Two agreements promoting cooperation between the international and European standards organizations have been in place for many years.
- The Vienna Agreement governs cooperation between ISO and CEN. The core element of the Vienna Agreement is parallel voting. This means that the public enquiry and final voting on the draft standard take place in parallel at ISO and CEN. If the results of the public enquiry and final voting are positive in both organizations, the standard can be published in identical form as an ISO and EN standard.
- The Frankfurt Agreement governs cooperation in the electrical sector between IEC and CENELEC. The Frankfurt Agreement accords fundamental priority to international standardization in the field of electrical engineering. If a need for standardization activity is identified at European level, it is first determined whether the standard can be developed at international level by IEC. Where the need for standardization is not limited to the European level, development by IEC ensures that publication of an international standard is the direct result.
More information on the Vienna and Frankfurt Agreement: KANBrief 2/24: Cooperation between the international and European standards organisations
Since 1975, a contract between DIN and the German government (in German) has governed cooperation between the Federal Republic of German and the German Institute for Standardization (DIN). The contract accords DIN the status of responsible standards body for the Federal Republic of Germany and stipulates that, as a member of the non-governmental international (and thus also European) standards organizations, it officially represents Germany in standardization matters.
Besides these rights, the contract also imposes obligations on DIN. The first of these is the comprehensive duty to consider the public interest during standardization activity. This enables groups primarily representing social interests (in contrast to commercial enterprises) to participate in standardization work. Such interests include environmental protection, consumer protection and, of course, occupational safety and health, all of which acquired new weight in standardization as a result of the contract between DIN and the German state.
More information: KANBrief 2/25: 50th anniversary of the contract between DIN and the German government
In 2014, KAN joined the French OSH institutes EUROGIP and INRS in signing a Common declaration on standardization policy in the field of occupational safety and health. The declaration dealt with issues that were emerging at that time, such as the role of new forms of standardization document, standardization in the area of services and the standardization of management systems. CIOP-PIB, the Polish OSH institute, also signed the declaration in 2016. In the years since its adoption, many new topics have arisen in standardization. For this reason, the signatory institutions launched a revision process in 2023 to bring the document up to date and add further aspects. INSST in Spain and FIOH in Finland also participated in the update.
More information: KANBrief 4/23: Occupational safety and health institutions in several countries adopt position on standardisation