19. April 2012

Danish Minister for Science, Innovation and Higher Education: Standardisation activities are of great value to society and the corporate sector

The value of standardisation was brought into focus when Danish Standards gathered business people and politicians at a network conference for all interested parties at Lokomotivværkstedet.

Denmark needs standards which provide a unique tool for generating growth in a time of crisis. This was one of the key messages at Danish Standards’ network conference, which attracted more than 400 business people. Minister for Science, Innovation and Higher Education Morten Østergaard spoke about the importance of standardisation in connection with the development of Denmark’s new growth and economic policy. 

 ”We all have an interest in ensuring that our investments in research, innovation and education foster growth and job creation. Predictability is an important element in that context and here we need to focus on standardisation. Today we see the great value of standardisation activities to society and the corporate sector. I will not pre-empt the outcome of our analyses, but standardisation is indeed relevant in terms of our innovation strategy, said Minister Morten Østergaard, and referred to electric vehicles and electronic patient records, which are based on standards.

Among the speakers at the network conference were also ISO Deputy Secretary-General Kevin McKinley and CEO Anne Hasløv Stæhr of Danish Standards, who was challenged by Lasse Rimmer, the compere of the conference. She said:

”In the next 40 years the global population is expected to increase by two billion. This puts great demands on our ability to develop new solutions to protect the environment and conserve resources. Standardisation of these new solutions will be imperative in order to popularise and commercialise them on a large scale. There is no doubt that Danish businesses who take steps to introduce new standards can give us significant competitive advantages.” 

The conference offered four different workshops focusing on standardisation in terms of bottom line and growth, innovation, globalisation and international influence. At the workshop on international influence, Head of Department Hans Fhær Larsen, Novo, spoke about the importance of standards to the development of the insulin pen in the international market.