Eighth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Rotterdam Convention

Geneva, Switzerland from 24 April to 05 May 2017

Venue: Geneva International Conference Centre (CICG), 17 rue de Varembé, Geneva, Switzerland.

Summary of outcomes: About 1,400 participants took part in the Conference, which was held from 24 April to 5 May 2017, back-to-back with the thirteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Basel Convention (BC COP-13) and the eighth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Stockholm Convention (SC COP-8). The meetings also featured a high-level segment that was held on the afternoon of Thursday, 4 May and the morning of Friday, 5 May 2017. The theme of the meetings and the high-level segment was "A future detoxified: sound management of chemicals and waste". The meetings included joint sessions among two or three of the conferences of the parties on joint issues.

The eighth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Rotterdam Convention adopted 17 decisions, including six identical ones for the three meetings of the conference of the Parties. Some of the main outcomes of the Conference include the listing of four new chemicals in Annex III to the Convention, namely carbofuran and trichlorfon as pesticides, and short-chain chlorinated paraffins and tributyltin compounds as industrial chemicals, and a decision to undertake further intersessional work on enhancing the effectiveness of the Convention.

Thanks to voluntary contributions from the European Commission, Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland, financial support was provided to the participation of developing country Parties and Parties that are countries with economies in transition to attend the meetings.

Working languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

Meeting documents

  • Report
  • Decisions
  • Working documents
  • Information documents