Symposium abstract, RIVM, Bilthoven, December 1st, 2006
On 29 October 2003, the European Commission presented its proposals for a new chemical substances policy in the EU: a comprehensive system for the Registration, Evaluation, and Authorisation of CHemicals: REACH.
The objective of REACH is to improve the protection of human health and the environment while maintaining the competitiveness of the EU chemicals industry. REACH is expected to enter into force in 2007. The implementation of REACH will change many procedures in the European chemical legislation. Currently, governments perform the risk assessment, while under REACH, this responsibility will be shifted to the industry. They will have to assess many of their own chemicals, estimated to be about 30,000 of the 100,000 currently on the market.
Although REACH aims at reducing the number of test animals, the usefulness of QSARs and in vitro techniques which may replace traditional test methods is still subject of discussion.
The symposium: "Does science REACH policy?" focuses on how far we are in the development of new procedures to implement REACH and how to use scientific data in the process of decision making.