Moldova to ratify convention on use of products containing mercury

Chisinau, 5 April /MOLDPRES/ - The quick ratification of the Minimata Convention on Mercury has provided Moldova with more benefits and will allow it participating in important decision takings on the international stage. Environment Minister Valeriu Munteanu made statements to this effect at a today’s news conference on the signing of the concerned document and completion of a project on assessing its implementation.  

“The project on the implementation of the Minimata Convention, backed by the UN, allowed us finalizing and adopting the national legal framework on environment, ceasing the proliferation of products with contents of mercury. Along with our partners, we will continue undertaking active measures, including of publicizing and raising the awareness of the residents, in order to prevent a real ecological danger,” Munteanu said.  

The official stressed that the Environment Ministry had plans to create a centre for managing dangerous waste, which will also deal with the destruction of products containing mercury.

Attending the event, Moldovan MP Valentina Buliga expressed confidence that, in its capacity of signatory to the Minimata Convention, “our country will use all possible instruments to change the attitude towards the environment and make the life safer.”  

For her part, a representative of the United Nations Environment Programme, Giovanna Chiodi Moiré said that Moldova was among the first countries to ratify the Minimata Convention. You will enjoy every support of UNEP, a well as of other international environmental organizations in the projects you plan in the context of this Convention,” Giovanna Chiodi Moiré noted.

The Minimata Convention on Mercury was signed by 140 countries in Kumamoto, Japan, in October 2013. The document, ratified by the Moldovan parliament on 30 March 2017, is a multilateral treaty on environment. At the same time, the symbolical name Minimata was assigned to remind about an ecologic disaster emerged in 1950s following overflowings of waste water full of mercury compounds in the Minimata Gulf, Japan. The disaster resulted in numerous people dead after consumption of contaminated fish.   

Although Moldova produces no mercury, a string of products containing mercury are annually brought to the domestic market. It is about fluorescent tubes, batteries and accumulators, devices for measurement, etc., which, if not treated properly, pose an increased risk for life and health.    

(Reporter L. Grubii, editor L. Alcaza)