Who writes the digital product passport standards

CEN and CENELEC write the standards for the digital product passport. The two bodies run one committee for the work, and its number is CEN/CLC/JTC 24.

The committee's full name is Digital Product Passport, Framework and System. Its secretariat sits with DIN.

That committee decides the technical shape of a passport. New Zealand has no seat on it, and Standards New Zealand has adopted none of the six published standards.

So do not wait for a New Zealand standard. You will learn the technical requirements after the committee sets them. Each standard text costs 190 to 370 euros on the distributor listings.

A joint technical committee writes documents, and it does not make law

CEN and CENELEC are two European standards bodies. This site does not expand either name, because no checked source gives the full names.

A joint technical committee is one committee that two standards bodies run together. CEN and CENELEC set up JTC 24 for the passport work. So one committee wrote one set of standards, and the two bodies did not write two competing sets.

The committee does not choose its own subject. The European Commission asks for a standard, and the committee writes it. The request for this work is Standardisation Request M/604. An amendment, M/604_Amd1, followed.

Warning: a committee document is not law. A standard binds nobody on its own, and it stays voluntary even after a law points at it. See what is a harmonised standard.

Industry takes part as well. GS1 holds a liaison with the committee, through its member organisations. This site has verified no other industry route, and no New Zealand route.

The Commission asks, the committee drafts, a vote runs, then the Commission cites

Five steps run in order.

1. The European Commission issues a standardisation request.
2. The committee drafts the standard.
3. A formal vote runs, and it closes on a fixed date.
4. CEN and CENELEC publish the standard.
5. The Commission may cite the standard in the Official Journal.

Step five is the step with legal effect. Citation gives a product that is built to the standard a presumption of conformity. The standard itself stays voluntary, and the citation does not change that. No delegated act covers a product group today, so the presumption has no practical effect yet.

The table below gives the dates for the six published standards.

The Decision rests on the European law on standardisation. It does not rest on the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), which is the law that creates the passport. The article numbers are on the page for Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736.

The committee produced eight standards, and six are published

Six standards are published and cited. Two are still under approval.

The official titles of the six are on the page for which standards apply.

Count the six. There is no EN 18217 and no EN 18218. Some sources join the first number and the last number with the word "to". That notation invents two documents that do not exist, and a person who orders by it cannot tell which six to buy.

The drafts are prEN 18239 and prEN 18246. Their formal vote closed on 16 July 2026. CEN and CENELEC still show both as under approval. Neither is published and neither is cited, so neither gives a presumption of conformity today.

New Zealand has no seat, and no New Zealand body has adopted the six

The committee is European. This site searched the CEN and CENELEC membership and the published committee records, and found no New Zealand body on it.

Standards New Zealand has adopted none of the six standards. It sells all six as resold British Standards Institution editions, which is a different thing. It adopts a European standard when it chooses to, and it has not chosen to here.

Its 2025 consultation on digital standards reached no passport standard at all.

One New Zealand government source names the six, and it is a shop rather than a guide. A search of the Standards New Zealand catalogue for "digital product passport" returns all six, each dated 28 May 2026.

This site searched for New Zealand material on 16 August 2026, in fifteen separate searches, and read 104 separate pages. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade wrote the substantial government account, in a market report of October 2025. See what New Zealand agencies have said.

That report predates every one of these standards, so it names none of them. This site searched all 104 pages for Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736, and no New Zealand source names it.

The order of events is a problem for you. The committee fixed the technical shape first. The text then went behind a paywall, at 190 to 370 euros for each standard on the distributor listings. Standards New Zealand sells the same document for 847.47 New Zealand dollars.

This site has not bought any of the six. So it states no normative content for any of them. See why the standard texts are paywalled.

What to do about a committee you cannot join

Warning: do not buy a standard because a supplier names the committee. Check first if a rule covers your product group.

1. Find out if a delegated act covers your product group. As at 14 August 2026 no such act covers any group.
2. Take the standard numbers and the titles from the Decision, and from nowhere else.
3. Ask your European customer which documents they will require, and ask by number.
4. Treat a scope claim about any of the six as unverified. The person who makes the claim must quote the purchased text.

One claim in wide circulation shows the risk. Many pages state a count of the product identifier schemes that EN 18219 permits, and they name a scheme among them. Nobody has checked that count against the standard. See identifier schemes: what is verified.

Your next step is on the page for first steps for a New Zealand exporter.