COUNCIL RESOLUTION of 18 June 1992 on the role of European standardization in the European economy (92/C 173/01)

THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,

1. RECALLING its conclusions on standardization of 16 July 1984 and its resolution of 7 May 1985 on a new approach to technical harmonization and standards (1);

2. RECALLING the Community's policy of opening up public procurement, which gives importance to European standardization by requiring that the contracting authorities in Directives 71/305/EEC (2), 77/62/EEC (3), and 90/531/EEC (4) refer to European standards;

3. RECALLING the objectives of the Single Act, including the strengthening of economic and social cohesion;

4. RECALLING the Commission communication on an industrial policy in an open and competitive environment the conclusions of which were approved by the Council on 26 November 1990;

5. RECALLING the need for European standards to ensure the interoperability of the trans-European networks in the spirit of the conclusions of the Maastricht European Council;

6. TAKING INTO CONSIDERATION that the extensive and significant discussions among all the parties concerned on the future development of European standardization further to the publication of the Commission communication of 16 October 1990 (5) has highlighted the strategic importance of standardization for the European market;

7. TAKING INTO CONSIDERATION the opinion of the European Parliament (6), and that of the Economic and Social Committee (7), the opinion of the interested parties expressed during consultations on that communication and the Commission communication to the Council dated 20 December 1991 on standardization in the European economy (8);

8. REITERATES the importance of a cohesive system of European standards, organized by and for the parties concerned, based on transparency, openness, consensus, independence of vested interests, efficiency and decision-taking on the basis of national representations;

9. CONSIDERS that European standardization, while organized on a voluntary basis, also serves the public interest and therefore believes that it is necessary to pursue and extend a partnership at European level between the Community and the European standards organizations;

10. CONFIRMS the interest of an international standardization system capable of producing standards that are actually used by all the partners in international trade and of meeting the requirements of Community policy;

11. ENDORSES the desire to avoid the fragmentation of work on European standardization and increased bureaucracy at the expense of efficiency;

12. WELCOMES the steps already taken by European standards organizations as part of the aforementioned discussions and in particular the decisions relating to efficiency, openness to economic and social partners organized at European level, the transparency of standardization activities and the visibility, accessibility and clear identification of European standards, cooperation with third countries, and the agreements with other international standards organizations, and expresses its interest in these efforts being pursued;

13. STRESSES the urgent need for high-quality European standards both for the application of Directives and the implementation of European policies and to respond to market needs;

14. STRESSES the need to increase the effective availability of European standards at national level through their systematic transposition into national standards, so that they may be widely circulated and Community acts efficiently applied;

15. STRESSES the importance of strengthening links between research and development activities and standardization;

16. WILL CONTINUE, wherever possible, the new approach set out in its resolution of 7 May 1985 (9) for the implementation of the Community's technical harmonization policy;

17. CONSIDERS that the use of European standards should be further encouraged as an instrument of economic and industrial integration within the European market and as a technical basis in support of legislation, in particular in defining technical specifications for products and services or for testing methods to be used in other areas falling within the scope of Community legislation;

18. INVITES the European standards organizations to strengthen their coordination in order to optimize the organization of work in view of the limited resources available;

19. ENCOURAGES the European standards organizations jointly to continue and increase their consultations on a regular basis with all the parties concerned, including small and medium-sized undertakings;

20. INVITES the European standards organizations to continue their discussions on a possible harmonized expression of conformity with European standards;

21. INVITES the Commission, where appropriate, to apply the principle of referring to European standards in future draft Community legislation;

22. INVITES all interested economic circles to organize at European level and coordinate more closely in order to play a constructive and more effective part in their own right in European standardization activities;

23. INVITES Member States to take all appropriate measures to encourage their national standards organizations to comply with the common rules of European standards organizations of which they are members and take effective part in European standardization discussions;

24. UNDERTAKES TO CONTINUE to grant financial aid, within the limits of overall budget constraints, to European standards organizations so that the standards required for Community legislation and policies can be developed.

(1) OJ No C 136, 4. 8. 1985.

(2) OJ No L 185, 16. 8. 1971, p. 5.

(3) OJ No L 13, 15. 1. 1977, p. 1.

(4) OJ No L 297, 29. 10. 1990, p. 1.(5) OJ No C 20, 28. 1. 1991, p. 1.

(6) OJ No C 240, 16. 9. 1991, p. 208.

(7) OJ No C 120, 6. 5. 1991, p. 28.

(8) OJ No C 96, 15. 4. 1992, p. 2.(9) OJ No C 136, 4. 6. 1985, p. 1.