Overview

Notifications of final regulatory action are the means by which Parties inform the Secretariat of their actions to ban or severely restrict a chemical for human health and environmental reasons. Summaries of new notifications of final regulatory action are published each June and December in the PIC Circular and are in the database of notifications of final regulatory action.

Article 5 of the Convention sets out the obligations of Parties with respect to notifying the Secretariat of their final regulatory actions. If a Party takes a final regulatory action to ban or severely restrict a chemical for health and/or environmental reasons, it shares the information with all Parties by notifying the action to the Secretariat. Upon receipt of a notification of final regulatory action, the Secretariat must verify whether it meets the information requirements of Annex I of the Convention. If the notification is found to be complete against Annex I, a summary is prepared and published in the PIC Circular. The summary briefly describes the scope of the action and the reasons for it, including information on hazards and risks of the chemical to human health and/or the environment, and the expected effect of the regulatory action.

Parties, in preparing the submission of notifications of final regulatory actions, may wish to consider giving priority to the following subsets of chemicals for which notifications have already been submitted to the Secretariat.

Chemicals for which one complete notification has been received: Appendix V of the PIC Circular lists chemicals that are not listed in Annex III of the Convention but for which the Secretariat has received one notification that was verified as complete against the information requirements of Annex I of the Convention. A second notification for that chemical from a Party in a different PIC region could then trigger the process for the consideration of that chemical to be subject to the PIC procedure.

Chemicals for which a rationale has been adopted: Where the Chemical Review Committee (CRC) has determined that only one of the notifications of final regulatory actions in support of a candidate chemical meets the criteria of Annex II of the Convention, a rationale is prepared which explains how the criteria have been met. This rationale becomes part of the report of the CRC meeting. A second notification for the chemical from a Party in a different PIC region would then be reviewed by the CRC for the consideration of that chemical to be subject to the PIC procedure. The information available for these chemicals includes: notifications of final regulatory actions, supporting documentation and the rationales explaining why the notifications meet the criteria of Annex II of the Convention.

Article 5

Procedures for banned or severely restricted chemicals

1. Each Party that has adopted a final regulatory action shall notify the Secretariat in writing of such action.  Such notification shall be made as soon as possible, and in any event no later than ninety days after the date on which the final regulatory action has taken effect, and shall contain the information required by Annex I, where available.

2. Each Party shall, at the date of entry into force of this Convention for it, notify the Secretariat in writing of its final regulatory actions in effect at that time, except that each Party that has submitted notifications of final regulatory actions under the Amended London Guidelines or the International Code of Conduct need not resubmit those notifications.

3. The Secretariat shall, as soon as possible, and in any event no later than six months after receipt of a notification under paragraphs 1 and 2, verify whether the notification contains the information required by Annex I.  If the notification contains the information required, the Secretariat shall forthwith forward to all Parties a summary of the information received.  If the notification does not contain the information required, it shall inform the notifying Party accordingly.

4. The Secretariat shall every six months communicate to the Parties a synopsis of the information received pursuant to paragraphs 1 and 2, including information regarding those notifications which do not contain all the information required by Annex I.

5. When the Secretariat has received at least one notification from each of two Prior Informed Consent regions regarding a particular chemical that it has verified meet the requirements of Annex I, it shall forward them to the Chemical Review Committee.  The composition of the Prior Informed Consent regions shall be defined in a decision to be adopted by consensus at the first meeting of the Conference of the Parties.

6. The Chemical Review Committee shall review the information provided in such notifications and, in accordance with the criteria set out in Annex II, recommend to the Conference of the Parties whether the chemical in question should be made subject to the Prior Informed Consent procedure and, accordingly, be listed in Annex III.