The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Panel for Chemicals, Waste and Pollution is Born
Michelle Bloor, School of Social and Environmental Sustainability, University of Glasgow
I am delighted to report to the SETAC community that on the 20 June 2025, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Panel for Chemicals, Waste and Pollution (ISPCWP) was established, under the purview of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). This came after agreement of 107 Member States at the Intergovernmental Meeting with Co-Chairs Laura Dupuy and Yutaka Matsuzawa. UNEP’s Executive Director, Inger Anderson, proclaimed in her address to the Intergovernmental Meeting her delight at the establishment of the ISPCWP and that multilateralism is “alive and well.” Stakeholders also collaborated on a statement, read by Ajay K. Jha, which was prepared by Miriam Diamond, Dalia Marquez and myself, which welcomed the establishment of the panel.
To coin a phrase used by the Children and Youth Major Group delegation, “we have a panel.” The ISPCWP was indeed established, at a cost of approximately $8 million, after five meetings of the Open Ended Working Group (OEWG) and 3 years of negotiations since resolution 5/8 at UNEA 5.2. The OEWG meetings were intense and included very long days of negotiation. The rooms were filled with compromise and in some cases, red lines set by the governments of individual member states, which could not be crossed. Red lines were not focused on chemicals, waste and pollution, but geo-political party lines, such as gender topics, involvement of stakeholders, proposals to exclude specific countries, and the application of commas in the negotiating text, etc.
It all feels a little surreal at the moment, but work still needs to be done to finalize the operations and finer detail of the process. In truth, it’s likely to be 8–10 years before any assessments are commissioned or generated through the ISPCWP. I suppose the point left unanswered is how can stakeholders get involved. Stakeholders can participate as observers at the panel meetings if they have accreditation to the UNEP Major Groups system, like SETAC has. The panel is a government body, as is the case of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Stakeholders with relevant knowledge or technical expertise might also have the opportunity to be appointed by member states and regions to the Interdisciplinary Expert Group, which is the group that will make topic recommendations to the panel. However, as there are only 25 seats in the Interdisciplinary Expert Group, selection will be a competitive process, and participation in the group will preclude individuals from taking part in any assessments. Last but certainly not least would be the potential to participate in the assessment writing teams. As the process moves forward, I would imagine that there will be more clarity on all of these potential options, how to make interests known, and also how to apply.
Over those years, I have had the honor of representing SETAC, supported by the SETAC Advisory Panel on Chemicals Management (CheM). You can read the statement we prepared for this last meeting, which took place between 14–19 June in Punta del Este, Uruguay, and where the panel was established. To learn about SETAC’s work on this issue, you can also read the July 2024 Globe article on the topic, which also links to relevant UNEP webpages and documentation, stakeholder statements, including SETAC’s, and other resources of interest.
Moving forward, CheM is hosting a session on ISPCWP during the SETAC 9th World Congress, which will be held from 29 September through 3 October in Johannesburg, South Africa. The results from the Global Consultation on Chemicals Management that we have recently undertaken will be shared and discussed prior to publication, along with a conceptual framework that we have developed and are in the process of publishing. The session will include multisectoral talks on topics linked to ISPCWP, a panel discussion and interactive audience participation. We are also delighted to announce that Tessa Goverse, Principal Officer at UNEP and the Secretariat for the OEWG, will be a speaker at the session.
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