Standards Offices

Standards Offices educate and inform businesses, mainly SMEs, about standards and their importance for competitiveness.

They offer the following services:

• informing companies about standards in preparation;
• facilitating consideration of SME interests in the drafting of standards;
• assisting individual companies with their research, interpretation and standards application problems.

They have been established at collective research centres since 1998.

Currently, 19 Standards Offices have been set up within 7 collective research centres.

Standards Offices are supported financially by the FPS Economy via the Standards Bureau to which it has delegated that task.

The 19 Standards Offices

The 6 Standards Offices of the Belgian Building Research Institute – BBRI :

• fire prevention;
• eurocodes;
• energy and indoor climate;
• acoustics;
• drainage and water supply in buildings;
• concrete, mortar and aggregates.

The 5 Standards Offices of the Collective Centre of the Belgian Technology Industry - Sirris:

• overall safety of machinery and equipment;
• process equipment’;
• construction products directive for manufacturers of metal and synthetic products;
• electrical engineering;
• ICT.

The 4 Standards Offices of the Belgian Textile Research Centre – Centexbel:

• clothing;
• technical textiles;
• interior textiles;
• non-woven products.

The Standards Office of the Research Centre of the Belgian Ceramics Industry – BCRC :

• ceramics and glass.

The Standards Office of the Technical Centre of the Wood Industry – CTIB :

• wood processing.

The Standards Office of the Belgian Road Research Centre – BRRC :

• highway materials and equipment.

The Standards Office of the Belgian Welding Institute – BWIS [only available in French]:

• welding technique.

Collective research centres

Collective research centres are research centres established on a sectoral basis.

They are created to promote and coordinate technical progress in their sector.

Their activities are threefold:

• collective research;
• miscellaneous scientific and technical services provided individually to their members;
• dissemination of technical information, training etc.

Belgian collective centres have their roots in the Decree-Law of 30 January 1947, commonly known as the ‘Groote law’. This law gives them special status. Any business in the sector is required to become a member and to pay membership contributions.

There are 9 centres that have adopted this special status in the following sectors:

• ceramics and glass – BCRC;
• cement– CRIC;
• construction – BBRI;
• road construction – BRRC;
• the technology industry – Sirris;
• textiles – Centexbel;
• wood processing – CTIB;
• breweries and malthouses - CBM;
• the diamond industry – CRSTID;

Other centres have been created with the same objectives, based on a voluntary membership and membership fees. They cover the following sectors:

• steel – CRM;
• coatings and paints – CoRI;
• welding – BWI;
• the electrical industry – Laborelec.