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The chemicals we use and the wastes we produce have the potential to cause damage to human, animal and plant life and health and the environment if they are not managed with care. Some substances need to be banned completely because they are so dangerous, while many more can continue to be useful so long as their potential for damage is recognised and dealt with.
The task of chemicals and wastes management is undertaken nationally in New Zealand through a mixture of legislation – these include the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act (HSNO) which regulates the whole life cycle of those chemicals classed internationally as hazardous, and policy such as the New Zealand Waste Strategy.
International agreements about hazardous substances
New Zealand has also been involved in the negotiation and development of a number of international and regional treaties aimed at protecting human, animal and plant life and health and the environment when the adverse effects of hazardous wastes and chemicals arise from transboundary movements. Transboundary movements are imports and exports and other movements of chemical and waste emissions across national borders. These agreements are the Basel Convention, the Waigani Convention, the Rotterdam Convention and the Stockholm Convention.
The Basel Convention
The Basel Convention sets out procedures for the transboundary movement (import and export) of hazardous wastes. The basic rules of the Convention are that trade in hazardous wastes must take place only when it cannot be managed domestically; only when the express written agreement of the exporting and importing country has been secured in advance; and only when the importing party can guarantee that the waste will be managed in an environmentally sound manner. Movements which do not meet these requirements are deemed illegal traffic and a criminal act.
The Convention entered into force in 1994. New Zealand has been a party to it since then.
The Waigani Convention
The Waigani Convention is a Pacific regional agreement on movements of hazardous wastes. It is open to members of the Pacific Islands Forum and is managed by the Pacific Regional Environment Programme - (SPREP). The provisions of the Waigani Convention are similar to those in the Basel Convention.
In order to protect Pacific countries from unwanted dumping of hazardous wastes, the Convention also requires that Pacific Island Forum members (apart from New Zealand and Australia) ban imports of hazardous and radioactive wastes from outside the Forum region, while Australia and New Zealand must ban exports of such substances to other Parties. New Zealand ratified the Convention in late 2000. It entered into force in October 2001.
The Rotterdam Convention
The Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent (PIC) Procedure for Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides.
The Rotterdam (PIC) Convention seeks to control the movement of certain hazardous chemicals and pesticides on the basis of Prior Informed Consent, that is, the formal and advance agreement of the importing party to accept the substance. The provisions of the Convention facilitate such decision-making by providing parties with full information on the environmental and human health risks of each substance. The Convention does not ban trade but gives each party the option to ban or restrict imports based on its assessment of the risks involved and its national circumstances.
New Zealand signed the Convention in 1998 and ratified it on 23 September, 2003. The Convention entered into force in February 2004.
The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants
The goal of the Stockholm Convention is to eliminate production, use, and trade in extremely hazardous substances - persistent organic pollutants (POPs) - whose characteristics of persistence, ability to cross borders, and bio-accumulation (they accumulate in fatty tissue) pose serious risks to human and animal health and the environment. New Zealand signed the Convention on May 23rd 2001 and ratified the Convention on 24 September 2004. The Convention entered into force in New Zealand in December 2004.
The ozone layer forms part of the atmosphere, 10-50 kilometres above the earth, and absorbs most of the harmful ultraviolet-B (UV-B) radiation from the sun.
The depletion of the Earth’s protective stratospheric ozone and the likelihood of increased UV exposure became a matter of urgency in 1984 with the discovery of the ozone “hole” above the Antarctic.
It was realised that the earth could be facing a major environmental disaster threatening a wide range of life forms. This realisation led to a programme of research, and negotiations leading to the first agreement about the Ozone layer, the Vienna Convention, in 1985.
New Zealand has made commitments to protect the ozone layer.
