{"id":526,"date":"2009-05-19T08:39:34","date_gmt":"2009-05-19T08:39:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/neu.innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/?p=526"},"modified":"2017-02-06T09:53:12","modified_gmt":"2017-02-06T07:53:12","slug":"un-forum-pledges-action-on-chemicals-including-nanotmaterials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/un-forum-pledges-action-on-chemicals-including-nanotmaterials\/","title":{"rendered":"UN Forum Pledges Action on Chemicals Including Nanotmaterials"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The second International Conference on Chemicals Management\u00a0(ICCM2) in Geneva focused on\u00a0emerging\u00a0issues, each of \"which have\u00a0not yet been generally recognised or sufficiently addressed, but which may have significant adverse effects on human beings and\/or the environment\".<\/p>\n

The conference comes as Europe has started to implement its REACH regulation on chemicals, which is seen as a world reference\u00a0for promoting chemical safety.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0event\u00a0underlined the need\u00a0to improve the accessibility and availability of\u00a0information on chemicals<\/strong> contained in products such as\u00a0computers, textiles, toys, furniture, jewellery, cars and\u00a0clothes as well as electronics and their accessories. \"An information system or framework of systems\"\u00a0was proposed to tackle\u00a0the issue, and a\u00a0working group\u00a0will be set up soon to address the practicalities of the proposal.<\/p>\n

The objective is to provide information on chemicals'\u00a0effects on human health and the environment, intrinsic properties, potential uses, protective measures and regulation.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0range of cooperative actions\u00a0were put forward\u00a0to address\u00a0the\u00a0new\u00a0health and safety challenges posed by rapidly merging\u00a0nanotechnologies<\/strong>, as well as\u00a0the challenges of assessing the safety of\u00a0manufactured\u00a0nanomaterials<\/strong>. Actions proposed range from raising awareness and respecting the precautionary principle to\u00a0minimising exposure of workers and promoting\u00a0alternatives to nanomaterials.<\/p>\n

As for\u00a0electronic waste<\/strong>, the\u00a0forum\u00a0underlined\u00a0Africa's lack of\u00a0capacity\u00a0for\u00a0environmentally sound management of electronic waste and\u00a0toxic chemicals.\u00a0The conference\u00a0also highlighted the problem of illegal dumping of e-waste, resulting in the\u00a0\"transboundary movement of its hazardous constituents such as heavy metals and brominated flame retardants\".<\/p>\n

To\u00a0tackle\u00a0e-waste, SAICM\u00a0pressed\u00a0for\u00a0\"clean technology and environmentally friendly design\" to be included in electronic and electrical products, including phasing out hazardous substances used in production. It also stressed improved product stewardship and extended producer responsibility in the life-cycle management of electronic and electrical products.<\/p>\n

The conference also emphasised the need to prevent children's and occupational exposures to\u00a0lead in paint<\/strong>.\u00a0Actions proposed there\u00a0include encouraging wholesalers and retailers to halt sales of paints containing lead\u00a0and the\u00a0use of financial incentives to support the use of lead-free paints and phase out\u00a0the manufacture and sale of these paints.<\/p>\n

Apart from its work on the emerging issues, the ICCM2 also pledged to improve the management of\u00a0perfluorinated chemicals<\/strong>.\u00a0These are used to make materials stain,\u00a0stick and heat resistant, but like the chemicals known as POPs (persistent organic pollutants), they are toxic, accumulate in the body and are easily transported\u00a0across long distances.<\/p>\n

The conference also said\u00a0more funding was needed to help developing countries implement the SAICM.<\/p>\n

Source: EurActiv<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A UN global chemicals forum on safe and sustainable chemicals management agreed last week to address four emerging policy issues in the sector: nanotech, e-waste, chemicals in everyday products and lead in paint.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-innovation","category-nanotechnology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13075,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526\/revisions\/13075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/innovationsgesellschaft.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}