EEA stands for European Economic Area. The EEA agreement, to which all EU Member States and the EFTA members Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway are parties, entered into force on 1 January 1994. The objective of the agreement is to establish a dynamic and homogeneous European Economic Area, based in substance on common rules and equal conditions of competition. Formally, two separate legal systems coexist within the EEA: the EEA agreement is applied when trade between EFTA members and the Community or between EFTA States is affected; Community law when trade between EU Member States is affected. The EEA agreement is applied both by the European Commission and by the EFTA Surveillance Authority (
