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News and discussion
- Prior to the workshop
- REACH on Monday
- REACH on Tuesday
- REACH on Wednesday
Workshop Photos

Program
- Program
- General Information

Participants

Speakers
- Terlouw
- van Gennip
- van Geel
- Patrick Hennessy
- Thomas Jostmann
- Klaus Mittelbach
- Michael Warhurst
- Stefan Scheuer
- Nico Schrakamp
- Frans Tummers

Workshop Venue
- Kurhaus
- Mauritshuis
- Den Haag /
  Scheveningen 
  Tuesday
Threats or opportunities?
 









   
 
Typical Dutch
The Dutch are a bit funny, if you believe other Europeans. First there is the difficult language: Terlouw challenged the participants to pronounce "Scheveningen" and spoke of words like 'leuk', 'luik' and 'lijk' (which sound the same to the non-Dutch but mean respectively: nice, hatchet and dead body).
Then there is the need to speed things up and to be on time. When one of the ladies from the Congress Bureau stressed participants should be in the lobby at six fifteen sharp for the tram to the Mauritshuis, the Greek and Italian delegation sniggered and said: "Of course, we will be on time. We are in Holland now!"
Finally, we heard several times that the Dutch are known for coming to conclusions in a very short time. We hope - as Dutch people- that this goal has been realised during the workshop.
On the second day of the workshop, things were speeded up. The biggest challenges of REACH were discussed extensively on this day: direct and indirect costs, competitiveness and innovation, as well as the impact of REACH on society. During the day, Professor Jan Terlouw stimulated all participants to develop preliminary recommendations on these different items.
Introducer Nico Schrakamp elaborated on the direct costs, caused by REACH, for especially SMEs, and introduced the British Hungarian proposal OSOR (One Substance, one registration) as a possible solution for that.
Frans Tummers passionately talked about indirect costs. He questioned the use of scenario thinking, certainly when a scenario for the impact of REACH is called 'hurricane'. Hurricanes never occur in Europe...

Tummers also said not to be afraid of substance withdrawal, because he doesn't expect a great number of substances to be withdrawn from the market: "That would mean we are living dangerously now!". He also claimed that companies won't wait for the legislation to be implemented, but are already looking for new solutions. It is important that SMEs receive good information fast and get full co-operation from the institutes that have to implement REACH.
Tummers was brief on the subject of confidentiality: "Coca Cola has already had to register the recipe of the famous drink numerous times, but nobody has ever got hold of the information of the product. Otherwise, millions would have become very rich."
On the subject 'competitiveness and innovation' the workshop came up with recommendations to a number of possible negative effects on competition and ways to avoid short-term negative effects on innovation. And finally the workshop decided the impact of society should be mentioned, even if they are wide-ranging.
And when most of the participants wound down having diner in the Mauritshuis, a small group worked till late to prepare draft recommendations, which will be presented for discussion on Wednesday.



Be courageous!
Jan van der Kolk, responsible for the REACH program at the department for Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment is the host for the delegates at the Mauritshuis.
"The delegates should have the courage to really want to implement the necessary changes, although some items aren't clear or are even uncertain. We, as policy makers, should support our politicians. And we should understand that 'not acting' IS 'acting'. If we don't act, Europe will hand over the initiative to other parties. Europe has been a front-runner; let's not give up on that! Therefore we have to act, and advise our politicians strongly. Think ahead, beyond the set boundaries."