White asbestos finds backers at Rotterdam Convention

another attempt to bring chrysotile, the most common form of asbestos, under the prior informed consent list (pic) of the Rotterdam Convention has failed. Parties to this international treaty governing trade in toxic substances met in Geneva between October 10 and 13, 2006. But they couldn't agree on adding chrysotile to a list of 39 substances about which exporting countries must inform importers before shipping. The decision has been postponed till 2008. The opposition to list chrysolite, which accounts for 94 per cent of the global trade in asbestos, in pic was spearheaded by Canada with support of a few countries, including India.

"The failure is cause for concern for many developing countries that need to protect their citizens from the well-known risks of chrysotile,' says Achim Steiner, executive director, un Environment Programme, which, together with the global body's Food and Agriculture Organization, provides the Rotterdam's Convention's secretariat in Geneva.

The convention is a multilateral agreement that tries to ensure that export of hazardous materials takes place with the knowledge of importing nations. Although five types of asbestos were included in its pic list in 2004, the asbestos lobby including Canada, India, China, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, blocked action on chrysotile. "At the recent meeting, this lobby succeeded again, despite un agencies and the treaty secretariat's acknowledgement that there were sufficient grounds to include it in pic list,' says Laurie Kazan-Allen, coordinator of the International Ban Asbestos Secretariat, London.

At the recent meet, the Canadian representative was the first to oppose the inclusion of chrysotile in pic list. Delegates from India, Kyrgyzstan, Iran, Peru and the Russian Federation followed suit. Most governments did express serious concern about the failure to list chrysotile asbestos at this time.

who representatives also stated that chrysotile is a human carcinogen and that at least 90,000 people die every year of asbestos-related diseases such as lung cancer and mesothelioma. But this was to little avail. "As a pic listing can only be achieved by consensus, the minority put a spanner in the meet's agenda,' Kazan-Allen rues.

Health campaigners have warned that the failure will discredit the Rotterdam Convention. "Asbestos kills one person in every five minutes, more than any other industrial toxin. If it can't be listed under the Rotterdam Convention, then every peddler of hazardous substances will know how simple it is to get off the hook,' says Anita Normark, general secretary of the Building and Woodworkers International (bwi), a global body at the forefront of the anti-asbestos campaign. "A handful of unscrupulous governments have done the bidding of the global asbestos industry. At least 200,000 workers will be killed by asbestos-caused diseases before the proposal is tabled again,' says Kazan-Allen.
Double standards The Union ministry of environment and forests thwarted inclusion of chrysotile in the global trade list on the one hand. But on the other, in an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court in August 2006, it admitted that asbestos is taking its toll. The affidavit quotes a report of the National Institute of Occupational Health, Ahmedabad, stating that almost one in six workers (16 per cent of the workforce handling asbestos) could be suffering from an early stage of asbestosis: an irreversible lung condition that often leads to cancer. Most of these workers have worked for less than 10 years in the asbestos industry. Normally, it takes more than 10 years for full-blown asbestosis to develop but its onset is hastened with higher levels of exposure.

"The government has consistently supported asbestos companies,' says the Ban Asbestos Network India. In fact, office memorandum number 6 (6)/94 of the Union ministry of industry, notes, "The asbestos industry should shed the... image of an industry which is a health risk, and project... being eco-friendly.' In Geneva, Indian representatives stood up for old friends again.