19 June 2025, Manila, Philippines/Gothenburg, Sweden. The International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN) lauded the Governments of Switzerland, Morocco and Cameroon for nominating lead chromate pigments for Rotterdam Convention listing, while urging other countries to follow suit in order to control the global trade of this common ingredient in making lead paint, one of the most widespread sources of lead exposure.
As published in the Database of Notifications of Final Regulatory Action, the Swiss Government has submitted a notification nominating lead chromates and other lead-containing ingredients used in the manufacture of paints such as lead-based pigments, corrosion inhibitors, and driers for listing in Annex III of the Rotterdam Convention.
The Governments of Cameroon and Morocco had earlier filed their respective Notifications in 2024 informing the Secretariat of the Rotterdam Convention of their final regulatory actions prohibiting or severely restricting lead chromates. The Notifications were largely based on the regulations their countries adopted banning lead in paints.
Lead paint ban advocates push for stricter global rules to control trade in lead chromates and paints containing these toxic pigments.
With countries from two regions – Africa and Europe — calling on the Rotterdam Convention to add lead chromates to Annex III, the Secretariat has received enough Notifications to trigger the beginning of the process by which the treaty gives active consideration to making international trade in lead chromate pigments – and trade in paints and other mixtures that contain lead chromate pigments – subject to its Prior Informed Consent (PIC) procedure.
By listing lead chromates under the Convention’s PIC procedure, countries that have banned lead paint will be better equipped to impose their ban, and countries that have yet to adopt lead paint restrictions will be incentivized to adopt a ban, IPEN emphasized.
“Hazardous chemicals like lead chromates should never be sent across borders without the knowledge of the recipients. The Rotterdam Convention provides a common-sense tool that gives countries the information they need to decide about imports of this toxic chemical, which poses significant hazards to children and adults, in particular to paint industry workers in their countries,” said Sara Brosché, PhD, IPEN’s Science Advisor. “We welcome the call by Cameroon, Morocco, and Switzerland and look forward to advancing this urgent proposal to protect children’s health around the world.”
IPEN and several of its participating organizations in the global south have actively campaigned, since 2022, to encourage national governments that had already banned lead in paints to submit Notifications nominating lead chromates for a Convention listing. CREPD in Cameroon and AMSETOX in Morocco, in particular, were successful in encouraging and helping their governments prepare and submit Notifications.
“Our experience shows that we need global controls on the trade in lead chromates to protect our children and families,” said Gilbert Kuepouo, Executive Director of CREPD. “Information on imports of lead chromates is vital for Cameroon to enforce our country’s lead paint ban. We encourage all Parties to the Convention to support this proposal at the next COP.”
According to the rules of the Rotterdam Convention, when at least one Government from each of at least two regions nominates the same chemical substance for a Convention listing, the Secretariat will verify whether those submissions satisfy all of the information requirements. If it finds that they do, the Secretariat will forward the Notifications to the Convention’s Chemical Review Committee (CRC), which will then determine whether they also satisfy the listing criteria.
And finally, if the CRC determines that they do satisfy the listing criteria, the Secretariat will place the decision of listing lead chromates on the agenda of the next meeting of the Conference of the Parties with a recommendation that the COP agree to make international trade in that chemical subject to the Convention’s PIC procedure.
While lead paint has been tightly regulated for decades in most wealthy countries, the toxic paints are still widely sold in most low- and middle-income countries, posing ongoing threats to children’s health in those regions. Even in countries where lead paint is banned, they are still often found on the market, as enforcement is made more difficult without the knowledge or consent to products that come across their borders. This is why the control under the Rotterdam Convention is a crucial tool.
Ban lead paint to protect the health of children against harm caused by lead exposure.
Lead paint is a well-known source of childhood lead exposure, which has been linked to serious health concerns including damage to the developing brain and the nervous, immune, reproductive, and cardiovascular systems, with a range of adverse effects including loss of IQ, attention deficit disorder, hypertension, and other physical and behavioral problems. Often, these effects are permanent, irreversible, and untreatable.
In 2009, 120 countries called for a global phase-out of lead paint. Since 2007, IPEN member groups have collected and analyzed more than 5,000 paints in 59 countries and conducted awareness raising using the testing data. This work has supported the development and adoption of lead paint regulations in more than 30 countries, with nearly 40 more countries developing regulations. But more work needs to be done to end lead paint globally, including by regulating the trade in lead chromates through the Rotterdam Convention.
Link to the Database of Notifications of Final Regulatory Action:
https://www.pic.int/Procedures/NotificationsofFinalRegulatoryActions/Database/tabid/1368/language/en-US/Default.aspx?tpl=std
International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN)
https://www.ipen.org/
EcoWaste Coalition
https://ecowastecoalition.
