The Chemical Weapons Convention has recently effected some changes in the parameters for declarations and the Chemicals Ministry has asked the pharma industry associations to bring the changes to the notice of the members so that they can submit declarations accordingly.

In a note sent to all industry associations related to pharma and chemicals, the chemicals department has said that conference of state parties some time back had made the decision in this regard and hence declarations are not required under Part VII of verification annex. India is a signatory to the Convention which is a universal non-discriminatory, multilateral, disarmament treaty to ban development, production, acquisition, transfer and use of chemical weapons.

Declarations and verifications are two important aspects for the implementation of the convention and each state party is required to make annual declaration of the production, import and export of scheduled chemicals and their production facilities. The changes are expected to ease the burden on the pharma and chemical manufacturers in the country, sources said.

“In terms of Paragraph 5 of Part VII of verification annex, declarations are required for mixture containing low concentrations of schedule 2 chemicals, in accordance with guidelines, in cases where the ease of recovery from the mixture of schedule 2 chemical and its total weight are deemed to pose a risk to the object and purpose of the Convention,” the letter said.

Now a decision has been taken to exclude mixtures of chemical containing one percent or less of schedule 2A or 2A chemicals, it said. “Besides, mixtures of chemicals containing more than one per cent but less than or equal to 10 per cent of schedule 2A chemical, provided that the annual amount produced, processed or consumed is less than the relevant verification thresholds specified in Paragraph 12 of Part VII of the Annex” are also exempted from declaration, according to the Chemicals Department.