Role of ARATA in Developing Australian Standards for Assistive Technology Products

Standards Australia is the Australia’s leading independent, non-governmental and not for profit standards organisation.  It is charged by the Commonwealth Government to meet Australia’s need for contemporary, internationally aligned Standards and relevant services. Standards Australia is also Australia’s representative for the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and makes sure that Australia has a voice in the international standards development. More information about Standards Australia can be found on their website https://www.standards.org.au/

ME-067 : Assistive technology products for Persons with Disability is Standards Australia’s technical committee that works on drafting, reviewing and updating national and international standards relating to assistive technology products for persons with disability. The committee consist of experts (participating and observing) from several public, private and not for profit organisations across Australia and meets 2-4 times every year either face to face or via teleconference. The committee works throughout the year, especially in between meetings to facilitate the drafting and publishing of Australian standards. 

ARATA is one of the contributing organisations for the development of ME-067 standards and ARATA’s representative is a participating member of the committee who is financially supported by ARATA for reasonable travel costs. As a participating member the representative is involved in reviewing and writing standards and technical specifications pertaining to a wide range of assistive products including wheelchairs, hoists, personal hygiene, cognitive accessibility, and more.

The ARATA ME067 representative reports back to the ARATA Board and provides updates and summary of committee’s activities to the ARATA membership. The reports are also uploaded on ARATA’s website and can also be found in the latest news section. The summary report from

the ME067 meeting held in March 2018 can be found here.

the ME067 meeting held in June 2019 can be found here

the ME067 meeting held in November 2019 can be found here

Here is the list of projects ME067 is currently working on and ARATA members can email its current representative Karthik (Karthik.pasumarthy@health.wa.gov.au) to obtain more information:

International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) Representation

Standards Australia take the approach of harmonising with international standards. This may involve adding an Australian appendix to an ISO standard to make it applicable to Australian conditions. Australian experts are drawn from ME067 to sit on International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) committees and contribute to the development of international standards. A number of ARATA members hold expert representation roles on Technical Committee 173 Assistive Products.