Bolivia Bans Dozens of Pesticides, Activists Call for Rest of LAC to Follow
Monday, February 2nd, 2009At the close of the meeting of the Latin American section of the Pesticide Action Network (known by its Spanish acronym RAP-AL) in La Paz last week, host country Bolivia announced that it was banning all pesticides with active ingredients classified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as extremely (Class 1a) or highly (Class 1b) […]
Colombia Finally Joins the POPs Convention / Por fin Colombia es Estado Parte del Convenio sobre los COPs
Tuesday, January 20th, 2009On 20 January Colombia finally joined the ranks of Contracting Parties (CPs) to the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). The Stockholm Convention commits CPs to eliminate, severely restrict and/or minimize the production, use and trade of 12 POPs — nine pesticides (including DDT), three byproducts of industrial processes and of combustion (dioxins, furans […]
Unique Customs Cooperation Pact on Multilateral Environmental Agreements
Monday, December 29th, 2008Earlier this month Ministers from Central America and the Dominican Republic responsible for the environment, agriculture, health, defense and customs signed an Inter-Institutional Cooperation Convention for the Control of Imports, Exports and Transit Related to Multilateral Environment Agreements. The accord is supposedly the first of its kind in the world (I would be interested to […]
Panama Launches Mercury Project
Friday, August 10th, 2007Panama’s National Environment Authority (ANAM) recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) to launch in that country the Pilot Project for Developing an Inventory and Risk Management of Mercury. The project will draw up a national inventory of emissions and products that contain the heavy […]
Guyana Joins Ranks of LAC Nations Ratifying POPs Convention
Sunday, July 29th, 2007The Guyanese Government announced this week that it will ratify the Stockholm Convention on Pesistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). The Stockholm Convention (text: English, Spanish) commits Contracting Parties (CPs) to eliminate, severely restrict and/or minimize the production, use and trade of 12 POPs — nine pesticides, three byproducts of industrial processes and of combustion (dioxins, furans […]
The Significance of the WTO Biotech Ruling for LAC
Monday, March 5th, 2007When the World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute panel on biotech products involving Argentina, Canada, and the US vs. the European Union (EU) released its report at the end of September, I sat down to start this entry with an outline and list of possible points, thoughts, items to check on, etc. — my usual brainstorming. […]
The Basics I: Open Wide and Say “Ah….”
Thursday, November 23rd, 2006This begins a blog series on environmental law and policy that I like to call “The Basics.” This will examine some of the elements many experts think (and I agree) are necessary to have an effective environment policy. What are these? Some people might add to this list, but most agree on at least the […]
Toxics in Electronics Redux: Greenpeace Responds
Monday, October 30th, 2006As I noted here previously on the Temas Blog, a few weeks back Treehugger invited me to guest blog about my reservations concerning Greenpeace’s handling of its report on the testing of laptops for certain substances. My entry drew quite a few comments, including a long, detailed reply reputedly penned by the scientist who did […]