Title: White Paper on chemicals and Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants: perspectives for environmental risk management

Authors: Carlo Zaghi, Marcelo Enrique Conti, Gaetano Cecchetti

Addresses: Ministero dell'Ambiente e Della Tutela del Territorio, Direzione V.I.A., via C. Colombo 44, 00147 Rome, Italy. Dipartimento di Controllo e Gestione delle Merci e del loro Impatto sull'Ambiente, Universita ''La Sapienza'', Via del Castro Laurenziano, 9, 00161 Rome, Italy. Istituto di Ecologia e Tecnologie Ambientali, Universita di Urbino, Ex Sogesta Loc. Crocicchia, 61029 Urbino (PS), Italy

Abstract: The ever-growing attention to the environmental risk assessment of chemical substances has had considerable repercussions in the recent agreements reached within the European Union and on the international stage. In the conclusions on the European Commission|s White Paper Strategy for a Future Chemicals Policy, the Council of the European Union recently referred to the need to include persistent, bio-accumulative and toxic substances (PBT) and very persistent and very bio-accumulative substances (VPVB) among the chemicals which must be subject to authorisation, as soon as the necessary criteria for identifying them have been defined. On 23 May 2001, a few days before the adoption of the Council|s conclusions to the White Paper, over 100 national Governments signed the international Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants (POPs), which provides for a common commitment at global level and fixed criteria for identifying new POPs apart from those already known. In this work, the scenarios described by the White Paper are examined, with particular reference to the problems of defining criteria for identifying PBT and VPVB substances, in the light of the criteria already defined for POPs by the Stockholm Convention.

Keywords: chemicals; environmental risk assessment; risk management; chemicals policy; persistence; bioaccumulation; persistent organic pollutants; dangerous substances.

DOI: 10.1504/IJRAM.2002.002555

International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management, 2002 Vol.3 No.2/3/4, pp.234-245

Published online: 23 Jul 2003 *

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