T he International Organization for Standardization (ISO) develops and publishes more than 19,200 voluntary international standards that bring benefits for businesses, governments, and society. But how do the standards contribute to the economic returns of countries and companies? What is the bottom line?

A new brochure provides answers by giving examples in hard figures of the benefits of implementing ISO’s and other voluntary, consensus-based standards for the global economy, national economies, and individual companies from different sectors and countries.

An inventory of studies established by ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on the economic and social benefits of standards, from which many of the following examples are taken, can be accessed here.

Macroeconomic studies on the contribution of standards to national economic growth show that:

• Standardization directly contributes to the growth in the French economy, for up to 0.81 percent, or almost 25 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) growth.

 …