‘Unjustified blacklist’ fears over French EDC strategy

The French environment ministry held a consultation between 14 January and 8 February on the strategy after it promised stricter national controls on the substances.Late last year, the ministry urged the European Commission to strengthen its own new EU-wide strategy on EDCs.The planned French approach to use the categories 'known', 'presumed' and 'suspected' "does not make sense and it has not been retained as the lead option at EU level", a group of ten trade bodies, under the umbrella of the French Chemical Industries Association (UIC), said in their consultation comments.France’s proposal will not lead to better management of the chemicals, the group added, and suggested a sit down with government to "settle" on one list of ‘known’ EDCs.They should not be treated as a special case, they said. The CLP Regulation allows classification of substances based on adverse effects, whether the mode of action is endocrine or not, the group said.Several pieces of legislation are already in place at EU level to regulate known EDCs, they added, and having a categorised approach could lead to "double classification" for some chemicals.