Brussels, 12/05/2005 (Agence Europe) - The inter-institutional and multi-actors seminar on the REACH regulation (registration, assessment and limited authorisation of chemical products) organised by the Luxembourg presidency of the Council on 10-11 May, on the recommendation of the presidency, provided precise indications on which the Competitiveness Council of 6 June and the Environment Council of 24 June could use in the pursuit of their work. André Weidenhaupt, from Luxembourg chaired the proceedings and said that, “the main presidency concern is to make REACH flexible and practical at all levels, without excessive bureaucracy at company and public administration levels, while guaranteeing a high level of environmental protection and health”. This workshop focused on the sectoral impact study of this future legislation and the practicability of key REACH processes, particularly the registration process, which is subject of most attention. The presidency drew the following conclusion from the most recent impact studies: they only provide a limited number of indications on substances to be withdrawn from the market for economic reasons resulting from REACH obligations; substances produced or imported in low volume are more vulnerable to additional financial charges; SMEs facing increasing difficulty that others in implementing new legislation, given their limited resources; improved information in the supply chain could reduce the withdrawal of substances; compulsory information targeted at low volume substances could facilitate registration; strengthened cooperation between declaring parties could reduce financial and administrative burden.
On this basis, the presidency considers that, “impact studies have provided sufficient information to evaluate the complementary proposals in the Commission text - proposals which should provide solutions to the problems identified, without imperilling the basic REACH principles”. Three Member States proposals are of particular concern and which, at the ad hoc Council group, put forward concrete suggestions for substance registration procedure: the joint Hungarian/British proposal based on the principle of “one substance/one registration” (the so-called OSOR proposal), the Maltese/Slovenian proposal, focusing on implementing priorities and a practical system for registration and assessment of around 20,000 substances produced or imported in low volume (between 1 and 10 tonnes per year) and the Swedish proposal to guarantee consumer protection against chemical substances in imported articles. The three European Parliament rapporteurs, Guido Sacconi (environment), Lena Ek (industry) and Hartmut Nassauer (internal market/consumers) highlighted, presenting essential elements and their reports, practical improvement, reduction of costs falling on SMEs and optimisation of balance between costs and advantages in the regulation proposed. They also confirmed their intention to work for the closure of the first reading in the autumn.