A move to bring under one umbrella all EU legislation on food contact plastics, due to come into force in May 2011, was passed unopposed by the European Council of Ministers at a meeting in Brussels on 20 December.
The proposed Plastic Implementation Measure (PIM), officially the draft regulation (14262/10) on plastic materials and articles intended to come into contact with food, is subject to the so-called regulatory procedure with scrutiny. “This means that now that the Council has given its consent, the Commission may adopt [it], unless the European Parliament objects,” states a report on the proceedings.
The regulation outlines the need for more rigour in migration testing to reflect the complexity of plastics used in food contact materials. It also says that mutagenic, carcinogenic or toxic substances must be authorised for use.
The risk assessment of a substance by the European Food Safety Authority should cover ‘the substance itself, relevant impurities and foreseeable reaction and degradation products in the intended use’; and potential migration should be assessed ‘under worst foreseeable conditions of use and the toxicity’, says the regulation.
The regulation would repeal a large amount of current legislation and be subject to a staggered introduction with transitional arrangements from 1 May 2011 to 1 January 2016.
The coming into force of the PIM will be preceded by what will be the final (7th) amending Directive to the outgoing Plastics Directive 2002/72/EC: to implement the adoption of a ban on the marketing in, or importation into, the European Union of polycarbonate baby bottles. This special measure amends the entry for bisphenol A (BPA) – a major starting substance for the manufacture of polycarbonate plastic - in the list of permitted starting substances for food contact plastics with the qualification ‘Not to be used for the manufacture of polycarbonate infant feeding bottles’. This uses as the definition for ‘infant’ that in Commission Directive 2006/141/EC on infant formula – persons up to 12 months of age. Member states will be obliged to declare their intended national measures by 31 January aimed at banning manufacture from 1 March 2011 then marketing and importation from 1 June 2011.
A number of European trade associations have expressed opposition to what they believe to be a largely politically-motivated measure, with other potential ramifications, but further by the fact that a voluntary phase-out of polycarbonate baby bottles was underway anyway in Europe and beyond.
