This document is an excerpt from the EUR-Lex website
EFTA documents
In this section, you can find the acts adopted by the EFTA institutions (Surveillance Authority, Standing Committee, EFTA Court) under the EEA Agreement and published in the Official Journal of the European Union from 1994 onwards.
You will find these acts accompanied by a rich legal analysis and links to related information (validity of the acts, dates of effect, relationships with other documents, etc.).
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The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is an intergovernmental organisation whose members are Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. It was established in 1960 by the EFTA Convention (revised in 2001) to promote free trade and economic integration between its members, within Europe, and globally. Three EFTA States (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway) together with the EU Member States are part of the European Economic Area (EEA), established by the EEA Agreement (see a summary of the EEA Agreement). This agreement entered into force in 1994. Its objective is to extend the EU’s Internal Market to the three EFTA States that are part of the EEA. It guarantees equal rights and obligations within the Internal Market for individuals and economic operators in the EEA.
All relevant Internal Market legislation is integrated into the EEA Agreement so that it applies throughout the whole of the EEA. The core of these rules relates to the free movement of goods, capital, services and persons. In addition, the EEA Agreement covers ‘horizontal’ areas such as social policy, consumer protection, environment, company law, statistics, tourism and culture. To ensure equal conditions of competition throughout the EEA, the EEA Agreement mirrors the competition and state aid rules of the EU treaties. It also provides for participation in the EU programmes such as those for research and education.