Swedish Proposal on Treated Articles

The Swedish Chemicals Agency KEMI has presented ways of regulating treated articles.

The rules for treated articles are an important aspect in the implementation of the BPR. The VCI has therefore intensively studied the proposals of the Swedish authority KEMI for stronger regulation of treated articles in the context of the BPR in the CA meetings in September and November 2021 and has developed a position.

• The breadth of new information requirements and the restriction of use options would further complicate the implementation of the BPR and increase the hurdle for innovations even more.
• The proposal thus undermines the idea of the Green Deal, which aims to support environmentally friendly innovations and improve the sustainability and longevity of products.
• For many small and medium-sized enterprises, an additional hurdle would rise that could not be overcome for financial reasons.

A pragmatic attitude is necessary so that treated articles can also be produced in the EU in the future and compliance with the obligations can be checked by the European monitoring authorities.

It is explicitly emphasised that the VCI, like the Swedish KEMI, aims to prevent the EU wide availability of treated articles that pose an undue risk to the environment or to human health. Nevertheless, the BPR is not the suitable instrument to regulate each and every product. However, the VCI believes that the existing legal framework is suitable to achieve this goal. Besides the BPR, which focuses on the making available and use of safe biocidal products, there are other regulations that close the regulatory gaps left by the BPR. Overarching REACH and CLP regulations apply to all chemical substances and mixtures, and downstream product regulations also cover treated articles that fall within their respective scopes.

Before implementation issues of the Swedish proposal are discussed in more detail, it is crucial from the VCI's point of view to carefully evaluate the need for additional provisions as well as the legal basis.

The VCI therefore requests information on how many treated articles legally made available on the market under the current EU chemicals legislation and whose active substances have been assessed following the "one safe use" principle in the BPR are causing severe problems with regard to environmental, occupational or consumer protection.

Furthermore, the VCI would like to ask the European Commission to scrutinise the legal basis for a more detailed regulation of treated articles.

The complete position here or on top of this page for download. PDF | 137 kB | Version as of: 31 January 2022