A total ban on Bisphenol-A (BPA) in food packaging within the EU will not come overnight. MEPs at the environment, public health and food safety committee on Wednesday 11 January called for the ban in the hope of gaining a veto against a European Commission proposal for a regulation, deemed insufficient for protecting consumer health. They were unsuccessful (see EUROPE 11936).
In their objection, MEPs’ proposed to block the Commission draft regulation aimed at lowering the legal limit of migration of this chemical substance towards foodstuffs. BPA had recently been recognised as a presumed endocrine disrupter by the European Chemical Agency (ECHA) and is present in varnishes and coatings inside materials which enter into contact with food, such as food cans and tins (see EUROPE 11936). A large majority overrode the objection: 42 votes to 17 and 1 abstention to the great disappointment of the Greens/EFA Group and NGOs.
Those voting against the objection were: the EPP Group, the ECR Group, a large part of the S&D Group and, probably, a part of the ALDE Group, of which MEPs were given a free vote. They said their vote was based on pragmatism, as did Christel Schaldemose (S&D, Denmark): “We are in favour of a total ban but that is not the subject of the proposal on the table. It is a proposal for stricter migration limits”.
German MEP Martin Haüsling (Greens/EFA), who was at the initiative of the draft objection, said “this vote is a serious setback for the preventive protection of consumers”. He recalled that “for years, numerous scientific studies have shown how dangerous Bisphenol-A is, which means that the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has placed the substance in an extremely worrying category”. He spoke of “irresponsibility towards the unborn child, infants and children of young age”.
Michèle Rivasi from France, who is in the same group, added: “Bisphenol-A has neurotoxic effects on development, even at low doses, and this can be amplified by the cocktail effect. This substance should be totally banned throughout the EU”. She went on to point out that “some countries, including France, have decided on the basis of scientific knowledge, to ban BPA in all foods”.
The NGO Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL) also considers that the Commission regulation will not protect citizens’ health and will mainly be of benefit to the chemicals industry. “The harmful effects of Bisphenol-A, even at low doses, are so well documented that the substance should have been banned a long time ago in all consumer food products”, Natacha Cingotti, from HEAL, states in a press release.
The Commission’s draft regulation is based on a 2015 opinion from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which provides for the potential effects of BPA on the reproductive, mammary and nervous systems to be re-assessed this year on the basis of studies carried out since 2016. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)