Plant protection products must comply with legislation on classification and labelling of chemicals which are placed on the market in the EC. Harmonised rules are laid down in Council Directives 67/548/EEC (the ‘Dangerous Substances Directive’) and 1999/45/EC (the ‘Dangerous Preparations Directive’).
The Directives will gradually be replaced by a new EC Regulation on Classification, Labelling and Packaging of Substances and Mixtures (known as the CLP Regulation), which will implement the United Nations’ globally harmonised system (GHS) for classification and labelling in all EC member States.
The Directives are implemented in Great Britain by the Chemicals (Hazard Information and Packaging for Supply) Regulations 2009 – known as ‘CHIP 4’ (replacing ‘CHIP 3’ in April 2009). Northern Ireland will implement these provisions through regional legislation later in 2009.
CHIP 4 introduces transitional arrangements which allow suppliers to apply the labelling requirements of the CLP Regulation as an alternative to those in CHIP. It will gradually be replaced by the new CLP Regulation and will be repealed completely when that Regulation is fully in force (anticipated June 2015).
The Labelling Handbook provides guidance on the application of CHIP to plant protection products, but has not yet been updated to reflect the new provisions in CHIP 4. Both the Handbook and related guidance on the website will be updated over the next few months, and in the meantime the CHIP web pages contain further information about:
