01-June-2011
European Commission Announce Standardisation System Reform

The European Commission today published its proposals to reform the European Standardisation System (the "Standardisation Package"), available at http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/newsroom/cf/itemlongdetail.cfm?item_id=5171&lang=en&tpa=0&displayType=news

The Package proposes a series of legislative and non-legislative measures to develop more and faster standards. The most important steps that the Commission took are the following:

• push for more international standards
• develop more market-driven European standards for services
• propose a light and fast way to recognise the increasingly important ICT standards
• enhance its cooperation with the leading standardisation organisations in Europe (i.e. CEN, CENELEC and ETSI)
• involve organisations representing those most affected, or most concerned – consumers, small businesses, environmental and social organisations in the drafting of standards

The legislative measures are contained in the accompanying proposal for a Regulation on standardisation, which updates and combines existing European legislation and is accompanied by an Impact Assessment. Non-legislative measures include actions to be taken by the Commission and a series of recommendations addressed to other actors in the European standardisation system.