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Standards in Daily Life
29th World Standards Day
14 October 1998

1998-09-03

Each year on 14 October, the members of ISO and IEC celebrate World Standards Day, which is a means of paying tribute to the collaborative efforts made by the thousands of experts worldwide who develop the voluntary technical agreements that are published as International Standards.

Technical standardization is unlikely to cross the minds of many of us during the course of our everyday lives - yet we daily benefit from the "invisible" support of International Standards. They make so many aspects of life safer, healthier and more convenient, as well as ensuring quality and bringing us economic benefits.

To highlight this, "Standards in Daily Life" is the theme chosen for this year's World Standards Day by the three principal organizations responsible for developing international technical standards. The leaders of the three organizations say in their joint World Standards Day message: "From the moment you wake, throughout the day, standards in some form are helping to shape your day, to make it easier, more comfortable, safer and simply more convenient."

They give some practical examples: "Imagine, for example, not being able to withdraw money from an automated telling machine because your bank card is too big to fit in the slot; imagine batteries that will not fit any of your electrical equipment; stores without barcodes to quantify and price stocks of goods; imagine Internet sites without standardized domain names."

The heads of ISO (International Organization for Standardization), IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission) and ITU (International Telecommunication Union) acknowledge that we do not usually think about standards - unless their absence causes inconvenience.

"In today's world, where we expect fast, efficient communications, we demand compatibility and interoperability between electronic appliances, and we want our work tools, our consumer goods and our products to be cheap, easily available and of the best quality. International Standards are hence absolutely essential - even if most of the time they are so invisible as to be taken for granted."

Standards, say the ISO, IEC and ITU chiefs, provide the end-user with a criterion for judgement, a measurement of quality, and a certain guarantee of compatibility and interoperability.

"Whether it is a standard to ensure global linking of telephone networks, a standard to ensure that life-saving medical equipment in the hospital is electromagnetically compatible, or a standard to help a company in providing a service that is quality managed and environmentally friendly, International Standards provide a veritable backbone for daily life. They encourage an improved quality of life by contributing to safety, human health and the protection of the environment."

ISO, IEC and ITU, whose scopes of standardization complement each other, form a complete system for the supply of voluntary international technical agreements. Published as "International Standards" or "Recommendations", these agreements are helping to bring about the compatibility of technology worldwide.

The ISO, IEC and ITU leaders declare: "If machines, systems or devices work together, in many cases you have International Standards to thank for it - even if few are those that realize it."