In an article published on July 20, 2017, the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) informed about the current progress in preparing the guidance document on “how to identify pesticides and biocides with endocrine disrupting properties.” This work is being performed together with the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Commission’s (EC) Joint Research Centre (JRC) (FPF reported). In December 2016, an outline of the draft guidance was published (FPF reported).
In April 2017, ECHA’s “joint drafting group” consulted a “specially constituted consultation group” on an initial draft of the guidance. This consultation group includes “members of ECHA’s Endocrine Disruptors Expert Group and pesticide experts from EU Member States and other stakeholder groups.” Numerous comments were received, and “due to the amount and complexity, more time has been needed to take the comments into account than was originally envisaged.”
The current deadline for receiving comments from the consultation group is August 31, 2017. After this, the joint drafting team will prepare a revised draft version of the guidance. This version will then be subject to a public consultation, which is scheduled to take place after the adoption of the EDC criteria by the European Parliament and Council.
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ECHA (July 20, 2017). “Work on guidance document for identifying endocrine disruptors proceeding.”
