The Affiliates of CEN and CENELEC are National Standards Bodies and National Committees in countries covered by the European Neighbourhood Policy of the European Union. CEN has Affiliates in 17 countries (all of which are also members of ISO), while CENELEC has Affiliates in 13 of these countries (all of which are also members of the IEC).

Each Affiliate has the right to adopt (or 'implement') any European Standard (EN) as a national standard, provided that it notifies the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre and respects the 'Guidelines for the distribution and sales of CEN/CENELEC publications' (CEN/CENELEC Guide 10). The notification of adoptions by Affiliates is important for CEN and CENELEC, as well as for the European Commission.

Notifications enable CEN and CENELEC to monitor the level of uptake of European Standards in their Affiliates’ territories, and provide accurate information to their national members. This information is also valuable for the European Commission, as the alignment of standards is especially relevant for the negotiation of trade agreements and, in certain cases, the EU accession process. Finally, notifications can also help the CEN and CENELEC Management Centre (CCMC) to identify the priority sectors in different countries and develop more targeted actions and events (seminars, etc.).

CEN and CENELEC have an IT (Information Technology) system in place that allows Affiliates to easily notify their adoptions of European Standards (ENs), and CCMC has increased its efforts to encourage Affiliates to notify their adoptions of ENs, with mostly positive results. In particular, Affiliates in the Western Balkans region (Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia) have notified very high levels of adoption of the CEN
and CENELEC standards catalogues.

In recent months, Affiliates in a number of countries (namely Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Egypt, Georgia, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Moldova, Morocco and Tunisia) have shown significant improvements in terms of fulfilling the obligation to notify CCMC about adoptions of ENs. CEN and CENELEC thank their Affiliates for the progress made so far, and encourage them to pursue their efforts towards the alignment of standards in order to facilitate trade and economic development.