24 March 2022
BSI and the Standards Council of Canada renew Cooperation Agreement to support trade and investment priorities between the two countries and strengthen collaboration in standards development. Scott Steedman, Director-General, Standards at BSI and Chantal Guay, Chief Executive Officer at the Standards Council of Canada signed the Cooperation Agreement.
The new Cooperation Agreement intends to strengthen the global use and adoption of international standards, uphold best practices in the development of national standards to prevent the creation of unnecessary barriers to international trade, and improve cooperation on standards development to facilitate trade in goods and services. The work will be carried out in collaboration with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).
Scott Steedman, Director-General, Standards at BSI, said: “We are very pleased to work with the Standards Council of Canada to promote the role that consensus standards play in building a sustainable future. Standards are an important priority for both nations to accelerate innovation and facilitate trade and we look forward to increasing our joint activity on the use of standards to accelerate the net zero transition.
“Our newly signed Cooperation Agreement builds momentum and an opportunity for us to serve the bilateral trading relationship through better use of standards.”
Chantal Guay, Chief Executive Officer at Standards Council of Canada, added: “‘Through our strong relationship, we have supported standardization strategies that contribute to the economic prosperity of our countries and global efforts to build a cleaner world. Together with BSI, we are able to move shared interests forward in our bilateral trading relationship.”
Standards and related conformity assessment activities are recognized by both National Standards Bodies as key to reducing regulatory and technical barriers to trade between Canada and the United Kingdom. The consensus best practice shaped in standards encourages greater alignment of regulatory requirements to facilitate market access and support the implementation of a future bespoke trade agreement.
BSI and SCC first signed a cooperation arrangement in 2018. Since then, the two organisations have worked closely together to shape new and revised international standards and to share experience and good practice. Recent examples include the support of the Agile Nations network and Our 2050 World, which is a global campaign to support organisations using standards to meet their net zero ambitions. Both countries share a leadership role with the National Standards Body of Brazil, ABNT as co-chairs of the ISO Strategic Advisory Group on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting.
The agreement will be in place until 2025.
