An interesting piece in Chemical Watch on how regulators and politicians see the chemical industry. I worked on the survey.
REACH could improve industry’s reputation, says top executive
CEFIC agm debates reputation; survey shows over 80% of Brussels policymakers mistrust chemicals
30-Sep-2011
REACH offers the European chemical industry the opportunity, in the long term, to improve its reputation by allowing it demonstrate that safety data has been generated and supplied to ECHA for all chemicals, according to a leading company executive.
Speaking today at the European Chemical Industry Council (CEFIC)’s agm in Madrid during a panel discussion on the industry’s reputation – a session opened up to the press for the first time – Ben van Beurden, executive vice president of Shell Chemicals, said the chemicals industry should “intuitively like the fact that REACH is science-based”, but the Regulation is not in the public consciousness and the debate about REACH is currently focused on the perception that the chemicals industry “hides information or acknowledges that it isn’t there”. But he was “reasonably certain” that the industry can change this perception “and say the information is all there” as more and more substances fall under REACH’s registration requirements and dossiers are submitted to the agency. But, Mr van Beurden warned, “we think now that REACH is in place that’s the end of it, but the debate about our reputation is only just starting.”
Echoing the point that battles lie ahead for the chemical industry, fellow panellist Nick Andrews, a senior partner at PR firm Fleishman-Hillard, said the way the industry deals with the issue of nanomaterials “will determine how the industry is viewed by the public for the next 15-20 years”. And Russell Mills, Dow Chemical’s head of energy and climate change policy, said when it came to nanomaterials, “the deeper we went with the public the more worried they got about the amount we don’t know.”
Mr van Beurden presented the results of a recent CEFIC survey of 50 Brussels-based policymakers, including European Commission desk officers and heads of unit, EU permanent representation office staff, MEPs and political group advisers. These show that 84% agree that there is a general perception of mistrust concerning chemicals. Of the MEPs surveyed, 50% said “chemicals” are unsafe and not properly tested.
The survey also produced what Mr van Beurden called the “astonishing insight” that NGO representatives meet with policymakers as often as CEFIC does. “The face time we get is being matched by an NGO community that is less well resourced but clearly better organised than us. They are setting the agenda and we must address this.” To do this, the chemical industry needs to show a different level of leadership when it comes to talking about these issues and make its top executives available to the media. “We need to make our message inspirational. Let us commit – and I will as I speak – to having regular interviews with the media.”
The industry also “needs to be seen as a solutions provider” and move away from talking about its plants and legacy issues towards the products and applications that chemicals help to provide. This may prove easier to do for some products, such as cars, where the chemical industry is helping the production of light-weight materials, than for others, “but we have to start and go on the offensive”, he said.
The good news, said Mr van Beurden, is that the survey shows the industry has been successful in getting its message across to policymakers that chemicals are important and central to innovation, and that CEFIC is providing good representation for the industry.
Comparing the automotive industry’s “cleverness” at offering the public a positive future where all cars could one day be “green”, Mr Andrews, whose company includes CEFIC and some of its sector groups among its clients, said the chemicals industry has failed to offer a similar vision that will reassure the public that whatever its current problems, it is moving in the right direction. He also challenged the chemicals industry to consider the idea that it might be in its interests to sometimes support the banning of a particular substance. “Has the chemical industry ever advocated banging a chemical ever, in its whole history? If not, it’s out of step with society.”