Tarja Gordienko -

Towards more efficient chemicals assessment and management – what is being tried, what works and what needs further work?

Regulators and businesses are busy with the work of compliance with chemicals notification, registration and authorisation laws. Hazard and exposure data is mounting in many countries.

Yet substantial challenges remain to improve the quality of this data, translate this into real knowledge about the risks of chemicals and to manage these risks sufficiently speedily to keep pace with the rate of new products entering the market and to catch up with a legacy of products for which there was insufficient data.

At the Helsinki Chemicals Forum in June 2017 a panel of experienced industry and regulatory experts will give a snapshot of where we are today in terms of generating the necessary safety information  and the pressure on regulators and businesses to improve both the efficiency and efficacy of chemicals management.

They will discuss the use of data generated by in vitro and in silico methods in a regulatory context and debate the assumptions behind these comparing to more traditional animal test methods. They will also examine recent attempts to regulate by grouping assessment of chemicals of concern to include potential alternatives and to take a product-based approach to regulation. The panel will also return to the perennial but valid question of optimising data sharing across jurisdictions to save resources and improve efficiency of regulation and corporate risk management.

What has been found to work? What is being tried and how do we make better progress? This is an essential topic for regulatory teams in businesses and authorities.

Panelists:

  • Dorte Bjerregaard Lerche, PhD, Ministry of Environment and Food, Denmark
  • Anne Gourmelon, Principal Administrator, OECD
  • Erika Kunz, Head of Global Registration and Evaluation of Chemicals, Clariant, Germany
  • Brian Richards, Executive Director, Office of Chemical Safety, Australia
  • Russell Thomas, Director, National Center for Computational Toxicology, EPA, USA

Mamta Patel

 


By Mamta Patel
Director & Co-Founder, Chemical Watch

The Panel about “Speeding up chemical assessments: from novel information to new management approaches, what works?” will take place on Friday 9th June 2017 in Helsinki Chemicals Forum. You are also welcome to join the conversation on Twitter @ChemicalsForum.