EUROCAE & ICAO sign Memorandum of Understanding

EUROCAE & ICAO mark the start of an even closer partnership with the signature of an updated Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). On 12 December 2017, the two organisations agreed on reinforced cooperation on the development of standards for better & safer aviation by signing an MoU along with other major standardisation bodies in aviation.

EUROCAE has been recognised by ICAO as an international organisation in 2014. Already the 12th Air Navigation Conference, held in November 2012, the community clearly recognised the value and importance of international standards and encouraged ICAO to make more and better use of such material from recognised standard-developing organisations (SDOs) to complement the ICAO provisions. This was endorsed by ICAO Assembly Resolution A38-11 in 2013. The collaboration between EUROCAE and ICAO has proven over the years to ensure a high level of aviation safety based upon harmonised rules complemented by technical standards. EUROCAE shares the same vision and is looking forward to a constructive cooperation for the benefit of the aviation industry.

The updated MoU signed today implements the political commitments to collaborate and ICAO’s appreciation of industry standards. This reinforced partnership between EUROCAE and ICAO will bring added value for both organisations and the aviation community overall. The MoU provides a basis for facilitating the collaboration, making available EUROCAE standards and ICAO provisions to be truly complementary and supporting each other’s efforts in an efficient and effective manner. This will provide to the community a full set of regulations, standards and technical specifications for deployment and harmonised implementation. A more performance-based approach to ICAO provisions will call SDOs, like EUROCAE, even more to provide technical standards and therefore the "how" to comply with the regulatory frame.

“The exchange of information permitted by these new agreements will be critical to ICAO’s efforts to develop mature and comprehensive standards for international civil aviation,” Dr. Liu, ICAO Secretary General, emphasised. “Industry standards serve unique and often complementary roles in support of global air navigation objectives, which underscores the importance of ICAO’s provisions being fully compatible with the efforts of these new partners. But most importantly,” Dr. Liu stressed, “the enhanced interoperability these agreements have achieved will directly support improved sectoral performance in terms of aviation’s safety, sustainability and efficiency.”

EUROCAE President, Francis Schubert noted that there is a line of successful examples of complementarity between EUROCAE standards and ICAO provisions, and the fact that EUROCAE standards are well coordinated with our international partners like RTCA, SAE and Arinc.
Christian Schleifer, EUROCAE Secretary General, pronounced a keynote speech during the ICAO GANIS/2 on 11 December and committed to actively cooperate within the framework of the MoU, by making best use of the limited resources available to the advantage of the community. There is much more potential of complementing ICAO´s provisions by industry standards. The MoU is an important step in addressing and closing this gap.