The NORMAN Association and the European Partnership for Chemicals Risk Assessment (PARC): let’s cooperate!
- Year of publication
- 2020
- Journal
- Environmental Sciences Europe
- Involved from NIVA
-
Bert van Bavel
- Contributors
- Valeria Dulio, Jan Koschorreck, Bert van Bavel, Paul van den Brink, Juliane Hollender, John Munthe, Martin Schlabach, Reza Aalizadeh, Marlene Agerstrand, Lutz Ahrens, Ian Allan, Nikiforos Alygizakis, Damià Barceló, Pernilla Bohlin-Nizzetto, Susanne Boutroup, Werner Brack, Adele Bressy, Jan H. Christensen, Lubos Cirka, Adrian Covaci, Anja Derksen, Genevieve Deviller, Milou M. L. Dingemans, Magnus Engwall, Despo Fatta-Kassinos, Pablo Gago-Ferrero, Félix Hernández, Dorte Herzke, Klára Hilscherová, Henner Hollert, Marion Junghans, Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern, Steffen Keiter, Stefan A. E. Kools, Anneli Kruve, Dimitra Lambropoulou, Marja Lamoree, Pim Leonards, Benjamin Lopez, Miren López de Alda, Lian Lundy, Jarmila Makovinská, Ionan Marigómez, Jonathan W. Martin, Brendan McHugh, Cécile Miège, Simon O'Toole, Noora Perkola, Stefano Polesello, Leo Posthuma, Sara Rodriguez-Mozaz, Ivo Roessink, Pawel Rostkowski, Heinz Ruedel, Saer Samanipour, Tobias Schulze, Emma L. Schymanski, Manfred Sengl, Peter Tarabek, Dorien Ten Hulscher, Nikolaos Thomaidis, Anne Togola, Sara Valsecchi, Stefan van Leeuwen, Peter von der Ohe, Katrin Vorkamp, Branislav Vrana, Jaroslav Slobodnik
Summary
The Partnership for Chemicals Risk Assessment (PARC) is currently under development as a joint research and innovation programme to strengthen the scientific basis for chemical risk assessment in the EU. The plan is to bring chemical risk assessors and managers together with scientists to accelerate method development and the production of necessary data and knowledge, and to facilitate the transition to next-generation evidence-based risk assessment, a non-toxic environment and the European Green Deal. The NORMAN Network is an independent, well-established and competent network of more than 80 organisations in the field of emerging substances and has enormous potential to contribute to the implementation of the PARC partnership. NORMAN stands ready to provide expert advice to PARC, drawing on its long experience in the development, harmonisation and testing of advanced tools in relation to chemicals of emerging concern and in support of a European Early Warning System to unravel the risks of contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) and close the gap between research and innovation and regulatory processes. In this commentary we highlight the tools developed by NORMAN that we consider most relevant to supporting the PARC initiative: (i) joint data space and cutting-edge research tools for risk assessment of contaminants of emerging concern; (ii) collaborative European framework to improve data quality and comparability; (iii) advanced data analysis tools for a European early warning system and (iv) support to national and European chemical risk assessment thanks to harnessing, combining and sharing evidence and expertise on CECs. By combining the extensive knowledge and experience of the NORMAN network with the financial and policy-related strengths of the PARC initiative, a large step towards the goal of a non-toxic environment can be taken.