General Public & NGOs

The general public is all of the people or citizens in an area country or wider geographical space. Citizens of an OECD member country or a non-member country adhering to the Mutual Acceptance of Data as well as citizens of other countries working in the public or private areas or on behalf of an interest group can participate in the work on Test Guidelines by submitting comments to their National Coordinator, the OECD secretariat or approved policy committees and organisations; the Business and Industry Advisory Committee (BIAC), the International Council on Animal Protection (ICAPO), or the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) (Consult Instructions for Commenting on Draft Test Guidelines).

Citizens participating in the work on Test Guidelines can provide comments on draft Test Guidelines/ or other documents (such as Guidance Documents) open for public commenting (Consult the list of currently open to public commenting TGs/GDs).

Citizens can participate using their own time to review publicly available documents of their interests.

Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) is a group or institution with a social mission that operates independently from a government. The remit of NGOs is variable depending on the interests of their members (e.g. animal welfare, alternatives to animal experiments ecology, consumer rights). Generally, global NGOs ensure that the interests of civil societies and members are represented at regulation/policymaking levels. They also have a common remit to inform and train citizens/members and to support independent research and projects identifying priority areas and raising funds.

Structure can be variable following the organisation but generally implies the consultation of members through annual general assemblies, in which members of the executive committee or board, and the secretariat are elected for several years. Sometimes executive and secretariat are subdivided into departments or committees and overseen by a director or CEO.

Global NGOs can be involved in standardisation and harmonisation processes through variable channels, directly either as an invited participating member or as an official stakeholder of an institution such as EURL ECVAM. Global NGOs can also use official OECD policy committees and organisations of the OECD Test Guidelines Programme; the International Council on Animal Protection (ICAPO) or the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) depending on their area of interest. OECD Test Guidelines and Guidance Documents drafts are also open to the public for consultation and comments before finalisation, giving a window to citizens and groups of interest to provide comments and questions on harmonised test methods.

Global NGOs can provide scientific expert knowledge and comments, and support for the identification of regulation needs as they can have expertise across different legislations/regulations for specific topics. Ensure harmonisation practices make use of available non-animal methods, support the standardisation and harmonisation of in vitro technical requirements (NAMs), and support standards and harmonised test methods toward the green transition objectives.
They may be involved as an Advisory Board member (e.g. CIEL and NanoHarmony), Project partner (e.g. Peta and ASINA, SAFE and SISTERS, ZeroW, R3PACK, CIRCALGAE), or by participating in events and workshops.

Some of the NGOs are selling products as a source of income other than donations and fundraisers, or participation in projects.  

A list of NGO members of ICAPO and EEB can be consulted; Who We Are | ICAPO and Our Members (eeb.org).