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Maria Hansson. Photo.

Maria Hansson

Senior lecturer

Maria Hansson. Photo.

Conflicts of Interest in the Assessment of Chemicals, Waste, and Pollution

Author

  • Andreas Schäffer
  • Ksenia J. Groh
  • Gabriel Sigmund
  • David Azoulay
  • Thomas Backhaus
  • Michael G. Bertram
  • Bethanie Carney Almroth
  • Ian T. Cousins
  • Alex T. Ford
  • Joan O. Grimalt
  • Yago Guida
  • Maria C. Hansson
  • Yunsun Jeong
  • Rainer Lohmann
  • David Michaels
  • Leonie Mueller
  • Jane Muncke
  • Gunilla Öberg
  • Marcos A. Orellana
  • Edmond Sanganyado
  • Ralf Bernhard Schäfer
  • Ishmail Sheriff
  • Ryan C. Sullivan
  • Noriyuki Suzuki
  • Laura N. Vandenberg
  • Marta Venier
  • Penny Vlahos
  • Martin Wagner
  • Fang Wang
  • Mengjiao Wang
  • Anna Soehl
  • Marlene Ågerstrand
  • Miriam L. Diamond
  • Martin Scheringer
Show all

Summary, in English

Pollution by chemicals and waste impacts human and ecosystem health on regional, national, and global scales, resulting, together with climate change and biodiversity loss, in a triple planetary crisis. Consequently, in 2022, countries agreed to establish an intergovernmental science-policy panel (SPP) on chemicals, waste, and pollution prevention, complementary to the existing intergovernmental science-policy bodies on climate change and biodiversity. To ensure the SPP’s success, it is imperative to protect it from conflicts of interest (COI). Here, we (i) define and review the implications of COI, and its relevance for the management of chemicals, waste, and pollution; (ii) summarize established tactics to manufacture doubt in favor of vested interests, i.e., to counter scientific evidence and/or to promote misleading narratives favorable to financial interests; and (iii) illustrate these with selected examples. This analysis leads to a review of arguments for and against chemical industry representation in the SPP’s work. We further (iv) rebut an assertion voiced by some that the chemical industry should be directly involved in the panel’s work because it possesses data on chemicals essential for the panel’s activities. Finally, (v) we present steps that should be taken to prevent the detrimental impacts of COI in the work of the SPP. In particular, we propose to include an independent auditor’s role in the SPP to ensure that participation and processes follow clear COI rules. Among others, the auditor should evaluate the content of the assessments produced to ensure unbiased representation of information that underpins the SPP’s activities.

Department/s

  • BECC: Biodiversity and Ecosystem services in a Changing Climate
  • Centre for Environmental and Climate Science (CEC)

Publishing year

2023-12-05

Language

English

Pages

19066-19077

Publication/Series

Environmental Science and Technology

Volume

57

Issue

48

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

The American Chemical Society (ACS)

Topic

  • Environmental Sciences

Keywords

  • conflict of interest
  • ecosystem health
  • human health
  • science−policy panel

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 0013-936X