Page 10 - CE Marking

PART 2 CE-Marking
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for the Safety of Toys (88/378/EEC) includes both teddy bears and
construction blocks.
Because of their broad scope, the new directives no longer include
detailed-and rapidly outdated-technical requirements. Instead,
they contain so-called essential requirements. These are general
requirements covering all possible hazards related to consumer
safety.
In practice, the manufacturer of a CE-marked product is responsible
for coming up with solutions on how to control these hazards and thus
on how to comply with the directive(s).
The technical details on how to implement the requirements of the new
directives can be derived from standards.
National standards indicate how legal requirements can be fulfilled.
However, unlike directives and national law, standards have no legal
status; manufacturers may ignore them if they wish. They are merely
a collectively designed answer to possible product safety problems.
The EU is currently aiming at harmonising national standards and
bringing them together to form a basis for the efficient implementation of
EU directives. The process of standard harmonisation is well underway,
though not all standards have been harmonised yet.
For some product groups, such as weighing instruments, simple
pressure equipment and gas appliances, more than 80 per cent
of standards have been harmonised, but for others, such as in
vitro medical devices and equipment used in potentially explosive
atmospheres, the score is less than 30 per cent.
In those cases for which there are no harmonised EU standards yet,
national standards apply. Once the process of harmonisation has been
Harmonised Standards