22.12.2011

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 376/69

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Opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee on the ‘Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on European Standardisation and amending Council Directives 89/686/EEC and 93/15/EEC and Directives 94/9/EC, 94/25/EC, 95/16/EC, 97/23/EC, 98/34/EC, 2004/22/EC, 2007/23/EC, 2009/105/EC and 2009/23/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council’

COM(2011) 315 final — 2011/0150 (COD)

2011/C 376/13

Rapporteur: Mr PEZZINI

On 24 June 2011 and 23 June 2011 respectively, the Council and the European Parliament decided to consult the European Economic and Social Committee, under Article 114 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), on the

Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on European Standardisation and amending Council Directives 89/686/EEC and 93/15/EEC and Directives 94/9/EC, 94/25/EC, 95/16/EC, 97/23/EC, 98/34/EC, 2004/22/EC, 2007/23/EC, 2009/105/EC and 2009/23/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council

COM(2011) 315 final — 2011/0150(COD).

The Section for the Single Market, Production and Consumption, which was responsible for preparing the Committee's work on the subject, adopted its opinion on 30 August 2011.

At its 474th plenary session of 21 and 22 September 2011 (meeting of 21 September) the European Economic and Social Committee adopted the following opinion by 121 votes to two with five abstentions.

1.   Conclusions and recommendations

1.1   The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) supports the Commission's initiative aimed at reviewing the European standardisation system, preserving its many successful aspects, correcting its deficiencies and striking the right balance between the international, European and national dimensions, thus ensuring qualitative excellence at global level.

1.2   The Committee is in no doubt as to the need to create a flexible and dynamic EU legislative framework so as to optimise the added value of European technical standardisation, the purpose of which is to foster competitiveness, innovation and growth.

1.3   The Committee reiterates the importance of European standardisation for the functioning and consolidation of the single market, especially in the fields of health, safety, environmental protection, consumer protection and interoperability. All of these fields now make increasing use of information and communications technology (ICT).

1.4   The Committee considers it of fundamental importance to bring the pace of drawing up standards up to speed and extend the scope of action to the service and ICT sectors, with a particular focus on the aims of quality, safety and the rate at which standards are produced, by using internet consultation platforms and online information exchange.

1.5   In the EESC's view, specifications adopted by international industry forums and/or consortia, in the ICT sector, should only be accepted after a process of approval by European standardisation organisations (ESOs), involving representatives of SMEs, consumers, environmental organisations, workers and organisations with strong social interests.

1.6   The EESC applauds the proposed simplification of the system, with an appropriate legal basis, of financing the ESOs, national standardisation bodies and other organisations responsible for cooperating in standardisation, as well as European stakeholder organisations.

1.7   The EESC calls for the preparation of a common foresight document so as to ensure coherence, coordination and correspondence with the future objectives of the market. In this context it would be useful for all stakeholders in annual programming to participate in preparing the work programmes of the ESOs, other bodies developing technical specifications in the ICT sector, the competent Commission services and national standardisation bodies.

1.8   The Committee also underscores the importance of having, in short order, updated technical standards in the service sector, which will continue to develop as an innovative pillar of the economy between now and 2020. At the same time, it points out that the specific character of services should be taken into account and that the model of standardisation of goods cannot be copied automatically. Further development of standards in the field of services must take the needs of the market and of society into consideration.

1.9   The EESC considers it important to ensure a stable framework of multiannual financial programming for the European standardisation system, and is concerned that the budget appropriations for this purpose are proposed by the Commission only for 2013.

1.10   The Committee calls for the greatest possible interaction between technical standardisation processes and European research and innovation programmes so as to ensure the rapid implementation of new technologies and the attendant competitive advantages to the European economy in the global market.

1.11   The Committee recommends close links between European Standardisation Organisations and the Patent Offices, which safeguard intellectual property rights (IPR).

1.12   The Committee asks that the new rules provide expressly for the strengthening of Europe's position in the context of international standardisation so as to facilitate trade and enhance Europe's competitiveness.

2.   Introduction

2.1   The Committee has repeatedly stressed the essential role of technical standardisation in supporting:

—	the quality of European products and services;

—	their competitiveness in the internal and global market;

—	consumer protection;

—	improvements in social and environmental standards.

2.2   The Committee has always called for ‘a more extensive use of European standardisation in EU policies and legislation in order to extend, in line with the needs of both society and businesses, the expansion of standardisation into new areas such as services, information and telecommunications technology, transport and consumer and environmental protection’ (1).

2.3   The Committee has also stressed that ‘European standardisation is vital for the operation and consolidation of the internal market, particularly through the ‘new approach’ directives in the areas of […]’ (2).

2.4   In its recent opinion Towards a Single Market Act, the Committee reiterated that ‘[s]tandards are a major building block of the Single Market’. At the same time, the Committee stressed ‘the importance of the greater involvement of consumers and SMEs while securing in a constant and sustainable way that the cost factors that limit their participation in this process are overcome. Standards should not be dictated by specific players. The EU standards have to play a much bigger role in global trade and should be promoted in the forthcoming trade negotiations at bilateral and multilateral level’ (3).

2.5   Technical standardisation plays a key role in the operation of the single market and in the international competitiveness of goods and services by providing a guarantee of their quality. It also ensures the interoperability of networks and systems, a high level of consumer and environmental protection, and higher levels of innovation and social inclusion.

2.6   For this role to be fulfilled as effectively as possible, various conditions must be met:

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the process of European technical standardisation needs to be able to respond quickly to the requirements of the legislator – on the initiative of the Commission – and rapidly changing industries in which the lifespan and development cycles of products are ever shorter, thus requiring greater speed and flexibility in responding to future challenges;

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technical standards need to be able to keep up with the rapid pace of technological developments, failing which they will be useless, and to cover ever broader sectors – particularly information technology and services – by ensuring that the standards themselves are produced promptly and in sufficient quantity and quality, inter alia by means of internet consultation platforms;

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the process of drawing up and implementing standards needs to be able to adapt to the requirements of small and medium-sized enterprises, and not the other way round, by ensuring high levels of representation and participation in the standardisation process, particularly at European level, whilst maintaining a balance between national delegations, given that, in general, the relationship between SMEs and technical standards is difficult and complicated;

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greater and broader legitimisation and consensus needs to be secured through a process of voluntary, transparent and open cooperation, where industry, SMEs, public authorities and other civil society stakeholders can work together with equal opportunities for access: standards often impact on the safety and well-being of the public, the efficiency of networks, the environment and other sectors of public importance. Those sectors should therefore have appropriate representation and influence;

—	the European standardisation system must be able to respond to the need to ensure full interoperability and compatibility of applications and services in information and communications technology (ICT) by means of approved European reference standards;

—

the European standardisation system needs to receive appropriate, simplified funding so as to ensure the full participation of all stakeholders in drawing up standards and the automatic inclusion of the standardisation dimension in public research and innovation programmes so as to support the development of the Europe 2020 strategy;

—

once the level of transparency, openness and balanced participation of all stakeholders has been ensured, the standards produced by ICT forums and consortia that are recognised at world level and verified by the European standardisation organisations – CEN, CENELEC, ETSI  (4)– should be included for reference purposes in European procurement legislation;

—	the system for exchanging information between all the standardisation organisations and bodies in Europe needs to be appropriately strengthened and fair access to standards for all stakeholders must be ensured.

2.7   With regard to funding, it is worth recalling that Decision 1673/2006/EC – on which the Committee issued an opinion – establishes the rules concerning the EU's contribution to the financing of European standardisation so as to ensure that European standards and other products of European standardisation are drawn up and revised in a way that is in line with the objectives, legislation and policies of the Union: the same provisions should apply to those bodies which, whilst not recognised as European standardisation bodies in the proposed Regulation, have been entrusted with carrying out preliminary work in support of European standardisation.

2.8   In view of the very broad field of involvement of European standardisation in support of Union policies and legislation and the different types of standardisation activity, it is necessary to provide for a variety of financing arrangements.

3.   Commission proposals

3.1   The requirements to be met by the proposal can be summarised as follows:

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to ensure that they have a significant impact in underpinning the single market in goods and services and preventing the creation of barriers to trade within the EU, the adoption of European standards by the ESOs should apply to both goods and services and continue to receive EU co-financing. The process of drawing up European standards should be speeded up and keep up with the ever-increasing pace of the development cycle of goods and services;

—	as the standard is the result of the consensus reached by those participating in its drafting, the standardisation process should be given legitimacy by involving interested civil society groups such as the social partners, small and medium-sized enterprises, consumers and environmentalists;

—	to bring about standards that ensure the interoperability of services and applications in the information and communications technology sector, it should be possible to formally recognise ICT standards even if they are drawn up outside the ESOs by specialised forums and consortia.

3.2   To this end, the proposal provides – aside from the amendments to directives 89/686/EEC, 93/15/EEC, 94/9/EC, 94/25/EC, 95/16/EC, 97/23/EC, 2004/22/EC, 2007/23/EC, 2009/105/EC and 2009/23/EC – for the revision and merging, in particular, of directives and decisions.

3.3   The proposed new legislation – via the instrument of a regulation to ensure uniform application – aims at:

—	greater transparency and cooperation between national standardisation bodies (NSBs), ESOs and the Commission;

—

recognition of the use of ICT standards (hardware, software and information technology services) even if they are developed by other organisations, provided they are consistent with the TBT/WTO (Technical Barriers to Trade/World Trade Organisation) principles and the need for interoperability within Europe;

—	annual planning of priorities for standardisation in the EU and mandates from the Commission;

—	enhanced representation of SMEs, with financial support from the EU, but also of consumers, environmentalists and representatives of social interests, including for ancillary/preparatory activities;

—	measures to speed up the drafting of European standards requested by the Commission with financial support for active consensus-seeking by ESOs;

—	incentives that also include promoting European technical standards at international level and assistance and technical cooperation programmes with third countries;

—	promoting European and international standardisation by facilitating translation into official EU languages for businesses, so as to improve cohesion and accessibility;

—	boosting standardisation activities in services to foster a competitive single market, avoiding multiple national standards, mandated by the Commission;

—	cutting red tape through the payment of fixed fees without checks on actual costs;

—	introduction of a performance system, based on agreed indicators and objectives (outputs and outcomes) to improve efficiency and speed of results and the process for achieving them;

—	an annual report to the Commission from the ESOs, specifically on aspects relating to finance, transparency, speed, simplification, involvement capacity and quality of the process.

4.   General comments

4.1   The Committee supports the aims of the Commission's proposal, as a fast, efficient and inclusive European standardisation process represents not only a key pillar in the architecture of the single market, which is the fulcrum of European integration and the Europe 2020 strategy that seeks to achieve it, but also and above all one of the foundations of Europe's economic competitiveness and a driving force for innovation.

4.2   The EESC considers that standardisation bodies should be encouraged to assess, as part of their work programmes, their policies with regard to intellectual policy rights (IPR), with a greater focus on promoting innovation and closer links with patent offices, especially the European one in Munich, so that matters of intellectual property can be considered from the outset, thus ensuring better quality both of patents and of standards.

4.3   The EESC therefore applauds the Commission's intention to review the European standardisation system, preserving its many successful aspects, correcting its deficiencies, striking the right balance between the European and national dimensions, and responding to the new requirements and expectations of businesses, consumers, social partners and European society as a whole.

4.4   The Committee considers it of fundamental importance to bring the pace of developing standards up to speed and extend the scope of action to the service and ICT sectors, on condition that these actions maintain the quality objectives of standards and that the extension to standardisation bodies other than ESOs happens with the same guarantees of transparency and participation by which these latter are bound.

4.4.1   To this end, the Committee considers it essential that the ESOs and the Commission carry out preliminary checks to ensure that specifications adopted by international industry forums and/or consortia, to be used as a reference for the purpose of public procurement, have been developed in a neutral, fair and transparent manner with appropriate involvement of representatives of small and medium-sized enterprises, consumers, environmentalists, workers and organisations representing important social interests.

4.4.2   The EESC recommends that this necessary increased participation should not complicate procedures and increase the time taken to draw up standards in a consensual manner. On the contrary, these processes should be significantly streamlined through the use of internet platforms for consultation, development and information exchange (5).

4.5   Similarly, the Committee asks that the regulation provide for the development of multiannual foresight plans on standardisation in Europe so as to provide a more effective and coordinated response to the global policies needed to address the issues of climate change, the development of smart grids, renewable energy and its transmission, and the urgent environmental and social challenges.

4.6   The EESC considers that in order to enable all stakeholders, at both European and national level, to participate effectively in the standardisation process, training programmes should be promoted and the necessary measures taken to enable the weakest national standardisation bodies, which do not currently run technical committee secretariats, to take a more active role in the training process.

4.7   The establishment of annual work programmes by the ESOs, by other bodies developing technical specifications in the ICT sector, the relevant Commission services and national standardisation bodies could be an effective means of ensuring the production of quality standards at a sufficient pace, in a timely manner and in sufficient number, provided that a framework for consistency and coordination is established and that there is effective participation by all stakeholders in the annual programme.

4.8   The EESC applauds the proposed simplification of the system, with an appropriate legal basis, of financing the European standardisation organisations, national standardisation bodies and other organisations responsible for cooperating in standardisation, as well as European stakeholder organisations referred to in Annex III.

4.8.1   The EESC is concerned that the budget appropriations for this purpose are proposed by the Commission only for 2013 and considers it important to ensure a stable framework of multiannual financial programming, starting as soon as possible.

4.9   With regard to the production of harmonised European standards, which ensure that products meet the basic requirements set out in EU legislation, ‘in the absence of harmonised standards, businesses cannot use the relevant standard to confer a presumption of conformity and must demonstrate compliance with the essential requirements in accordance with the conformity assessment module set out in the applicable EU legislation. In both cases, businesses are prevented from saving costs incurred due to fragmentation of the internal market or conformity assessment procedures’. (6)

4.9.1   On this point the Committee considers that there should be greater incentives for their production and use on a voluntary basis so as to guarantee ever higher levels of product safety.

4.10   The Committee considers that the proposed regulation should contain provisions to encourage the transposition at international level of technical standards adopted by the European standardisation system and to strengthen the role of national standardisation bodies and ESOs in international standardisation bodies. This could be achieved by means of coordinated European initiatives to strengthen international competitiveness and innovation.

5.   Specific comments

5.1   The Committee believes that it would be useful to list, in Annex I, recognised national standardisation bodies.

5.2   It is important to distinguish ‘technical specifications’ from formal standards: the EESC proposes to add ‘relevant standards and technical specifications’ to recital 19 and to change the wording ‘standards’ to ‘technical specifications’ in recitals 20 and 22.

5.3   In Article 2, it would be helpful to state ‘a technical specification, approved by a recognised standardisation body, for repeated …’ and to add a new point 9: (9) ‘National standardisation body’ – a body listed in Annex I.

5.4   In Article 3, the EESC considers that NSBs should be able to state objections even if they cannot object to the European work programmes and therefore proposes that point 5 be reworded as follows: ‘National standardisation bodies may not object to a subject for standardisation included in their work programme being dealt with at European level in accordance with the standards laid down by European standardisation bodies, and shall not take any action that may prejudice a decision on the subject’.

5.4.1   The EESC also proposes that a new point 6 be added, as follows:‘Member States shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that, during the preparation of a European standard referred to in Article 7, their standardisation bodies do not take any action which could prejudice the harmonisation intended and, in particular, that they do not publish in the field in question a new or revised national standard which is not completely in line with an existing European standard’.

5.5   In Article 7, the EESC proposes that a new point 3.1 be added after point 3, as follows: ‘3.1 In the case of a request for a harmonised standard, this must be formalised by an agreement between the Commission and the relevant European standardisation organisation’.

5.5.1   The EESC believes that the proposal to allow the ESOs only one month to respond to the Commission's request could potentially limit the consultation of stakeholders. The EESC recommends 3 months.

5.6   In Article 9, the EESC proposes that the subtitle be reworded: ‘Recognition, for the purposes of public procurement, of technical specifications in the field of ICT’ and that the following words be added at the beginning of the article: ‘… the Commission may, in the field of information and communications technology, decide …’.

5.7   In Article 16, the EESC proposes that a point a1) be added as follows:

‘a1)	update the list of national standardisation bodies set out in Annex I on the basis of the information supplied by the Member States referred to in Article 21’

and that point b) be replaced with the following wording:

‘b)	adapt to technical developments the criteria for recognising technical specifications in the ICT sector for the purposes of public procurement’.

5.8   In Article 17, the EESC proposes adding to point 2:

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(1)  See OJ C 110, 9 May 2006, p. 14.

(2)  See footnote 1.

(3)  See OJ C 132, 3 May 2011, p. 47.

(4)  ETSI: the European telecommunications standards institute (ETSI) is an independent non-profit EU standardisation organisation in the telecommunications industry.

(5)  As already happens at the ISO and the IEC, technical specifications ‘are deliverables for which the consensus was insufficient for the status of an international standard’.

(6)  COM (2011) 315 Explanatory Memorandum, point 1 and recitals 18 and 36.

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