Institutions and policy issues

This Section explains how standardization and conformity assessment work in practice and describes the relevant characteristics of standardization and conformity assessment infrastructures in various regions of the world. It starts with a discussion of the standardization process and considers where standardization takes place, how it is organized and who participates in the process. Subsection 2 discusses the organization of conformity assessment at the international, regional and national levels and describes the ways in which conformity assessment requirements may impact on trade.