On May 12, 2020, the Philippine Environmental Management Bureau under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR-EMB) issued Circular No. 2020-007 to publish the additional chemicals appended to the Philippines Inventory of Chemicals and Chemical Substances (PICCS). The new list includes 31 additional chemical substances, which are the same as those in the draft released last October. (ChemLinked News [2]) According to the Circular, the changes became effective immediately.
PICCS (the Inventory of existing chemicals of the Philippines), now contains over 47,000 items. The DENR-EMB first published the Inventory in 1995 and later updated it in 2000, 2002, 2005, 2008, 2011, 2013, 2015, and 2017. To help enterprises check whether their chemical substances are listed in the PICCS, EMB provides an online search system [3], which is based on the 2015 version of PICCS.
Once a chemical is listed in the PICCS, its manufacturer and importer are eligible for exemptions from notification requirements provided the chemical is not included in the Priority Chemical List (PCL) or Chemical Control Orders (CCO). If a chemical is not included in the PICCS, the chemical is designated as a “new chemical” in the Philippines. Manufacturers or importers of new chemicals are required to submit a Pre-Manufacturer and Pre-Importation Notification (PMPIN) to the DENR-EMB, to get a new chemical notification and security clearance. To learn more about chemical management in the Philippines, please refer to the expert article: Chemical Management in Philippine [4].
