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European Standards (EN)

For community sports and training activities, that fall outside of the scope of sports’ federation standards, there are European Standards. These are technical standards developed by Europe’s official standardisation body the European Committee for Standardisation (Comité Européen de Normalisation – CEN).

The members of CEN are the national standards bodies (e.g. DIN, AFNOR, NEN, BSI) of the EU and EFTA member states, plus other European countries. Currently CEN has members from 34 countries, making it one of the most geographically comprehensive standardisation bodies in the world.

The are two types of European Standard. Most are voluntary standards, which are developed to support the European Single Market. By removing local standards, they enable the free movement of products removing artificial barriers to free trade. Some EN standards are known as Harmonised Standards (ENh). These are specifically requested by the European Commission to support compliance with EU legislation (e.g. the Construction Products Regulations). Currently there are no harmonised European Standards for synthetic turf sports surfaces.

European Standards are developed by technical committees (TC). For sports surfaces this is CEN TC 217: Surfaces for Sports Areas. Often the work is undertaken in working groups and for synthetic turf this is CEN TC 217 Working Group 6. Currently, there are no CEN committees directly considering synthetic turf used for landscaping or recreational applications.

Members of a CEN technical committee or working group are nominated by their national standards body. Their job is to ensure that national positions, technical expertise, and stakeholder interests are properly reflected in the development of a new EN standard. Additionally other interested bodies (e.g. European trade associations, European consumer groups) may join technical committee and working group as observers. Observer groups may participate in the meetings and drafting of a new En, but do not have any voting rights.

For CEN TC 217 ESTC, FIFA, FIH, World Rugby and World Tennis have observer status.

European Standards (EN)

Sport’s governing bodies

At the international level, standards are set by a number of international sports federations and compliance is often mandated through their sporting and competition regulations. International sports’ federations setting standards for synthetic turf sports surfaces include:

Additionally, some national sports federations set their own standards for surfaces and fields used in their domestic competitions.

The development of sports’ federation standards is led by the federations, working with selected industry partners, test institutes and research organisation. The process is flexible and allows the standards to be updated whenever a need is identified. The standards generally focus on single sport’s use, often at the higher levels of competition.