In todays increasingly competitive global market, the quality of footwear products has become an important factor restricting their market performance. Europe, as an important pole of the global economy, its standard system has a significant impact on the global footwear market. Understanding the European footwear standard system is of great significance to enterprises engaged in the design, production and sales of footwear products.

In the footwear manufacturing field, there are mainly 2 European standardization organizations that are relevantCEN/TC 309 Footwear, which is mainly responsible for the test methods, terms and performance requirements of footwear components, the test methods and terms of whole shoes, as well as the formulation and revision of standards for footwear environmental protection, excluding special - purpose footwear products.CEN/TC 161 "Foot and leg protectors", which is mainly responsible for the formulation and revision of European standards in the field of protective shoes and leg protection devices.

As of November 2021, CEN/TC 309 has 93 existing standards, including 4 amendment sheets. Among these 93 standards, there are 6 basic standards, 8 product standards (technical reports TR) for footwear components, and the remaining 79 are all test method standards: 9 chemical methods and 70 physical methods.

CEN/TC 161 has published 21 standards, of which 5 are EU-specific standards, and the remaining 16 standards are issued in sync with ISO/TC 94/SC3.

The EU footwear standard system effectively controls the quality of whole - shoe products through strict control of the performance and quality of footwear components, providing an important technical reference for the global footwear industry. For enterprises, understanding and mastering the EU footwear standard system is helpful for their product design, production and marketing, and also helps to enhance the international competitiveness of their products.