I just hope that during my brief statement I don't cause any indigestion for committee members.
Mr. Chair, if you allow me, I will read my statement and then as you get to dessert, we'll be able to entertain questions.
On behalf of the Standards Council of Canada, I appreciate the opportunity to provide my comments on the programs and activities of the Canadian General Standards Board. As you are aware, the SCC is Canada’s national accreditation body. We accredit organizations that are in the business of developing and maintaining standards. In our lingo, we call those bodies standards development organizations, so when an organization develops standards, the acronym we use to refer to it is SDO. You'll hear me talking about SDOs. I apologize if I get into acronyms. We also accredit bodies that certify products to ensure they meet the standards. Those bodies are called conformity assessment bodies or CABs. So you have organizations that develop standards and organizations that test products according to those standards. We accredit both types of organizations at SCC. SCC, it's very important to note, does not develop standards itself, so we are not in the business of developing standards, and we do not certify products either. From that vantage point, SCC is not a competitor to the Canadian General Standards Board, CGSB. Our role is to accredit this organization when it develops standards or in a case where it certifies products. That's our relationship with CGSB.
Up until three years ago, there were only four organizations that were accredited to develop standards in Canada. One was the CGSB. That's the subject of our discussion this afternoon. Then there's the Canadian Standards Association, CSA, which is the largest one in Canada. So that's another one. You also heard Rae Dulmage earlier this morning from Underwriters' Laboratories of Canada, ULC; and Monsieur Rousseau from the BNQ. So those are the four organizations that we accredited previously. Since 2012 the number of SCC-accredited bodies to develop standards has been expanded to eight. So now we accredit eight organizations. The additional organizations include the American Society for Testing and Materials, ASTM. It's a very large U.S.-based organization with hundreds of standards being used across Canada. There is Underwriters' Laboratories, UL; the Air Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute, AHRI; and the last one recently, the National Sanitation Foundation, NSF, which is in the business of developing standards for water quality and testing. I will explain the impact of this important development in a few minutes.
In order to maintain SCC accreditation, all SDOs must follow a standards development process that we have developed and are maintaining. This process is based on internationally accepted guidelines. It is in compliance with the Code of Good Practice from the World Trade Organization. In a few words, it promotes the open, transparent, and inclusive standards development process. The SDOs that we accredit must establish standards development committees that consist of a balanced matrix of representatives from affected stakeholders. That's one thing. The second thing is that committee members are selected based on their ability to represent a combination of interests and expertise. No single group in our committee structure can dominate the agenda or decide the outcome. A balanced matrix of interests means a balance between regulators and industry, consumers and academics, so that you come to a consensus when you develop a standard.
One important aspect of our process is that—and you heard it this morning—the developer of the standards is required to assess the need for revisions at least every five years. If that needs to be done more frequently, then the SDOs will do that. This is an important feature of the standards development process. In response to technological change, health and safety, and market conditions, many standards are under almost constant review and revision.
I want to talk to you about trends regarding standardization in the country, which impact CGSB, consumers, and regulators.
Over the past decade, we have seen a clear shift from developing and using domestic standards to developing and using either North American or international standards in Canada. Our catalogue of domestic standards, which used to contain more than 5,000 different documents about 15 years ago, has shrunk to 2,600 this year—so it's been diminished by roughly half—and that downward trend will continue, so we'll have fewer and fewer specifically Canadian standards in our current marketplace in terms of standards development. Conversely, we have seen a significant growth of activity at the international level. If you think about the major standards development organizations internationally, such as ISO, IEC, which deals with electro-technical standards, and ITU, which deals with telecommunications, their combined catalogue of standards exceeds 30,000 documents. We see about 1,000 to 2,000 standards being published every year by these three large organizations, so the catalogue of standards internationally is growing by leaps and bounds.
Our role at SCC is to coordinate the effective participation of more than 2,600 Canadians in international standards development activities to ensure that our strategic interests are reflected in the key standards that are being developed. The issue here is that we have to make a distinction, given the scope of activity, between those areas in which we have to agree and accept that we are standards-takers, while accepting that these international standards can be used in Canada, and those areas in which we have to become standards-makers, areas in which we have a strategic interest in ensuring that those standards reflect our needs. That's a distinction that wasn't made in the past and now we need to focus on it more and more. We're seeing industry reducing its investment in domestic standards and at the same time, when you look at regulators, we're seeing increasing reliance on international standards.
SCC maintains a database of all standards that are incorporated by reference in federal regulations. In 2014, we found more than 1,160 different standards incorporated in federal regulations. Only 38% of those standards are domestic. Everything else is either a standard from the U.S., a regional standard or an international standard. The trend is continuing, so as our domestic catalogue is shrinking, we see regulators using more and more regional and international standards.
I've spoken to you about the accreditation of those four additional SDOs in Canada. We should note that these organizations have been active in the country for many years. For example, ASTM, which is a very large U.S.-based testing business, has more than 1,400 Canadians participating in its committees. It's not as though it's a U.S.-based organization that has no roots in the country. It has significant roots in the country. We're just recognizing a fact of life now with the accreditation of this organization in Canada.
In terms of the trends, we're also seeing that Canadian business interests have been loud and clear on the need for one standard, one test accepted everywhere, in order to maintain their competitiveness vis-à-vis other regional markets, such as those in Europe and Asia. This is why our accreditation of these new standards development organizations makes sense: they will allow for the development of joint Canada-U.S. standards.
From a public policy perspective, we also need to step up our efforts on the standards front to develop more joint Canada-U.S. standards in order to support the objectives of the Regulatory Cooperation Council, the RCC. One example that we've recently announced is that UL will be developing joint Canada-U.S. standards for life jackets and marine abandonment suits. These will facilitate the harmonization efforts between Transport Canada and its counterparts in the U.S. Once developed, these standards will be adopted as national standards for Canada as well as the U.S. These standards will replace outdated domestic standards that are currently in CGSB's standards catalogue.
Over the course of the last three years, as part of its maintenance process, SCC has reviewed and looked at CGSB's standards catalogue. We've seen a trend here that I think is important for you to be aware of. We've asked CGSB to review and update its standards that have not been maintained according to our accreditation requirements. Although CGSB did withdraw more than 650 outdated standards from its collection, over half of the standards currently in its catalogue remain out of date. This situation is problematic for key stakeholders, including regulators, industry, and consumers.
As you continue your study, I hope this provides some context surrounding standardization in Canada, and I would be pleased to take any comments or questions.
