The Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International Trade was adopted on 10 September 1998 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and entered into force on 24 February 2004. It is jointly administered by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), with a secretariat based in Geneva and Rome.
The convention's core mechanism is the Prior Informed Consent (PIC) procedure. Chemicals listed in Annex III may not be exported to a party unless that party has been formally notified and has explicitly consented to receive the shipment. This shifts part of the regulatory burden onto exporting states and gives importing countries—particularly developing nations with limited chemical-management capacity—a procedural shield against unwanted hazardous imports. Parties must also notify the Secretariat when they ban or severely restrict a chemical domestically, and exporters must label shipments and provide safety data sheets.
Annex III currently covers dozens of substances, including various pesticides (such as aldrin, DDT, and parathion), severely hazardous pesticide formulations, and industrial chemicals like certain forms of asbestos and tributyltin compounds. Listing decisions require consensus at the Conference of the Parties (COP), a rule that has repeatedly blocked the addition of chrysotile asbestos despite recommendations from the Chemical Review Committee—a recurring point of contention among delegates.
The Rotterdam Convention is one of three sister chemicals-and-waste agreements, alongside the Basel Convention (1989, hazardous waste movement) and the Stockholm Convention (2001, persistent organic pollutants). Since 2011 these treaties have held coordinated "synergies" COPs to share resources and align implementation.
The convention does not ban chemicals outright; it regulates information flow and consent in trade. Domestic bans remain the prerogative of each party. As of the mid-2020s, it has over 160 parties, though several major chemical-producing states have ratified with varying degrees of implementation rigor.
Example
At the 2022 Conference of the Parties in Geneva, proposals to add chrysotile asbestos to Annex III were again blocked by a small group of exporting states including Russia and Kazakhstan, despite majority support.
Frequently asked questions
No. It does not prohibit production or use; it requires exporters to obtain prior informed consent from importing countries before shipping listed chemicals.
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