On September 8, 2023, Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW), the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), and the Ministry of the Environment (MOE) jointly published a notice on the declaration schedule for the manufacturing and import of new chemical substances in 2024, bringing important information to industries in the chemical sector. In accordance with laws on chemical substance review and manufacturing, enterprises must make a declaration according to the regulations before manufacturing or importing new chemical substances to obtain relevant determination notice, so as to undergo review on the properties of the chemical substance.

On August 10, 2023, the Manufacturing Industries Bureau of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry officially published an announcement concerning three substances newly listed as prohibited substances at the eleventh meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Stockholm Convention (SC COP-11), as the Class I Specified Chemical Substances in the Chemical Substances Control Law.

On June 29, 2023, the National Institute of Technology and Evaluation (NITE) in Japan published recommended GHS classifications for 170 chemical substances. This is in accordance with JIS Z 7252: 2019 (Classification of chemicals based on the United Nations' Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS)).

Recently, Japan has detected sodium aluminate dioxide (CAS No.: 1302-42-7) in some imported products containing sodium aluminate (CAS number: 11138-49-1). In accordance with the announcement of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), sodium aluminate dioxide was classified as deleterious substance under the Poisonous and Deleterious Substances Control Law (PDSCL) on July 1, 2018.

On May 31, 2023, the MHLW released 20230531 The draft of Table 1 and 20230531 The draft of Table 2 as the positive lists of base materials and additives. The draft positive lists include Table 1 and Table 2.

On July 15, 2022, three Japanese ministries held an online conference during which they announced they had completed revisions to the methods for screening and risk assessment of priority assessment chemical substances (PACs) under the chemical substance control law (CSCL). The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), and Ministry of Environment (MoE) are expected to publish the revised technical guidelines and relevant documents in September. In the first session, they talked about the risk assessment methods for PACs as well as the revision to screening assessment method; in the second session, they discussed and deliberated of new chemical substances.

On June 3, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare of Japan identified four substances that pose a risk of respiratory issues or skin absorption to workers on exposure. The Ministry recommends that companies that produce or process these substances should take precautionary measures under the Industrial Safety and Health Act (ISHA), including alleviating or preventing workers’ exposure to these substances by improving ventilation conditions, as well as providing personal protective equipment (PPE).

In January 2022, the RCEP Agreement entered into force, covering 10 ASEAN countries, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand. After RCEP comes into effect, more than 90% of the trade of goods in the region will eventually achieve zero tariffs, which involves the chemical industry with more than 1,000 tariff numbers of RCEP origin rules, benefiting the import and export trade of chemicals. Within the RCEP coverage, most countries, including China, have adopted GHS classification and labelling systems, which requires the Safety Data Sheet (SDS) and labels of chemicals to comply with the GHS-related regulations and standards of each country and region.

CIRS is going to attend the Chemical Substance Management Meeting 2019 on 18-19 September 2019 in Tokyo, Japan. Ms. Ling Yang will bring a presentation concerning the chemical management in China during the meeting. Following is the major points of the presentation: Framework of chemical management in China; New chemical notification in China, Hazardous chemical management in China; China GHS Chemical substance management meeting was first held in 2015. It is the only inform

31 Jul. 2018, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), the Ministry of Labor and Welfare (MHLW), and the Ministry of the Environment (MOE) announced that 257 substances are regarded as general chemical substances under Chemical Substance Control Law (CSCL). Substances that were notified on and after April 1, 2011, as substances that are either newly manufactured in, or imported to, Japan and are neither classified as Class I Specified Chemical Substances nor as Priori