Brussels, 03/11/2003 (Agence Europe) - As soon as the draft Reach regulation on chemicals reform was unveiled, the unprecedented lobbying in this connection took off again with even greater intensity. As far as the European Commission is concerned, the proposed regulation is the most balanced solution for chemical policy reform in the interests of public health and the environment, without hindering competitiveness and innovation in the European chemical industry (see EUROPE of 30 October, p. 9). Nevertheless, judging by the first reactions to the proposal, nobody is happy with it. Which proves, in Environment Commissioner Margot Wallström's view, that it strikes a good balance between opposing interests.
Proponents of industrial competitiveness challenge the accuracy of the estimated cost of the reform for industry (direct costs of EUR 2.3 billion over eight years, indirect costs for downstream users between 2.8 and 36 billion over 11 to 15 years). The costs have, indeed, been revised down on amendment of the Commission's initial draft, but based on a forecasted impact study which does not go into enough detail, in their view. Environmentalists and champions of consumer health slam too generous concessions to industry and want the Parliament and the Council to plug loopholes and redress the balance. At the Parlement, views have already been expressed on both sides of the same divide.
The Commission's draft would force producers to register and carry out risk assessments (for health and the environment) for around 30,000 chemicals already on the market, more than one tonne of which is produced or imported each year per producer or importer. 20,000 chemicals, produced in quantities of up to 10 tonnes a year, would face a less onerous procedure. If the data required for registration is not supplied and in the absence of assessment, chemicals would be banned from sale.
In a joint press release, environment NGOs and health protection organisations (EEB, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, European Public Health Alliance, Women in Europe for a Common Future) express disappointment at an artificially sweetened text that needs health supplements and urge the Parliament and Council to fill the loopholes that would allow extended use of dangerous chemicals.
A few big and dirty companies have driven the Commission to set a dangerous precedent: allowing specific business interests to prevail public health and environment protection. The Commission intends to test REACH together with industry. We insist that the Commission includes in the testing the achievements for public health and environment," said John Hontelez, Secretary General of the European Environmental Bureau. Jorgo Iwasaki Riss of Greenpeace said, "REACH has been stripped down to its bare bones... we expect it to be fully fleshed out before it becomes law."
The WWF calls for an increase in the safety information required for the 30,000 chemicals covered by REACH, a simple ban on industry using dangerous chemicals when these can be replaced by less hazardous substances, a guarantee that imports will meet the same safety requirements as chemicals made in the EU, better consumer information and registration by product rather than a separate registration of information by each company manufacturing the product in question.
Tasmin Rose, General Secretary of European Public Health Alliance, pointed out: "It has taken 30 years for the EU to address the issue of the health impact of dangerous chemicals. Unfortunately, the REACH proposals do not yet show the way out of using hazardous chemicals in everyday consumer goods."
When it comes to trade and industry, the criticisms are rather different. European employers, via the organisation Unice, regret that the Commission published the text without an overall impact study for industry and without sufficient dialogue with sections of industry using chemicals.
The Union of Chemical Industries (UCI) lists improvements to previous drafts of the text as including simplified functioning of the new European agency for assessing chemicals, but regrets that in its view, its impact study on competitiveness has not been sufficiently taken into account.
On behalf of small and medium-sized enterprises, UEAPME calls for an additional impact study on costs and the impact REACH will have on industry downstream that uses chemicals.
Eurocommerce, representing wholesalers, retail and international trade, recognises the improvements the Commission made in its initial text, but highlights the need for a practical, applicable chemicals strategy that does not constitute a trade barrier. Unconvinced by the impact studies carried out in the last two years, the organisation is calling for the still absent impact study to be carried out into trade and international trade, urging the Parliament and Council to ensure such studies are organised and that the measures provide good value for money.
At the European Parliament, Werner Langen (EPP-ED, Germany) regrets that despite a series of reworkings of the text, Commissioners Wallstrom and Liikanen have still not published reliable statistics on the consequences of the REACH system with regard to competition and employment, which has not prevented the Commission from playing with decisions affecting production sites, capital and investment in two of the most important sectors of the economy for the European Union. The CDU MEP calls for the certification of chemicals to focus solely on risks and potential dangers, rather than artibrarily imposing assessment of 30,000 substances.
Another CDU MEP, Karl-Heinz Florenz argues that the draft regulation is unbalanced because it lacks a political objective, makes no reference to practice and the systematic test procedures are barely comprehensible. Rather than providing clarity, he says the text simply creates confusion because it gives far too much space to interpretation and does not answer the key issue of knowing what information the consumer will be able to use because it is useful for him or her. Florenz therefore recommends orienting the text procedures towards clearly set out priorities to avoid implementing arbitrary tests, and to ensure more relevant information is collected.
For the Greens/EFA group, lobbying and horse-trading at the highest political level (the Schröder/Blair/Chirac letter) have undermined a crucial piece of legislation for the environment and public health. It is, they argue, the European Parliament's duty to beef up the "one calorie" REACH system. This is vital legislation for public health because citizens are being used as general guinea pigs by exposing their bodies to a combination of toxic products that most of them know virtually nothing about. Fortunately, the Commission's proposal reverses the burden of proof - in the future it will be for industry to prove that most hazardous substances can be used in full safety if it wants to continue selling them. But is reconfirms old measures that provide unacceptable loop-holes to the authorisation system and undermine the effective implementation of the substitution principle, explained Inger Schoerling (a Swedish Green MEP). Calling! for the issue to be referred to the European Parliament's Environment Committee to counter-balance the fact the issue has been removed from the Environment Council and handed to the Competitiveness Council, she calls for the reintroduction of tighter requirements for the 20,000 substances produced in volumes of under 10 tonnes, for an improvement in the provision of information on chemicals to the general public, and for a tightening of the requirements that hazardous chemicals be replaced by less hazardous alternatives. Caroline Lucas (British Green MEP), calls for funds to be provided to enable the introduction of a modern test system that does not require human or animal experiments, thereby partly reflecting the animal welfare concerns expressed by Eurogroup for animal Welfare.
It is clear that debate will continue on thi issue. The regulation will be adopted in 2005 at the earliest.