PURPOSE: to approve, on behalf of the Union, the
Minamata Convention on Mercury.
PROPOSED ACT: Council Decision.
ROLE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT: Council may adopt the
act only if Parliament has given its consent to the
act.
BACKGROUND: mercury is recognised as a global threat
to human health and the environment. Mercury is characterised by
its transboundary nature. Global action is therefore necessary
to ensure the protection of the individuals and of the environment
within the Union as a complement to domestic measures.
The Minamata Convention on Mercury, concluded under the auspices of the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP), is the main international legal
framework for cooperation and measures to control and limit the use
and anthropogenic emissions of mercury and mercury compounds to
air, water and land.
The Convention was adopted and opened for signature at
a Conference of the Plenipotentiaries in Kumamoto, Japan, in
October 2013. The European Union and twenty-one Member States
signed the Convention on 10 October 2013 while Croatia, Cyprus,
Latvia and Poland did so on 24 September 2014 and Malta on 8
October 2014.
The EU has made significant progress for the last 10
years in addressing mercury
domestically as a follow-up to the adoption in 2005 of the Community
Strategy Concerning Mercury, as supported by the Council of the
European Union and the European Parliament in its resolution
dated 14.3. 2006.
The Strategy was reviewed
in 2010 and was supported by the Council of the European
Union.
The Seventh
Environmental Action programme established the long-term
objective of a non-toxic environment and stated, for that purpose,
that action is needed to ensure the minimisation of significant
adverse effects of chemicals on human health and the environment by
2020.
CONTENT: with the present draft Decision, the Council
is called upon to approve, on behalf of the Union, the Minamata
Convention on Mercury.
The Convention addresses the whole life-cycle of
mercury with the objective to protect human health and the
environment. It:
- sets restrictions on primary mining and international
trade of mercury;
- prohibits the manufacture, import and export of a wide
range of mercury-added products;
- foresees prohibitions or operating conditions for
several manufacturing processes using mercury and calls for
discouraging new uses of mercury in products and industrial
processes;
- provides for measures to be taken to reduce mercury
emissions from Artisanal and Small-scale Gold Mining ("ASGM") and
major industrial activities, including through the use of best
available techniques;
- requires also interim storage of mercury and
management of mercury waste to occur in an environmentally sound
manner.
In parallel to this proposed Decision, the Commission
has put forward a proposal
for a Regulation by the European Parliament and the Council to
transpose the limited number of provisions of the Convention that
are not yet implemented into EU legislation.