International cooperation

Since the second half of XX century we face the developing globalization of economy.
The international exchange of goods is ever more extensive and rapid due to new technological developments (e.g. the use of the Internet). Unfortunately, the movement of goods and services encounters a number of barriers. Technical barriers are among them, and most of these are the consequence of differences between the technical standards that are used in various countries.

Therefore, it is becoming indispensable to harmonize these standards on the international level. This objective is achieved by the international and regional standardization organizations. These organizations unite national standards bodies from various countries. The basic goal of these organizations is to obtain consent for the contents of standardization documents from all parties involved. The parties are represented by national standards bodies. Besides this, the goal is to promote the usage of standardization documents.

The Polish Committee for Standardization (PKN), as the national standards body, is authorized by law to represent the interests of Poland in the international standardization arena. PKN actively cooperates with international and European standardization organizations as well as with standards bodies from other countries.

The cooperation is primarily fulfilled within the following standards organizations:

ISO International Organization for Standardization: www.iso.org
IEC International Electrotechnical Commission: www.iec.ch
CEN European Committee for Standardization (including ECISS - European Committee for Iron and Steel Standardization): www.cen.eu
CENELEC European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization: www.celenec.eu
ETSI European Telecommunications Standards Institute: www.etsi.org

Cooperation with international standards organizations

On the international level, the cooperation consists in membership in the following organizations:

 International Organization for Standardization (ISO) – a non-governmental organization with its seat in Geneva, established in 1947,

 International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) – non-governmental organization with its seat in Geneva, established in 1906.

The aim of both organizations is to support and advance worldwide cooperation in all issues connected with standardization, develop and promote international normative documents, mainly the International Standards.

The documents have the character of recommendations to be applied worldwide, and are published as standards, technical specifications, technical reports or guides. They are adopted by member countries in this form. The international ISO and IEC normative documents constitute the basis for national and regional standards, for conformity assessment systems (certification) and technical agreements in international trade. These documents can also be used by governments in their legislative work, as the basis for their national technical regulations.

It is not obligatory for ISO or IEC members to implement ISO or IEC standards into the set of their national standards, although it is recommended to facilitate international trade (e.g. such recommendation is included in Annex 3 to the WTO/TBT Agreement - “The Code of Good Practice for the Preparation, Adoption and Application of Standards”).

ISO and IEC play an important role in the globalization process:

they satisfy needs of the global market for international normative documents and conformity assessment systems;
they establish the conditions indispensable for interoperability of complexes and systems;
they help to improve the quality of products and services and the effectiveness of technological processes;
they play an important role in international activities undertaken to protect the environment and health and safety.

The scope of interest of ISO includes various areas of science, technology and economics, with the exception of telecommunications and sectors assigned to IEC - electrotechnology and electronics. .

Although the electrotechnical sector is relatively new, it is the area where the need to cooperate appeared first. IEC was established in 1906. The Polish National Electrotechnical Committee joined IEC in 1923. This membership is still valid (excluding a break due to World War II), and all the organizational changes undergone by the national standards body in Poland did not change that status. Currently, the Polish Committee for Standardization (PKN) performs the duties of the National Electrotechnical Committee.

Poland has also recognized standardization cooperation in other areas. In 1947, PKN became a charter member of ISO, and still performs an important role in the ISO as a national standards body.

Our cooperation with IEC and ISO is similar. It is the consequence of two facts: firstly, international standardization is based on the same fundamental principles, and secondly, internal regulations are shared by ISO and IEC (ISO/IEC Directives), and they both follow similar procedures.

There are two levels of membership in ISO and IEC. The first level is to take part in overall activities of the organization. A National Standards Body – NSB (in IEC, it is named after the National Electrotechnical Committee – NC) is a member. Its representatives can be elected for all management boards other decision-making bodies of the organization.

The second level concerns the participation in technical work. Each NSB (NC) declares its participation in work of Technical Committees (TC) or subcommittees (SC), or alternatively, informs of the lack of interest in the work of others.

There are two membership categories:

“P” membership (participating member): involves an active participation in the work of a given TC or SC; it gives the member both rights and duties. The duties include timely commenting on working documents and voting on draft normative documents, as well as taking part in meetings.
“O” membership (observer member): grants access to working documents and participation in TC/SC meetings as an observer – i.e. without the right to take decisions and vote (some exceptions are allowed).

Significant contributions have been made by PKN, and this is shown in the number of ISO and IEC committees and subcommittees where PKN is a “P” and “O” member. PKN is surpassed only by organizations from the most highly developed countries.

Polish experts take an active part in a number of Working Groups (WG) and other technical bodies. It means that many experts, members of PKN Technical Committees, are involved in international cooperation. This involvement is realized by commenting on documents and by taking part in meetings of TCs, SCs and WGs. It entails considerable effort in terms of finance and planning.

As ISO and IEC have switched to the fully electronic circulation and processing of documents, current cooperation and correspondence is exclusively carried out in the electronic working environment.

PKN participation in Technical Committees (TC) and Subcommittees (SC) of international standardization organizations:

Number of TC and SC / Percentage**
Organization	Type of Membership	2008
ISO*	P	249 / 34 %
ISO*	O	383 / 53 %
IEC	P	72 / 42 %
IEC	O	97 / 56 %

*) including data of ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee JTC1 and its subcommittees

**) Percentage – as of active TCs and SCs

Polish Committee for Standardization is a member of the ISO policy development committees:

P member of DEVCO (Committee on Developing Country Matters)
O member of COPOLCO (Committee on Consumer Policy)
P member of CASCO (Committee on Conformity Assessment)
P member of REMCO (Committee on Reference Materials).

PKN, as an ISONET (ISO Information Network) member, plays an important role in shaping ISO information policy.

Polish experts are delegated by PKN to work in Working Groups (WG) and various task forces (TF, MT, PT) of both organizations. Currently, there are 102 experts in ISO WGs, and 77 experts in IEC WGs (as of 31 December 2008).

Each member of ISO and IEC has the right to run secretariats of Technical Committees and Subcommittees of both these organizations.

In this case, the input of PKN is not significant. It is the consequence of organizational and financial resources, and of tough competition (national bodies from countries that are leaders in certain areas lobby to run secretariats, as this is beneficial for manufacturers).

PKN runs secretariats of two ISO technical committees:

TC 98 “Bases for design of structures”
TC 195 “Building construction machinery and equipment”; and three ISO subcommittees:
TC 34/SC 3 “Food products. Fruit and vegetable products”,
TC 98/SC 2 “Bases for design of structures. Reliability of structures”
TC 107/SC 7 “Metallic and other inorganic coatings. Corrosion tests”.

The Association of Polish Electrical Engineers SEP ( sep.com.pl ) and PKN runs the secretariat of one IEC technical committee:

TC 27 "Industrial electroheating".

Cooperation with European Standards Organizations

European Standards Organizations are much younger than their international partners, and their development is related to the idea of a Single European Market within the European Union and EFTA.

The European Committee for Standardization was established in 1974, The European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) – in 1973, and European Telecommunication Standards Institute (ETSI) – in 1988. These organizations are the private associations with their seats in Brussels (CEN and CENELEC) and Sophia Antipolis - France (ETSI).

As in the case of ISO, the members of CEN are National Standards Bodies (NSB) of European Union and EFTA countries. The members of CENELEC are the National Electrotechnical Committees (NC) of EU and EFTA countries. Similarly to international organizations, there is a prevailing rule of one member from one country.

In the case of ETSI, the rules of membership are different. An ETSI member can be any organization, company or institution that deals with communication in CEPT countries (European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations). Any institution, organization or company from outside Europe can become an associated member. Among members we can find producers, operators, end users, scientific institutes and universities, administration bodies and National Standards Bodies. Another form of cooperation with ETSI is to sign a special agreement (“Memorandum of Understanding” – MoU), which entitles the signatory to act as an ETSI National Standards Organization (“ETSI/NSO”).

It is the duty of ETSI/NSO to carry out public enquiry and votes on draft telecommunications European Standards, to announce and comply with standstill, and to national transposition of European Standards developed by ETSI. It is possible for one organization to be a member and ETSI/NSO at the same time. ETSI/NSO, when it is not an ETSI member, cannot take part in technical work, but it can take part in meetings of the decision-making bodies as an observer.

Contrary to a long tradition of cooperation of PKN with international organizations, which abide by the rule of total political neutrality, the “Iron Curtain” was an impediment to cooperation on a European level. Only bilateral contacts with other national standards bodies were allowed. It was in 1991 when the Treaty of Europe was signed between the Republic of Poland and the European Union and its Member Countries, which made it possible to take efforts to begin cooperation with European Standards Organizations.

In 1991, PKNMiJ (the predecessor of PKN) was granted the affiliate status of CEN and CENELEC (later taken over by PKN in 1994). This status enabled PKN to access information of their activities, the European Standards and their transposition into Polish Standards. It also made it possible to take part in work of Technical Committees and Subcommittees as an observer. As the integration processes developed, it became possible to gain full membership in CEN and CENELEC. PKN completed all conditions necessary to gain full membership on 1 January 2003, when the current Standardization Law came into force.

PKN was granted the status of full member of these organizations on 1 January 2004. As a member of these organizations, it has the right for full participation in technical work and in decision-making bodies. The PKN representatives are members of the CEN Administrative Board (CA) and CEN Technical Board (BT), and their consultative committees (CACC Financial Affairs and CACC External Policy) as well as consultative strategy and politics working groups. The PKN representatives are also members of the CENELEC Technical Board (BT) and its task forces.

In 1994, PKN (with the Telecommunications Institute) signed an MoU with ETSI, which gave PKN and Telecommunications Institute the status of ETSI National Standards Organizations. As a result of a number of circumstances (a new Standardization Law coming into force, which made it necessary for PKN to be the sole representative of Poland in the field of national standardization; the process of adaptation of the Polish standardization system to the European one), it became necessary to sign a new agreement between PKN and ETSI. The new MoU was signed on March 25, 2003. According to the new MoU, PKN is the only ETSI National Standards Organization. The Polish members of ETSI currently are: the Ministry of Transport,the Office of Electronic Communications,National Institute of Telecommunications,PolskaTelefoniaCyfrowa (Era network operator) and PTK CENTERTEL (Orange network operator). These institutions have the right to participate in ETSI technical work and the proceedings of decision-making bodies.

Cooperation with CEN and CENELEC

Conditions on participation in CEN and CENELEC technical work

When the Polish Committee for Standardization (PKN) was granted full membership at CEN and CENELEC, rules of PKN participation in European Standards Organizations changed as well. PKN has the right to participate in all bodies with their rights equal to those of other members. PKN is also a co-owner of all documents prepared by both organizations even when it does not take an active part in their development. Participation of PKN representatives is obligatory in some cases, and in others it is optional.

The rules of participation in technical work and drafting standardization documents are described in CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations:

Part 2. Common Rules for Standardization Work.
Part 3. Rules for the Structure and Drafting of European Standards.

All National Members are allowed to take part in Technical Committee meetings.

Each national member can delegate up to 3 representatives for each Technical Committee meeting. The Technical Committee (TC) meetings are held to discuss general issues (including planning and programming), to monitor activities of Working Group. Technical Committees in general do not discuss the content of standards. Theoretically, each meeting can be attended by different national delegates; however, it is recommended that the rule of continuity is observed in the case of representatives’ participation. National members do not have to take part in all TC meetings. The representative delegated to take part in a TC meeting has to be a member of a Technical Committee at PKN (and so is a representative of PKN). In this case, proposals are put forward by the relevant PKN/TC. The applications for meetings are carried out by the national secretariat.

Full members of the CEN and CENELEC do not have either to officially propose their representatives for technical committees (TC) and subcommittees (SC) or verify their participation annually.

It is obligatory to officially announce the appointment and recall of experts who will work at Working Groups (WG) and Task Forces (TF), and experts can be appointed and recalled at any time.

Participation in Working Groups is granted to all National Members. A member of the PKN Technical Committee can take part in WG activities (exceptionally, when it is proposed by PKN/TC, it can be a person who is not a member of PKN/TC, but is related to it). An expert takes part in WG activities as an independent specialist recommended by the National Standards Body (but not its representative) however he should be driven by the interest of the country. It is not right when in a public enquiry a country objects to the solutions suggested by their expert.

The representatives for WGs are proposed by PKN/TCs via PKN. Participation in WG activities is voluntary.

We cannot forget that the contents of standards are developed within Working Groups (WG). It means that any influence on the contents of standards can only take place by active participation in WG work.

Participation of PKN experts in Working Groups (WG) of the CEN and CENELEC (as of 31 December 2008) looks as follows:

	WG CEN	WG CENELEC
PKN participation	221	11

Access to working documents

As has been already mentioned, PKN has the right to access all working documents developed by both organizations. For organizational and technical reasons, the access may be limited to a certain number of potentially authorized people. The members of Working Groups exchange working documents in various ways, and PKN support is not needed here.

The situation is different with the TC. As the TC secretariats are run by different Members, TC working documents are located on Member servers or CEN/CENELEC central servers. The server access conditions are set up by organizations that run the secretariats, and they may limit the number of authorized people even to one. As the Member Body has the right to access the working documents even if it does not take an active part in TC work, it can nominate people who are allowed to download the working documents. For clarity sake, they are called contact persons. Contact persons receive an authorized access to the documents and they get information for the national mirror TC. Contact persons are responsible for communication with the national mirror TCs and they reply to all queries. Their replies are communicated by the national secretariat.

The contact person is a member of the PKN/TC. Member countries do not have to propose contact persons to each TC. Authorizations should apply to the bodies the work of which is of interest to PKN Standardization Divisions and PKN Technical Committees.

Cooperation with other organizations

Cooperation with UN/ECE

Polish Committee for Standardization represents Poland (based on authorization from the Minister of Economy) in the proceedings of the Working Party on Technical Harmonization and Standardization Policies (WP.6) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE).

The President of PKN takes part in the Working Party meetings, and PKN coordinates the preparation of the national position on issues that need to be decided later (e.g. development a list of issues that require standardization or specification of technical harmonization priorities).

Cooperation with ASTM International (American Society for Testing and Materials)

Cooperation between PKN and ASTM International is mainly about information exchange.

Cooperation with World Trade Organization: WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (WTO/TBT)

PKN runs the WTO/TBT National Information Point in order to fulfill the obligations resulting from the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade with respect to information exchange concerning national standardization . This is mainly about notifications of draft standards work commenting on documents related to the WTO and information service on documents notified within the WTO/TBT Agreement.

2009-01-13

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