An initiative designed to establish a pan-European set of standards for trainers in the health and fitness sector is entering its final phase.

Spearheaded by the European Health and Fitness Association (EHFA), the two-year European Accreditation - Fitness scheme has been funded by Lifelong Learning Programme and is entering its final four months.

The initiative, delivered in partnership with UK-based awarding body CYQ, is designed to enable health and fitness sector training providers and national associations across Europe to be accredited against the EHFA standards for fitness instructing and personal training.

So far uptake has included training providers in at least 11 countries and a total of 26 organisations have been accredited using the scheme.

Jenny Patrickson, director of awarding at CYQ, said: "The standard of training and assessment in the organisations that have been accredited is very high and many of the training providers have indicated that gaining accreditation has improved their business as a result of the endorsement.

"The project has enabled us to streamline the accreditation process, making it simple and easy to follow, and we have been able to translate accreditation documents into French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish and Dutch to make the process more accessible.

The results of the project will be presented at an EHFA conference in Brussels on 10 September.