Ratifying Global Toxics Treaties: The U.S. Must Provide Leadership.

The international community has, at long last, recognized that there are some toxic chemicals that are just too dangerous to produce, use, and store--put simply, too dangerous to have on the planet. The global treaty resulting from this recognition is an important and welcome international policy milestone that is long-overdue.

The chemicals in question are persistent organic pollutants--"POPs"--substances that are toxic, persist in the environment, accumulate in the body fat of humans and animals, concentrate up the food chain, and can be transported across the globe. At very low levels of exposure, POPs can cause reproductive and developmental disorders, damage to the immune and nervous systems, and a range of cancers. Exposure during key phases of fetal development can be particularly damaging.

Infants around the world are born with an array of POPs already in their blood. Many POPs pervade the environment, even in remote regions such as the Arctic and Antarctic; several have been found at high levels in the blood and breast milk of Inuit women living thousands of miles from the nearest possible source of pollution. POPs are found in today's U.S. food supply, even though many of the chemicals in question have been banned in the U.S. for decades.

The global nature of these pollutants led the UN Environment Program (UNEP) to sponsor several years of negotiations that recently culminated in an international treaty. The treaty, now known as the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, was signed into formal legal existence in Sweden on May 23, 2001 by 91 countries and the European Community.

The treaty identifies an initial list of 12 POPs slated for elimination. Nine of the 12 (aldrin, endrin, dieldrin, chlordane, DDT, heptachlor, hexachlorobenzene, mirex, and toxaphene) are pesticides, all of which have been targeted for elimination by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) around the world since the early 1980s as part of Pesticide Action Network (PAN) International's Dirty Dozen campaign. The other chemicals on the convention's initial list are PCBs, dioxins, and furans. PCBs and all of the nine listed pesticides have been banned in the U.S., some--like DDT--for decades. The U.S. continues to produce dioxins and furans, however, as byproducts of chlorine-based industries and waste incineration.

The Stockholm Convention establishes various timetables for elimination of the intentionally produced POPs, which include all the listed pesticides and PCBs. Provisions specific to DDT call for its ultimate elimination but allow interim use of the pesticide for vector control and call for aggressive efforts to develop and implement safe, and effective alternatives to combat malaria. The byproduct POPs are also slated for ultimate elimination, with an emphasis on alternative, cleaner production processes rather than end-of-the-pipe controls.

The Rotterdam Convention is a complementary treaty providing important controls on international trade of highly toxic chemicals. This convention, signed by 73 nations in 1998, is the formalization of a voluntary Prior Informed Consent (PIC) procedure, administered jointly by UNEP and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) since 1989. The PIC procedure requires that any country importing pesticides and certain other hazardous chemicals must be informed of bans or severe restrictions on that chemical in other countries.

The volume of hazardous pesticides crossing international borders is tremendous--an estimated 2.4 billion pounds per year in 1990. Developing countries often lack the capacity to adequately evaluate and regulate highly toxic chemicals imported from their Northern neighbors. The PIC procedure is the international community's response to this inequity, and it continues to be implemented on a voluntary basis, while the treaty accumulates the needed 50 ratifications to come into force. Although the convention could be strengthened, it represents an important tool for the international community to monitor and control the world's massive trade in dangerous substances.

Many NGOs, including PAN International and the International POPs Elimination Network (IPEN), are calling for 50 countries to ratify these important conventions by September 2002, when the World Summit on Sustainable Development (Rio +10) takes place in Johannesburg, South Africa. To date, Canada and Fiji have ratified the Stockholm Convention, and 14 countries have ratified the Rotterdam Convention. The U.S. has not yet ratified either.

Key Points

* A new global treaty, the Stockholm. Convention, aims to eliminate a class of chemicals that the international community has agreed is extremely dangerous to human health and the environment.

* A complementary treaty, the Rotterdam Convention, offers important controls on the international trade of highly toxic chemicals.

* A broad international network of civil society organizations is calling for 50 nations to ratify both treaties by late 2002.

Kristin S. Schafer, Pesticide Action Network-North America (PANNA)