일본 환경호르몬물질 관리의 정책과 법제

Abstract

There has also been increased public interest in environmental hormones in Japan due to the publication of the ‘Our Stolen Future’ written by Theo Colborn in 1996. The Japanese government has been conducting the program with the aim of Scientific Risk Evaluation on endocrine disturbance of chemicals. The Japanese government has been respectively executing Program ‘SPEED’98’, ‘EXTEND2005’ and ‘EXTEND2010’. Currently, the Japanese government is pursuing measures for risk assessment and management in accordance with EXTEND2016, which was established in June 2016. The main contents of these programs are accelerating the establishment and execution of the evaluation system on how and what environmental hormone substances impact on human health and ecosystem. The policy direction in Japan like this gives many implications to Korea where there is somewhat no the insufficient policy on environmental hormone substance management.However the management of environmental hormone substances in Japan is insufficient. The Japanese government does not have the special law or act that regulates only the environmental hormone substances to separate from the common chemical substances. The Japanese Government considers environmental hormone substances as one of the chemical substances. They regulate environmental hormone substances in accordance with ‘the Act on the Evaluation of Chemical Substances and Regulation of Their Manufacture, etc.’, known as ‘Kashinho’ and ‘the Act on Confirmation, etc. of Release Amounts of Specific Chemical Substances in the Environment and Promotion of Improvements to the Management Thereof’, known as ‘Kakanho’ with the character as the general law on chemical substances regulation. Otherwise they regulate the products that contain chemicals by the individual law or act.According to the Kashinho, none of the representative environmental hormones such as bisphenol A, phthalate, and nonyl phenol is designated as ‘the Class I Specified Chemical Substances’, ‘the Class II Specified Chemical Substances’ or ‘the Monitoring Chemical Substances’. The Kashinho designates only bisphenol A, some of nonylphenol and DEHP as ‘the Priority Assessment Chemical Substances which preferentially needs risk assessment. In this context, the majority of these substances are far less regulated than the European Union, where is regulated as ’the Substances of Very High Concern’(SVHC), ‘the Authorization Substances’ or ‘the Restricted Substances under REACH’. In Kakanho, there are some chemicals designated as ‘the Class I Designated Chemical Substances’ or ‘the Class II Designated Chemical Substances’. However, many things do not designated.Regulation of the products containing environmental hormones in individual laws and ordinances is a little weak. In the case of appliances, containers and packaging for foods made of polycarbonate, the dissolution standard of bisphenol A is 2.5 or less. There is any no restriction on the use of bisphenol A for polycarbonate bottles in Japanese law or act. However, the act for the ban on the use of bisphenol A in baby bottles has been adopted in Korea. In the European Union, the dissolution standard of bisphenol A from food containers is 0.05 mg / kg or less. Regulation of phthalates in Japanese toys is at the level of Korea and the European Union. DBP, DEHP, and BBP do not exceed 0.1%, and DIDP, DINP, and DNOP are similarly restricted against toys that infants play with mouth. However, this is also inadequate compared to the recently revised US CPSIA regulations. In addition, the guideline for the safety of European Union’s toy have lowered the dissolution standards of bisphenol A in children’s toys to 0.04 mg/L or less.The Kashinho also regulate chemical substances on the basis of the precautionary principle like ‘the Act on the Registration and Evaluation, etc. of Chemical Substances’ in KOREA or the European Union’s REACH. However, there is a considerable difference in the statutory system and its concrete contents. The issue of this is that there is a considerable difference in designating the kinds of substances which become foundation of the management of chemical substance even though it has the same properties. For example, in the European Union, bisphenol A is designated as SVHC, moreover as ‘the Substances Restricted under REACH’, however, in Japan, it is designated as ‘the Priority assessment chemical substances’. And only a few are ‘the designated as ‘Designated Chemical Substances’ In Japan, which has a very low level of regulation as in Kore, it is necessary to actively consider the standards of the European Union, in reestablishing the safety standards and the labeling standards of environmental hormone substances by harmonizing the precautionary principle and the proportional principle. In areas where safety is required, there will be no need to specify the safety standards unless In Japan, which has a very low level of regulation as in Korea, it is necessary to actively consider the standards of the European Union, etc. in reestablishing the safety standards and labeling standards of environmental hormones by harmonizing the precautionary principle and proportional principle. In areas where safety is required, there will be no need to specify safety standards unless there are special circumstances. It is common to say that regulation has a negative impact on the industry, but it should be taken into account that adequate regulation can be an opportunity to encourage the development of leading technologies.