Q. What is Transfer?
Every hazardous substance imported or manufactured in New Zealand for the first time from the time the Hazardous Substances part of the HSNO Act commenced on 2 July 2001 requires an approval from the Environmental Risk Management Authority. However, there are many hazardous substances that were already in use in New Zealand prior to 2 July 2001, including: pesticides, fuels, paints, solvents and cleaning agents. The transitional provisions of the HSNO Act provide for the continued use of these substances during the transition period, and also for these substances to be transferred to the new legislation by ERMA New Zealand.
All substances that are in lawful use remain "legal" due to the transitional provisions in the Act. The controls on them remain unchanged even though the legislation under which they were originally approved has been repealed. Work ERMA are currently undertaking will transfer these substances from the transitional provisions of HSNO to the main part of the Act before the transitional period expires.
Further information can be found on the Transfer Pages of the ERMA website.
Q. What has been transferred?
As at 1 July 2006 transfer was completed. The following groups of substances have been transferred:
- Explosives
- Dangerous Goods
- Scheduled Toxic Substances (STS)
- Pesticides
- Timber Preservatives and Antisapstains
- Antifouling Paints
- Vertebrate Toxic Agents (VTAs)
- Fumigants
- Veterinary Medicines
- Notified Toxic Substance (NOTS)
Q. What is a Notified Toxic Substance or NOTS?
A notified toxic substance (NOTS) is a substance that was notified under section 32 of the Toxic Substances Act 1979. Up until 2 July 2001, people who manufactured, imported or packed toxic substances were required to 'notify' the Ministry of Health by providing basic information about these substances. This information included the trade name of the product and the product's chemical composition. ERMA New Zealand has been processing these notifications since July 1998.
When the notification process was closed off on 2 July 2001, ERMA New Zealand had around 218,000 notified products recorded on the NOTS database. All of the NOTS have now been transferred, most under a new group standard approval, however single components and highly hazardous NOTS were transferred individually.