The Russian system of chemicals management - Bef-de.org

6. Summary and conclusions
The Russian Federation has taken the political decision to consider ensuring of chemicals
safety as one of the top priorities. The policy is based on improving and strengthening
of the relevant institutions and the legal framework, including harmonisation of legislation
with the provisions of international law, international treaties and agreements, of
which the Russian Federation is a part of. At the same time the changes are progressing
slowly. Already in 2004, drafting of a common legal framework on chemicals management
issues was a good starting point, including preparations for GHS implementation.
However, in 2010 the first ‘technical reglament’ on chemicals management is expected
to be adopted, enforcing classification and labelling according GHS. It also includes a
provision for substance registration and safety data sheets.
Requirements for the registration of substances are in place since 1992. Approximately
3,400 substances have been registered. However, about 15,000 substances have been
investigated prior to 1992, and those are considered being registered as well. Thus, the
situation in the Russian Federation could be considered similar to the EU pre-REACH
circumstances with having “old” and “new” substances.
In principle, the registration system in the Russian Federation has similar features with
EU registration scheme: an organisation which wants to market a chemical substance
will contract an accredited organisation to carry out the substance assessment on a paid
basis. Once the assessment is done, the applicant presents the dossier to the competent
authority to prepare the registration documentation.
The results of the assessment contain information on hazardous properties of a substance
(test results from literature as well as from newly performed studies, classification
of substance into different hazard classes) and measures to ensure safe handling
together with proposed environmental quality standards (MPCs).
Assessments are performed separately and by different institutions for toxicological
properties (hygienic assessment) and for ecotoxicological properties in the aquatic environment
(fishery water assessment). Thus there are two types of environmental quality
standards for water and different competent authorities for establishing them:
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for hygienic assessments, RosPotrebNadzpor is in charge;
for fishery water assessments, the Federal Fishery Agency with approval of the
Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology is responsible.
The full procedure of assigning a MPC is not fully described in legislation: if the registrant
proposes the MPCs in the documentation, should the MPC be assigned in the legislation
by the competent authorities before or after the registration occurs. With hygienic norms
it is not a major issue, as the authority confirming MPC and registration is the same. But
still it is quite common that a substance is registered and MPCs for human health are assigned,
but no MCP for fishery water is assigned. The opposite is also possible: a fishery
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