UNE has recently published two new standards of the Technical Committee CTN 166 “R&D&I Activities”. They cover aspects that have not been dealt with in other standards, such as the ethical assessment of R&D&I, for which they establish requirements and provide recommendations. The first, UNE-CWA 17145-1:2018 "Ethical evaluation of R&D&I. Part 1: Ethics committee”, defines how to establish an ethics committee and its codes of best practice. The second, UNE-CWA 17145-2:2018 "Ethical evaluation of R&D&I. Part 2: Framework for ethical impact assessment” provides practical guidance on the evaluation process of the ethical impact of R&D&I.
As recognised by the R&D&I State Plan 2017-2020, compliance with good practice in research is a key factor in the accomplishment of a research project, with and for society, as well as in the increase of levels of trust in society in the value of R&D&I. These standards can be useful for universities, research and technology centres, companies and other organisations aiming to establish or update their protocols of ethical evaluation of R&D&I. Both are adoptions of European documents and are based on international best practices.
