3.3 Challenges to consumer representation
Even though consumer participation confers many benefits on standards, there may be a number of obstacles in your country which consumer representatives will need to consider. This module should provide a first step in identifying and overcoming some of these obstacles, and the next section has more details about this.
Frequently mentioned difficulties include:
- Unfamiliarity of consumer organizations with ISO
- Lack of awareness
- Insufficient training and briefing
- Consumer organizations that are not yet organized
- Insufficient recognition by national standards bodies
- Inadequate resources for consumer representation
Unfamiliarity of consumer organizations with ISO
ISO and other standards organizations have a specialized vocabulary and "jargon". The perception is that "standards are for industry."
Lack of awareness
Lack of awareness by consumers and their associations of how standards ensure consumer protection is one of the biggest hurdles. In many countries, consumer organizations work to influence their governments to pass and enforce laws to protect them. However, this might not be the only answer.
The following three examples show the ways that standards can support legislation:
- Standards can provide the basis for legislation as mentioned in Section 1.2. Consumer input can shape and influence these standards.
- A law might not be comprehensive enough; it might not contain the technical specifications that a standard for a product could.
- Standards can provide a valuable indicator for minimum criteria to protect vulnerable markets. It is easy to forget that some consumer protection laws may be increasingly difficult to enforce due to market deregulation and globalization of trade. The "dumping" of substandard products across borders is one unfortunate result in these cases.
Many organized consumer groups campaign for better, safer, or more environmentally friendly products, but miss the chance to amend and improve specifications for the products themselves.
Insufficient training and briefing
Even when a consumer representative is willing and able to participate, an obstacle may be insufficient training and briefing available for the representative to make an effective impact. Providing support in this area is normally the shared responsibility of national standards bodies and consumer associations.
Consumer organizations that are not yet organized
Consumer organizations may realize the value of standards - but are not yet organized effectively for this work. On the one hand, they need to interact either with the national standards body, or with regional or international consumer organizations, on standards issues. On the other hand, they need to organize and brief the people who will be dealing with the standards activity.
Insufficient recognition by national standards bodies
On the other side, there is often insufficient recognition by national standards bodies of the value of consumer participation. A national standards body needs to ensure that adequate consumer representation happens at various levels.
There are many opportunities to ensure adequate consumer representation:
- Through consumer representation either on their governing or policy-making board. As a result, the standards programmes and priorities can then reflect consumers' interests.
For example, a consumer representative on a governing board might promote a standard for food packaging (either national in origin, or adopted from an existing International Standard).
- Consumer participation in key national technical committees as identified by the national standards body or a consumer group. It is neither practical nor feasible to support consumer representation in all technical committees, especially as many do not develop standards that impact directly on consumers or their environment.
- Consumer representatives within national delegations attending international technical committee meetings. The delegations should reflect a balanced view of all stakeholders within a subject area.
- Consumers' participation in NSB structures: by adequately informing consumer organizations about meetings, and by providing practical and financial help to enable consumers to attend them.
- Sharing information about forthcoming meetings, standards programmes, new work item proposals, and so on.
Inadequate resources for consumer representation
Some of the most frequent obstacles consumer organizations have are limited financial resources and human resources with appropriate expertise. Consumer representatives often rely on national standards bodies themselves to help defray the costs of attending meetings. Other sources of support are government agencies or outside donor agencies.
Consumer representation is a particular challenge at the international level.