Cooperation between Members States in the Area of Market Surveillance - the EMARS project

1. Cooperation between Members States in the Area of Market Surveillance - the EMARS project Jan Deconinck, M.Sc. Prosafe Chairman 4th International Workshop on Conformity Assessment - Rio De Janeiro - 8 / 9 December 2008

2. EMARS • Enhancing Market Surveillance through Best Practice • Collaborative Project coordinated by Prosafe with the direct participation of fourteen EU and one EFTA member states • Set to run until end of 2008

3. Main Objective To ensure a basic level of “Best practice techniques & cross-sharing of information and expertise in market surveillance” within EEA countries

4. Main Deliverables (1) • a body of knowledge (in the English language) on market surveillance including proposals for further updates, maintenance and operation of this body • a system for rapid advise on request to Member State officers and the Commission • handbook best practise techniques

5. Main deliverables (2) • strategy document on further enhancement of market surveillance • improvement of contact with other sectors of market surveillance involved in consumer product safety • a website including a data bases on ‘who is who’, enforcement structures and procedures, body of knowledge and product fact sheets and guidelines and manuals.

6. Contents of the project • Work Package 1: Cross-sharing of information and expertise • Work Package 2: Advise on market surveillance issues • Work Package 3: Inspection programmes and Techniques • Work Package 4: Risk assessment • Work Package 5: Co-ordination and secretariat • Work Package 6: Dissemination

7. Work Package 1 Cross-sharing of information

8. Purpose • To establish a body of knowledge … acknowledged by experts as best practices • Available to Member States and the Commission • Accessible via the Internet Throughout and after the project

9. Knowledge base

10. Knowledge base

11. Overview of documents by subject

12. Work Package 2 Advise on market surveillance issues

13. Rapid Advice Forum • Informal • Rapid • Advice • Individual experts • Procedures • Experiences • Riskassessments • Directives, legislation

14. Rapid Advice Forum • Presumptions: • Answer given by individual market surveillance officers based on their personal experience and expertise. • Not the opinion of a Member State. • Recipient is not obliged to follow the answer. • Aim: • Means for exchange of practical experience. • Uniform conclusions in uniform cases.

15. procedure • Nature of request • Description of product • Picture of product • Technical documentation • Indication of directives • Indication of standards • Indication of urgency

16. procedure • Send to raf@emars.eu • Working language = English • (Provide a summary of non-English documents, e.g. instructions, test reports, etc.)

17. procedure • Checked for completeness and relevance. • Forwarded to a list of experts. • The expert gives his personal opinion. • All advices are sent back to the requester. • Published on the closed part of EMARS-website

18. EXAMPLES

19. NO – Fire Extinguisher Ball

20. PL – Blow Gun

21. Lighters project • Lighter shaped as beer can • Novelty lighter torch • Lighter with a beer opener • Marking of lighters • Lighter with a compass • Lighters with lamps (leds ?) • Lighter in the shape of a chainsaw • Lighters shaped as poker tokens • Historical weapons • Other questions • Mini motor bikes

22. Work Package 3 Inspection Programmes and Techniques

23. Main activities, WP3 • Collect and describe best practice techniques for market surveillance (“the book”). • Collect market surveillance plans to encourage cooperation between Member States • Training

24. ”The Book” – most important chapters 2The EC legislative base for market surveillance 3 Market surveillance - organisation & infrastructure 4Market surveillance - the planning stage 5Project plan setup 6Reactive market surveillance 7Projects - the implementation stage 8Projects - follow-up 9 Projects - review, reporting and analysing 10 Risk assessment 11 Risk communication 13 Cross-border information systems 15 Customs co-operation in cross-border projects

25. Market Surveillance Plans • In November-December we ask Member States to submit their annual plans for following year • 15 – 20 responses • 200+ projects (titles) • Check for potential cooperation projects • 2008: 3 joint actions • Cords and drawstrings in children’s clothes • Sunbeds • Toys with magnets or lead

26. Training • “Better training for safe consumer products” • “If everybody is doing something on training, why not cooperate” • (Everybody isn’t doing something on training)

27. Work Package 4 Risk Assessment

28. Scope of Work Package 4 • Establish and test best practice method(s) for risk assessment • Consumer products • Relation to other (international) initiatives • Close liaison with WG IRAG • Practical approach: Perform a number of risk assessments on different products

29. Concluding Remarks

30. Deliverables • The Knowledge base (available on Webex) • The Rapid Advice Forum • A list of questions handled by the RAF • The book • (including a part on risk assessment)

31. EMARS www.emars.eu Jozef II-straat 12-16 1000 Brussels +32 2 286 17 41 info@emars.eu 4th International Workshop on Conformity Assessment - Rio De Janeiro - 8 / 9 December 2008