ICCA STATEMENT TO THE 1ST PREPARATORY COMMITTEE
MEETING ON SAICM
BANGKOK, 10 NOVEMBER 2003
Mr. President,
the delegates of the International Council of Chemicals Associations (ICCA) were listening
carefully to the views, perspectives and expectations provided by governments, IGO’s and NGO’s
regarding SAICM. We would like to add a few other thoughts to what was already said.
First of all I would like to state that ICCA through its member federations and their companies is
prepared further to promote and to contribute substantially to the development of a sound and
practical policy, based on Chapter 19, Agenda 21 and the IFCS Bahia Declaration and the
Priorities for Actions to ensure safety in processes and products at national, regional and
international level and further to provide benefits to the global society through innovation and its
products.
From our perspective the development of SAICM provides an opportunity to the global
community to build a new partnership approach to manage chemicals and processes safely at a
global level. This requires joint activities between governments, the chemical industry, other
industries across the product chain and other committed stakeholder. Partnership demands
transparency, openess, confidence and accountability as well as shared responsibility in managing
processes and chemicals safely. The development of SAICM could provide the opportunity to
remove barriers to trade, to reduce and further to avoid unnecessary costs and bureaucracy, to
streamline regulatory approaches, to promote voluntary activities and to provide public access to
information on the safe management of chemicals and processes. SAICM should be considered as
a road map to achieve that..
The ICCA would like to deliver three key messages to the 1st PrepCom reflecting in summary our
perspective on SAICM.
ICCA sees as a first step in developing a global strategy the identification of what has already
been developed, the status of enforcement, identification of synergies for accelerating
implementation and what are the real deficits and requires global regulatory and voluntary actions.
A global strategy has to be practical and flexible in implementation and should provide a basis for
more consistency and coherence in regulatory chemicals management systems / approaches. It has
to take into account national and regional political, societal, cultural and economic conditions. It
must create regulatory efficiency and sets the basis for sound and enforceable chemicals
management decisions without creating bureaucracy and any excess burden making. It should be
integrative and provide mechanism for improvement of internal and external co-ordination at
governmental and inter-governmental level to avoid duplication and ensure efficient enforcement
of MEA´s.
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Secondly, it is key that the strategy provides means for bridging the gap in chemicals management
between developed and developing countries. This requires a new partnership between all
stakeholder, governments, business and civil society, and in a broader sense between developed
and developing countries as it was agreed at the WSSD. Therefore, capacity building, in the sense
of building infrastructure, promote and support education and training for using best available
technologies and handle chemicals safely, should be a key element of this strategy.
Thirdly, the global chemical industries Responsible Care program has been adopted in 47
countries which puts our industry in a rather unique position to contribute to the development of
SAICM. In addition, Product Stewardship programs and other voluntary initiatives of the
chemical industry are elements for further developing SAICM. Chemical industries voluntary
initiatives at national, regional and global level should be seen as one cornerstone of SAICM.
The strategy should provide a basis for strengthening industries voluntary activities on chemicals
management.
It is our strong believe that only the development of a sound, consistently applied strategic
approach to international chemicals management will ensure that the global community will meet
the WSSD target to achieve the minimisation of significant adverse effects on health and the
environment, and that the strategy will contribute to all three pillars of sustainable development.
R Koch, Bayer
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