IEC and CENELEC signed an Agreement on ‘Common planning of new work and parallel voting’, the CENELEC Guide 13, better known as the ‘Frankfurt Agreement’ (the first agreement was signed in 1991, known as the "Lugano agreement", then replaced by the "Dresden agreement" in 1996 until it was revised as "Frankfurt agreement" in 2016).
The Frankfurt Agreement concerns the adoption of International Standards as European Standards. Other deliverables, i.e. Technical Specifications and Technical Reports are not part of the agreement.
The aim of this agreement is to promote the exchange of information, to increase transparency and to avoid duplication of work.
Mainly the work is developed by IEC and adopted through parallel procedure at CENELEC level. In some cases work is initiated by CENELEC and offered to IEC, either as a European Work Item (EWI) or as a published European Standard.
The implementation of the Frankfurt Agreement is described in the 'Day-to-day management' document.