标准20252016年9月11日，ISO发展中国家事务委员会（ISO /DEVCO)）在北京召开年度大会。在开幕式讲话中，世行集团贸易和竞争力全球业务总监福曼表示，贸易和和标准是实现联合国可持续发展目标(UN SDGs)的两大核心因素。
实现联合国可持续发展的目标是世界银行集团的重中之重和优先考虑的目标。福曼表示：“不久前，我们集团同国际标准化组织签署了一份谅解备忘录，对此我们倍感自豪，令人振奋的是，国际标准化组织早已经独立解决与可持续发展相关的问题”。提及此，福曼以ISO制定的IS0 26000 社会责任指南为例，说明标准的制定对可持续发展具有推动作用。他说：“该指南内容涵盖广泛，充分体现了一个组织在可持续发展事业中的担当和作为。广而言之，ISO制定的21000项标准可成为实现经济、环境和社会三者和谐可持续发展的一大利器”。
福曼认为，人类实现可持续发展目标的能力受到一系列全球大势的影响：人口变化、城市化、资源压力、气候变化和全球化革命。她说：“所有这些因素既能影响我们的环保标准，也会受制于人类标准”。但对贸易而言，标准非常重要。
福曼认为，贸易可帮助达成可持续发展目标。以可持续发展目标的第二条：结束饥饿贸易壁垒为例，该目标表明，尽管非洲具有粮食自给的潜力，但目前而言，除5%的粮食能够自给外，其余全部从外国进口。贸易能够带来经济发展机遇，促进男女性别平等（目标五），推动社会创新（目标九）。
发展中国家之间的贸易已成为当前新型国际贸易领域一大突出特点。对此，福曼解释道：“25年来，发展中国家间的全球价值链贸易规模增长了四倍，这里提到的贸易，实际指的是国际标准日程中一系列核心内容，它既是货物贸易和服务贸易，也是各国间投资、技术、理念和人员的相互流通”。福曼认为，ISO为各国之间广泛的交流提供了信心支持。福曼说：“ISO制定的标准已然成为国际贸易的通行证”。
在演讲中，福曼特别强调了ISO制定的标准是如何帮助实现国际可持续发展目标，其主要归纳为以下两点：一是帮助提高发展中国家全球贸易参与率，因为拒绝参与国际贸易，将阻碍该国吸引外资和参与国际外包活动。二是为实现可持续发展目标提供了一个实际的解决途径。
因此，推动标准化进程也是世界银行集团的一大目标。今天我们携手ISO以及各国人民进一步加强在标准化领域的工作。若想使已有的发展机遇最大化，各国尤其发展中国家须进一步加强合作，相互支持。
世界银行集团认为，实现可持续发展目标离不开三大关键支柱，而制定的标准却也为这三大关键支柱提供了支持。
第一大关键支柱是数据。为使决策实事求是，准确把握出现的问题并实现对进度的监测, 我们需要一个更加严格系统的数据收集渠道和数据应用方法。
第二大关键支柱是金融。于一国发展而言，仅官方支持还远远不够。须更加重视调动国内资源。而标准的制定可吸引民间资本，促进社会经济发展。
第三大关键支柱是缔结合作伙伴关系。我们必须增强已有的合作伙伴关系并不断建设新的合作伙伴关系。其中，国际标准化组织和世银集团之间的合作伙伴关系便是一大核心。
ISO/DEVCO向各成员国表示，其制定的国际标准可满足发展中国家的发展需求。在其召开的第50次年度大会上，ISO主席张晓刚博士希望大家能够积极关注最新发布的《发展中国家2016-2020年行动发展计划》，该行动计划为发展中国家未来五年的发展指明了战略方向。这份全新的行动计划目标宏伟，相当有远见。其设定的目标也和联合国制定的可持续发展目标相一致。
张晓刚博士表示：“能发布这份行动计划令人兴奋，因为我们组织的未来和发展中国家的未来，二者存在战略相关性。因为就我们组织甚至全球而言，发展中国家的成员国占据绝大多数。世界若想进步，发展中国家必须进步”。张晓刚说：“组织中有的成员国苦于有限的资源和复杂的国家状况，日子过得并不好，它们才是急需帮助的对象。不过我们同样也要帮助新兴经济体成员国，因为短期看来，新兴经济体可为国际标准化进程做出重大贡献”。
世行集团的福曼认为，国际标准还有如下好处：
一是促进经济可持续发展，提高生产率；二中帮助加快采纳有效的管理措施，形成规模经济，中小企业可从中受益不少；三是 通过减少贸易壁垒，树立对贸易产品及服务的质量与安全的信心，促进开放型国际贸易的发展；四是 促进创新，推广技术；五是为环保和社会事宜营造一个公平的竞争环境，为制定国际协定提供参考；六是 为各方理解社会难题、就社会难题达成一致奠定一个共同基础；七中 帮助国际社会和广大消费者规避危险或有害的产品和做法。
ISO standards help meet SDGs says World Bank Group expert
Trade and standards are key for meeting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs), said Cecile Fruman, World Bank Group Director, Trade and Competitiveness Global Practices. Fruman was speaking at the opening of the annual meeting of the ISO Committee on developing country matters (DEVCO), which took place in Beijing, China, on 11 September 2016.
The SDGs are a priority for the World Bank Group. “We are proud to have recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with ISO, and it’s heartening to note that ISO addresses a number of the SDGs directly.” Fruman cited ISO 26000 on social responsibility as an example of a standard contributing to sustainable development. “It is the most comprehensive guidance of what an organization should do to contribute to sustainable development. More broadly, ISO’s portfolio of more than 21 000 standards provides practical tools for all three dimensions of sustainable development: economic, environmental and societal.”
For Fruman, a number of key global trends will impact our collective capacity to meet the SDGs’ ambitious targets: demographic change; urbanization; pressure on resources; climate change; and the evolution of globalization. “All of them are likely to both shape the environment for standards and also be shaped by standards,” she said. But standards’ contribution to trade is particularly important.
According to Fruman, trade addresses all SDGs. Take, for example, SDG Goal 2 to end hunger – trade barriers have meant that only 5 % of African food staples are sourced from the continent itself, even though the potential is there to meet their own food security needs. Trade can also boost gender equality (Goal 5) through the creation of economic opportunities, and drive innovation (Goal 9).
“South-South trade is a key feature of the new international trade landscape. As evidence of this, global-value chain-related trade between developing countries has quadrupled in the last 25 years,” explained Fruman. “When I say ‘trade’, it is really shorthand for many of the issues central to the international standards agenda: not just trade of goods and services, but also investment, as well as flows of technology, ideas and people.” In Fruman’s view, standards build the confidence that underpins these different exchanges. “ISO standards have established themselves as the ‘passport’ of international trade.”
She emphasized two powerful ways in which ISO standards contribute to achieving the SDGs. First, by helping to increase developing country participation in trade – failing to do this is one of the greatest barriers to investment and outsourcing. Second, as a vessel for practical solutions to implement the SDGs.
Promoting standardization is therefore an important goal for the World Bank Group. “As we intensify our work in the area of standards, together with ISO and many of you represented here today… closer cooperation and support, especially for developing countries, will be needed to maximize the opportunities that exist.”
From the World Bank Group perspective, there are three pillars key to meeting the SDGs. Standards can contribute to all of them.
- The first is data. We need a more rigorous and systematic approach to collecting and utilizing data to make fact-based decisions, diagnose problems and monitor progress.
- The second is financing. Official development support is not enough; it needs to be complemented by a much greater focus on domestic resource mobilization. Standards can draw private investment.
- The third pillar is implementation backed by partnerships. There is a need to strengthen existing partnerships and form new ones. ISO and the World Bank Group partnership is key.
The ISO DEVCO committee brings together national member bodies from around the world to look at how international standardization can meet the needs of developing countries. Opening their 50th meeting, ISO President Dr Zhang Xiaogang drew attention to the new Action Plan for developing countries 2016-2020, which sets the strategic directions for the next five years. “This new Action Plan is ambitious. It’s visionary. Its targets are fully aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations.
“This is very exciting because ISO’s future, our future, is strategically linked with that of developing countries. They make up the majority of our members. And of the world. To progress, we need them to progress.
“There are members who are struggling because of limited resources or complex national situations. They need our help the most. But we also need to support members from emerging economies. They are the ones that can make important contributions to international standardization in the short term.”
For World Bank Group’s Cecile Fruman, the benefits of international standards are:
- Support sustainable economic growth and productivity gains
- Help facilitate the adoption of good regulatory practice and create economies of scale that are particularly beneficial for small and medium enterprises
- Promote open international trade by reducing technical barriers and building confidence in the quality and safety of traded products, and increasingly also services
- Promote innovation and technology diffusion
- Level the playing field on environmental and societal issues, and codify international agreements
- Provide common ground for understanding and agreement on difficult issues, e.g. social responsibility
- Help to protect communities and consumers from unsafe and harmful products and practices