The 19^th meeting of the Chemical Review Meeting (CRC-19) officially started today in Rome, at the FAO Headquarters, under the leadership of the CRC Chair, Ms. Noluzuko Gwayi.

In their official opening remarks, Ms. Christine Fuell (Executive Secretary ad interim of the Rotterdam Convention) and Mr. Rolph Payet (Executive Secretary of the BRS Conventions) highlighted:

• Their appreciation to the CRC members for their tireless work,
• Their appreciation to observers for their continued active participation in CRC meetings and work as a whole,
• FAO’s work in sound management of pesticides,
• Continued efforts by the Rotterdam convention to harmonise its work with the different MEAs on chemicals and waste management,
• Key outcomes of the ICCM5 meeting, which had closed just before the start of this CRC-19 meeting.

This 4-day (Oct 3^rd-6^th) meeting aims to review:

• notifications of final regulatory action received from Parties for 9 chemicals (chlorpyrifos, mercury, bromacil, ethion, diarsenic pentaoxide, carbaryl, chlorfenvinphos, methidathion, thiodicarb); and
• draft Decision Guidance Documents of 2 chemicals (methyl bromide and paraquat).

On Day 1, the draft Decision Guidance Documents (DGDs) were presented to the plenary, and discussion took place about the work on notifications of final regulatory action for chlorpyrifos, mercury, bromacil, ethion and diarsenic pentaoxide.

The meeting agreed to move forwards with preparing draft decisions transmitting the draft decision guidance documents to the Conference of the Parties for its consideration of whether to list the chemicals in Annex III to and make them subject to control under the Convention. The meeting also agreed that notifications from the following Parties met the relevant criteria and were to move to the next stage of the process:

• For the chemical chlorpyrifos from Malaysia and Sri Lanka
• For the chemical mercury from EU and Colombia.
• For the chemical bromacil from Costa Rica (bromacil)

Contact groups continued working on these elements into the evening on Day 1. Later in the week, the whole Committee will come back to these questions and any draft decisions prepared, once the contact groups conclude their work.

Regional preparatory meetings for the upcoming meetings of the conferences of the Parties to the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions are taking place in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Eastern Europe and GRULAC regions during March 2023..