Russia: Technical Regulation on Safety of Chemical Products

On Oct 7^th 2016, Russian Federation issued Government Decree No.1019 and passed a new regulation called “Technical Regulation on the Safety of Chemical Products". The new regulation will become effective from Jul 1^st 2021 and provide the legal basis for a REACH-like chemical registration system and the GHS implementation in Russia.

New substance notification and product registration

At present, Russia has a register of potentially hazardous chemical and biological substances (http://www.rpohv.ru/online/), containing over 10,000 substances that have appeared on Russian market since 1992. Generally speaking, Russian government regards all substances as “potentially hazardous substances” and requires registration. However, substances that are regulated by other authorities and regulations, including pharmaceutical substances, pesticides, agricultural and forestry growth regulators, etc. are excluded from registration.

The newly passed Technical Regulation introduces a more comprehensive registration system for both substances and chemical products that are manufactured in or imported into Russia. A newly proposed national existing chemical inventory will be established mainly based on the current register. Any substances that are not in the inventory will be regarded as new chemical substances and subject to notification if they are above 0.1% by weight. No small quantity exemption is applied. In addition to substance notification, chemical products also require registration regardless of whether they contain new substances or not.

Russian authorities haven’t disclosed much information regarding the implementation rules of substance notification and product registration, such as whether there will be tonnage-based data requirements. The Ministry of Industry and Trade is preparing another decree on detailed notification procedures.

GHS implementation

Russia has a series of national standards (GOST) on the requirements on classification and labelling of chemicals and SDS (which are also called “chemical product safety passport” by the Russian authorities). GHS requirements were adopted by Russia since Aug 1^st 2014, but only on a voluntary basis. The newly passed Technical Regulation requires GHS implementation to be mandatory from Jul 1^st 2021. It should be noted that the SDS must be written in Russian.