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On March 4, 2020, China Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) issued a notice [1] on the publication of drafts of 5 compulsory national standards, which are subject to a period of public consultation before approvals. One of the five standards is the Rules for classification and labeling of chemicals—Part 1: General specifications [2], which is revised from GB 13690-2009 General rules for the classification and hazard communication of chemicals [3] and will replace it. The public comments on these drafts shall be submitted before April 5, 2020.
In 2006, China issued GB 20576 ~ GB 20602 in accordance with GHS Rev. 1, marking the beginning of the implementation of the GHS classification in China. Then in 2009, GB 13690 was revised to adopt GHS Rev. 2 to provide up to date general rules for classification and labeling. In 2011, the revision of GB 20576 ~ GB 20602 started, and soon after, the GB 30000-2013 series were published, which were in reference to GHS Rev.4. GB 13690-2009 scheduled for revision in 2012, but the draft revised version was not published until 2015, and the final approved version was never released. Figure 1 [4] shows the current China GHS standard system.
Figure 1. China GHS Standard System
The revision of GB 13690 has been an ongoing task, which has caused a long-term vacancy of GB 30000.1. According to the preparation instructions of the new General Specifications, the revision of GB 13690 was restarted in 2019, and finally, the draft is now released. The new revised version has adopted GHS Rev.7 to align with advanced international standards. So compared with this one, the other relevant standards are outdated. The experts who formulate the General Specifications suggest revising the old standards after the General Specifications is issued, which means that the GHS implementation in China may comprehensively reference GHS Rev.7 in the future.
Comparing the new General Specifications with GB 13690-2009, the major differences are the revision to GHS. Specifically, the addition of hazard class Desensitized Explosives to the new draft as well as changes to the general rules for packaging, labeling, and SDS.
