News article • 4 mins read
On October 14th, the global community comes together to celebrate World Standards Day, a time to recognise the essential role of international standards in creating a more connected, secure, and sustainable world. The theme for 2024, “Our Shared Vision for a Better World“, highlights how standards can support the achievement of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), with a specific focus on SDG 9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure. This year, the spotlight is on how standards drive innovation and sustainability, particularly through fostering global collaboration in the age of artificial intelligence (AI).
The importance of international standards
Standards are foundational to modern society. They provide the technical frameworks that ensure interoperability, quality, and safety across industries. Whether it’s enabling the seamless operation of complex supply chains or supporting the secure and ethical development of AI, standards create a shared language that drives trust and cooperation between countries, industries, and people. This is vital to addressing global challenges like climate change, infrastructure development, and sustainable industrial growth.
By developing and implementing global standards, countries can accelerate progress towards SDG 9. This goal emphasises building resilient infrastructure, promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialisation, and fostering innovation. AI, which is transforming industries worldwide, can greatly benefit from these efforts and standards are currently being developed to help ensure that AI technologies are developed in a secure, ethical, and sustainable manner, enabling widespread adoption and fostering global collaboration.
The role of accreditation in supporting standards
Accreditation plays a critical role in enhancing and underpinning trust in global standardisation. It provides independent, third-party verification that accredited conformity assessment bodies (such as testing and calibration laboratories, certification bodies, inspection bodies, validation and verification bodies, medical laboratories and diagnostic medical services) are competent to carry out specific activities against the requirements of recognised international standards. UKAS accreditation ensures these organisations operate with impartiality and integrity. This strengthens trust and confidence to governments, consumers, and businesses in the products, services, and systems that rely on international standards.
As the United Kingdom’s National Accreditation Body, UKAS supports efforts to meet SDG 9 by ensuring that industries and businesses across the UK adhere to rigorous international standards. This fosters innovation, reduces risks, and supports sustainable growth. Moreover, by promoting global consistency in the application of standards, UKAS accreditation facilitates international trade and collaboration, helping industries worldwide meet shared environmental, social, and economic goals.
As part of the UK Quality Infrastructure (UKQI), UKAS works closely with its fellow UKQI partners the British Standards Institute (BSI), the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), the Office of Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) and the Chartered Quality Institute (CQI). Each of these bodies plays a distinct but complementary role in promoting quality, reliability, and innovation across industries. BSI develops national and international standards, NPL focuses on measurement science and calibration, OPSS is the UK’s national product regulator and CQI promotes best practices in quality management.
Together with UKAS, these organisations collaborate to create a robust infrastructure that enhances the UK’s global competitiveness. This spirit of cooperation ensures that the UKQI is far greater than the sum of its parts, delivering a comprehensive framework that supports and enhances technological advancement, fosters innovation, and increases trust in products, services, and systems across the UK and internationally.
Innovation through collaboration
Global challenges require global solutions, and standards are a key enabler of international cooperation. The development of standards is a collaborative and consensual process involving technical and other experts from around the world, including industry leaders, scientists, policymakers, academics and consumer advocates. This ensures standards are not only technically robust but also inclusive and aligned with the needs of diverse stakeholders.
Accreditation, in turn, supports this global collaboration by providing the necessary attestation that maintains the credibility of standards and their consistent application across borders. This is particularly important as we embrace emerging cross border technologies like AI, where trust and transparency are essential for widespread adoption.
A path toward a sustainable future
International standards and accreditation are more than just technical requirements but vital tools for achieving a shared vision for a better, more sustainable future. By supporting SDG 9, standards and accreditation drive innovation and help to create resilient and agile industries that can meet the challenges of tomorrow.
At UKAS, we are proud to play a part in this global effort, ensuring that organisations in the UK continue to meet the requirements of these international standards, contributing to a better world for all.