US chems must enlist customers in regs fight

27 September 2006 18:54  [Source: ICIS news]

GAITHERSBURG, Maryland (ICIS news)--US chemicals producers must build new cross-industry coalitions with their customers to combat the growth of unsound global chemical regulatory programmes, a top industry official said on Wednesday.

Madeleine Jacobs, president of the American Chemical Society, warned a gathering of US government and private sector manufacturing officials that more far-reaching regional regulatory movements such as the European Union's controversial registration, evaluation and authorisation of chemicals (Reach) programme are certain to emerge. 

She said major points of concern about Reach are the high costs of testing that Reach will mandate and, more significantly, "the scientifically unsound methodology that underlies the programme."

"While well-intentioned, these and other programmes are thought by many to be built on less-than-adequate scientific grounds and understanding," she said.

US chemicals producers and the broad domestic manufacturing sector now face market threats posed by Reach, she said, "because the US chemical enterprise has not been a major player in these international forums."

"We have to work harder to educate the public because public perception often leads to government policy, but policy not always based on sound science,” she said. “Policy making without sound science leads to disaster."

She also told the some 50 executives attending a two-day conference on emerging global chemical issues that chemicals manufacturers must forge coalitions with their downstream users "because those companies are our interface with the public and they can be invaluable partners in influencing public policy."

The two-day session at the National Institute of Standards & Technology headquarters here is the first of what is likely to be a series of government and private sector meetings to develop a strategy for dealing with increasing global regulation of chemicals.

Co-sponsored by the institute and the society, the meeting of automotive, aeronautical, computer and other electronic manufacturers along with some chemicals producers is expected to conclude on Wednesday with an action plan.

By: Joe Kamalick
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