, providing them a clear identity, visibility, and an arena to discuss matters of relevance to them;
• The provision of appropriate rights, including a ‘right of opinion’ at the time of enquiry and formal vote on a draft standard;
• Support for improved societal stakeholders’ participation in international standardisation, especially when work is related to standardisation requests from the EC/EFTA.

The CEN-CENELEC Workshop gathered interested national standards bodies, ETUC, ANEC, and ECOS with a view to make preliminary recommendations on potential improvements to the standardisation system. There was a generally positive attitude on behalf of the standards bodies present at the Workshop. CEN and CENELEC members will endorse the future recommendations at their General Assembly meeting in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in June.

More information on ECOS’ views on the future of European standardisation is available here.