Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Ecology Law Quarterly

Abstract

This Article examines three aspects of the existing situation in an effort to highlight the obstacles to effective international regulation, the benefits to be derived from such regulation, and the means to hasten cooperation among nations. Section I reviews the present international setting of chemical assessment and control. The discussion underscores the many institutional factors that act as barriers to international regulation, including: the dismal quality of existing test data; the reluctance of manufacturers and national governments to make data available on an international level for fear of jeopardizing their competitive market positions; and the lack of the international chemical testing standards needed to overcome the scientific chauvinism of nations which refuse to rely on foreign data as the basis for a domestic regulatory decision. Against the discouraging background of Section I, the second section recounts the accomplishments and the failings of existing bilateral and multilateral agreements. The section focuses on four current major international initiatives. These initiatives represent a significant improvement over most existing international regulatory efforts because they abandon thepiecemeal or categorical approach to chemical regulation and instead seek to develop comprehensive data on the human health and environmental impact of a wide range of chemicals. The four organizations are: (1) the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is assembling worldwide data on environmental causes of cancer, and seeks to provide national governments and other international agencies with an expert, independent assessment of possible human risks presented by numerous chemicals; (2) the International Register of Potentially Toxic Chemicals (IRPTC), which will help close the international information gap by providing complete data on all potentially toxic chemicals; (3) the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), composed of the noncommunist world's major chemical producing and consuming nations, which has already achieved a high degree of international environmental cooperation, and recently proposed a comprehensive, uniform approach to the assessment and prevention of both short-term and long-term chemical hazards; and (4) the European Economic Community (EEC), which regulates the classification, packaging, and labeling of dangerous substances, and has proposed a legal requirement that all new substances be thoroughly tested, prior to marketing, for adverse health and environmental effects. Section III analyzes the trade and economic implications of international regulation that make nations reluctant to adopt or agree to more stringent regulatory measures. Whether new restrictions deal with premarket testing and conditions of production, or prohibit specific substances, their predominant impact is to create balance of trade problems and to provide domestic manufacturers with incentives to relocate testing and manufacturing facilities in countries with lower safety standards in order to enjoy lower costs. While this Article argues for the adoption of uniform international standards for testing and evaluating toxic chemicals as a means of mitigating the adverse economic impact on environmentally conscious nations, the short-term prospects for such an achievement are virtually nonexistent. Section III discusses, as an alternative strategy, various unilateral actions that nations wishing to obtain foreign compliance with domestic health and environmental standards may undertake.

First Page

397

Volume

7

Publication Date

1978

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