Interaction of the EU Chemicals Regulation-REACH-with Occupational Safety and Health Legislation: A Report from the 5th German REACH Congress.

In April 2021, the 5th German REACH Congress took place as a hybrid event with a focus on discussing interlinkages between REACH and the occupational safety and health (OSH) legislation. More than 1000 people from Germany, the EU, and non-EU countries representing all stakeholder groups participated via livestream. Around 10% of the participants provided their opinions on various issues in an online survey. The presentations and discussions, as well as the results of the online survey, show that the stakeholders perceive a positive effect of REACH on the implementation of OSH, in particular via the information made available through the registration and communication in the supply chain, and the restrictions and authorization procedures. The integration of OSH and REACH expertise in the regulatory processes, as well as transparency and clarity about the selection of regulatory instruments to manage workplace risks, were highlighted as areas for potential improvement. Overall, it was concluded that the Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability would further improve the interplay of legislation, which would also benefit the level of safety and health at workplaces.

About hazard and risk assessment: regulatory approaches in assessing safety in the European Union chemicals legislation.

Hazard classification and labelling is the main and basic requirement for all industrial and consumer chemicals in the European Union, if they are not regulated under more specific legislation such as drugs, food ingredients or cosmetics. The first approach in hazard classification is hazard identification describing the hazardous properties of chemicals. Refinements in the classification criteria include the assessment of toxic potency (hazard characterisation) where feasible and the possibility to set higher or lower specific concentration limits for classification. In the past only a minor portion of the classified chemicals underwent a risk assessment including exposure assessment and risk characterisation. Risk assessment will become more frequent with the implementation of REACH. However, as risk assessment is rather labour-intensive even under REACH risk assessment will be performed in a targeted approach for a selected number of chemical substances while hazard classification and labelling will remain the basic approach for all chemicals.