Resource of the Week: Databases — National Institute of Standards and Technology
By Pat Harris, Technical Information Specialist (NIST)

Editor’s note: Do you work with standards? There was a time in my career when I did just that. Pat Harris, Technical Information Specialist at NIST, sent us a message to let us know about these resources, and we asked her to tell us more…so that we could share this knowledge with you.

ResourceShelf has, collectively, an amazing audience. We always enjoy hearing about resources you have developed or are hosting. Here’s Pat:

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Technical standards are one of the niche information resources that often get overlooked. This is especially true in the Untied States where the standards environment appears chaotic (and often is). Even for those who call themselves “standards professionals,” it is tough to determine which particular standard among many is operative. But over the last ten years, the federal government — recognizing that standards are increasingly important to national and global trade and critical to building a coherent business infrastructure — has invested in creating a number of free online databases to expose different facets of standards information.

The two databases that I will tell you about were developed by the Standards Services Division at NIST the National Institute of Standards and Technology (known for many years as the National Bureau of Standards.) Although these tools may not have the glitz and glam of commercial products, they have content value and are worth exploring.

And, of course, they are free.

If you work with researchers or faculty examining trade issues and the economy, companies outside the U.S. that want to import their products to the US, or US companies that are building an export strategy, you will want to know about these information tools which expose different facets of how standards are being used.

The Standards Incorporated by Reference (SIBR – I pronounce it “cyber”) database aggregates information on private-sector standards that are cited in the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), the federal government’s comprehensive codification of all federal regulations. If a standard or process is cited in the CFR, then it must be used. Not doing so is not an option if you want to do business in the U.S.

Using SIBR, you can easily find what U.S. standards are cited and underpin mandatory U.S. regulations. Why would you want to know this? In the U.S., the standards system is voluntary and market-driven — there is no “standards tsar.” Often there will be competing standards developers or at the least overlapping standards “camps.” Using the SIBR you can quickly extract the details on which U.S. standards in federal regulations are operative and be prepared to design to that standard.

You can also quickly determine how many times standards promulgated by particular standards developers are cited in the Code. You’ll find that over 300 standards organizations are mentioned. At the head of the pack are ASTM, capturing almost 2,400 citations; true to the 80/20 Rule, most organizations have fewer than ten references.

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Notify U.S., the second standards tool NIST makes available, reports on proposed national regulations and standards that are potential Technical Barriers to Trade and might impact global trade.

This database aggregates all of the TBT Notifications issued by the 153-members of the World Trade Organization. The World Trade Organization (WTO) works to make international trade flow smoothly and fairly by requiring that the rules of trade be transparent and predictable. This database supports transparency because it makes public what is going on at the ground level.

What we see in the trade world is that, as traditional trade barriers such as tariffs and duties have been lowered, technical barriers to trade, such as national regulations and standards, have proven to be equally effective tools for restricting access to national markets. Labeling and packaging requirements, and conformance to a particular national standard are the most common examples of technical barriers to trade. To support an open and transparent trading community, WTO members are required to inform the WTO community of proposed national standards and regulations that might be construed as a Technical Barrier to Trade.

The Notify U.S. database aggregates all of the WTO notifications and makes them searchable by country, topic, HS (Harmonized Schedule) code and ICS (International Classification for Standards, an ISO code set) code. Most important, it also links each entry to the full-text of the original announcement. For example, U.S. entries are linked to the announcement in the Federal Register. This feature ensures that database users get to the legal source.

Notify U.S. also offers an email alert service; registered users receive a brief email message telling them of new notifications that meet their defined profile. Is your company a pump manufacturer that exports only to Japan and Korea? Your Notify U.S. profile can be set up to include only Korean and Japanese notifications that pertain to pumps. This feature minimizes clutter in your in-box.

This database has grown considerably since its release in 2005 and, over time, trends will emerge. Already you can see that China, the U.S., Brazil are the biggest notifiers. However, it is also interesting to note that countries that are classified as developing economies are starting to notify proposed national standards and regulations, a sign that their economies are expanding due to growing trade culture.