Report Faults EU Regulators for Derailing Debate over Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals

The Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) has alleged that companies
used “numerous tactics from the corporate lobbyist playbook”
to persuade several European Commission departments to obstruct
the Directorate-General of the Environment (DG Environment) in
its attempts to regulate endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs). In
particular, the CEO report claims that groups representing the chemical
and plastics sectors not only promoted their own studies “as the only
‘sound science,’” but used the threat of economic damage as well as the
Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations “as
a leverage to prevent any new ‘trade barrier.’”

“By early Spring 2013, since DG Environment did not bend under the
pressure, the corporate lobby focused on demanding an impact assessment
as a delaying tactic,” opines the report. “In a culmination of fierce
lobbying pressure, DG Environment’s proposal for scientific criteria to
identify EDCs was finally rejected by the other DGs in the Commission.
Moreover, in July 2013 the Secretary-General, Catherine Day, ordered
the impact assessment the industry wanted so much. This move meant
that the Commission failed to meet the December 2013 deadlines to
come up with the scientific criteria, as demanded by EU law.” See CEO
Press Release, May 19, 2015.

Issue 566