On 23 September and 16 October 2025, CEN and CENELEC conducted two workshops on the premises of the European Commission’s DG Trade to present CEN and CENELEC international activities and discuss possible synergies. These workshops provided the opportunity to exchange with policymakers on CEN and CENELEC international policy and on how CEN and CENELEC can best support the EU’s trade policies with countries and regions outside Europe.
Standardization is a key enabler for global trade, supporting global competitiveness, helping to overcome technical barriers to trade and to foster market access for European industry. The focus of the training was twofold. On the one hand, the training focused on the results and benefits deriving from CEN and CENELEC’s long-standing cooperation with international standardization bodies, ISO and IEC. On the other hand, it focused on the existing partnership frameworks that allow bilateral agreements with foreign national and regional standardization bodies in order to further enhance technical alignment. The first session focused on the Pan-American continent and on Africa, while the second one centred on Asia and Oceania.
More than 20 representatives from DG Trade and EU Delegations participated in the workshops, which proved to be highly interactive and allowed to identify synergies for future cooperation on external trade-related matters. At the end of the sessions, CEN, CENELEC and DG Trade agreed to set up two yearly dialogues to further discuss their cooperation and identify areas of interactions with different regions and for CEN and CENELEC to involve DG Trade on the discussion platform on international policy.
