As the U.S. member body to the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and, via the U.S. National Committee, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) encourages its members and relevant stakeholders to submit comments by January 18 on a draft focused on recommended practices for standardization by the national bodies of ISO and IEC.
In 1994, ISO and IEC published Guide 59 (Code of good practice in standardization), which predated the existence of World Trade Organization (WTO) Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) documents detailing expectations of standardization and the WTO TBT Code of Good Standardization Practice. Over the past 1.5 years, a joint working group of the ISO Technical Management Board and the IEC Standardization Management Board has worked to produce a draft revision of Guide 59.
The document provided recommended standardization practices, intended to support the application of the following:
- WTO TBT Committee decision on principles for the development of international standards, guides and recommendations
- WTO TBT Committee's Code of Good Practice for the preparation, adoption and application of standards (Annex 3 of the 1995 WTO TBT Agreement)
All interested parties are invited to review the proposal, which includes an initial proposed work plan as well as information on how it may relate to existing to international standardization work as well as relevant stakeholders and organizations.
Please submit comments to Steve Cornish, ANSI senior director of international policy, at [email protected] by close of business on January 18, 2019. Based on the input received from U.S. stakeholders, a recommended ANSI position and any comments will be developed and presented to the ANSI ISO Committee (AIC) for approval before the ISO voting deadline of March 15, 2019.
ANSI has published an explanatory information document outlining the process used to develop U.S. positions on issues and activities under consideration by ISO and IEC.