We are looking for a Country Research Specialist

Holzgerlingen, June 16 2016

1cc GmbH as one of the leading providers of full-range consulting services for waste and product related environmental compliance, seeks a Country Research Specialist to be based in Irving/Texas or Washington/District of Columbia.

Position Summary
This position is responsible for conducting research on legislative changes related to waste management, producer responsibility, restriction of hazardous substances and chemicals, energy efficiency, pollution control and related fields as well as copy right levies for electronic equipment occurring in the Americas region. This job can be based in Irving/Texas or Washington/District of Columbia. Candidates must be able to legally work in the United States.

Responsibilities
• Ensuring up to date knowledge of legislative changes in assigned countries through a variety of sources, such as governmental websites and authorities;
• Interpreting and documenting new and changed legislation for specific countries;
• Work closely with project management to determine regulatory requirements;
• Maintain processes required to deliver timely and accurate legislative and regulatory updates;
• Be committed to a team-oriented work environment and high quality standards.

Qualifications/skill
• Strong problem solving and analytical skills;
• Legal knowledge would be an advantage;
• Ability to perform research using the internet and various data bases;
• Proficient with Microsoft Office applications: Word, Excel, PowerPoint;
• Must be able to prioritize and work independently;
• Must be able to work in an accurate, timely and reliable manner;
• Must be bi-lingual: English and either Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean or Japanese.

Education and work experience
• Bachelor’s Degree related to law, business administration or management, environmental science or engineering;
• 2+ years of work experience in a related field;
• Proven ability to research effectively from a computer through the internet.

1cc offer
• Challenging scope of duties and involvement in various projects for international customers;
• Professional, supportive and motivated team;
• We value creativity, initiative and commitment!

Please send your application to Johanna Terry (jobs@1cc-consulting.com).      

1cc Webinar: REACH 2018 – How to determine and handle your registration obligations easily

The end of the last deadline for registration of pre-registered substances under REACH is approaching quickly. Phase-in-substances that are manufactured in or imported to the European Union in metric tons between 1-100 per year are obliged to register until June 1, 2018.

Eva Hink, 1cc Senior Consultant, will outline the process of registration and provides you with input how to determine and handle your registration obligations easily.

Language: English
Date: Tue, Jun 28, 2016 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM CEST
Speaker: Eva Hink, Senior Consultant at 1cc GmbH

Sign up: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/1653647171746362113

PS: Participation in this 1cc Webinar is free. However, the number of participants in the webinar will be limited to 20 attendees.

African Copyright Levy Systems in motion

Copyright Levy Systems are gaining popularity: More and more countries worldwide are implementing these mechanisms in order to ensure adequate remuneration for right holders. This being true for several African countries, here some light is being shed on three countries which just activated or amended their copyright levy system by legislative revisions. The following shall give a brief overview of the characteristics.

Morocco: Exemption for private copying and payment obligations had already been introduced by mid-2014. Now, tariffs as well as reporting and payment regulations have been implemented by a Royal Decree on 17 March 2016. While manufacturers obligations arise when putting the product into circulation, importers are required to declare product information, quantity and origin before the product will be imported to Morocco. The entitled collecting society BMDA (Bureau Maroccain du droit d´auteur) authorized customs to collect copyright levies on their behalf. 1cc received stakeholder information that preparations are ongoing and personnel is being trained in order to enforce the legal provisions at customs.

Mauritius: Mauritius is about to revise thoroughly its Copyright Act of 2014. The law provides for a private copying exemption and requires to pay an “equitable remuneration” to authors. However, it leaves room for interpretation for the remuneration. In addition to many organizational issues, for example, with regard to the representation of authors, many questions should be clarified now by law-amendments. Copyright levies on blank media are expressly included in the considerations of a consultative body.

Ivory Coast: Already since 1996, the Copyright Act allows the private copy and requires manufacturers and importers to pay remuneration. Competent authority BURIDA (Bureau Ivoirien du Droit D’Auteur) is empowered “[…] To collect and distribute all rights to remuneration recognized by the Act […] in particular the remuneration for private copying, equitable remuneration, the remuneration for reprographic reproduction […]”

We will keep you updated on the further developments.

1cc Presents at Chemspec Europe in Basel – Non-EU Chemicals Legislation: Emerging issues

This year’s Chemspec Europe – a leading conference for the chemical industry – will take place in Basel June 1 and 2, 2016.

1cc consultant Nadiia Kaiun will participate at the conference with the presentation “Non-EU Chemicals Legislation: Emerging issues”.

The presentation held on Thursday, June 2, from 13:30 to 14:00 (Regulatory Services Zone) will provide an overview of upcoming deadlines for manufactures and exporters of chemicals to South Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan and an update on TSCA Reform in USA. Furthermore, certain aspects of organizing compliance efficiently will be discussed.

Further Information: www.chemspecevents.com/europe

Proposal for New Energy Efficiency Labelling Directive: Opinion of rapporteur Aldo Patriciello published

The EU Parliament’s Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) has sent its opinion on the proposal for the new Energy Efficiency Labelling Directive to the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE). ITRE is the responsible committee in the EU Parliament. The report, which has been prepared by rapporteur Aldo Patriciello, includes three major proposals for changes.

First of all, the ENVI Committee suggests that instead of fully emptying the top two product classes A and B, there should be a percentage limit that automatically triggers a rescaling review when more than 25% of the products sold to the EU market fall into class A, respectively 45% fall into classes A and B.

Besides, ENVI Committee does not agree with a periodic 10 year review cycle of the energy efficiency classes, but prefers a review upon product specific needs. Finally, the Committee proposes a few changes to clarify the use of electronic labels instead of labels affixed to the product.

The ITRE Committee is now called upon to consider this opinion and include the proposals into its position towards the Commission proposal. Overall, Members of Parliament have already filed over 500 amendments to the Commission proposal.

The ENVI opinion is available here:
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-573.039%2b03%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN

CE marking – transposition of EU-directives following the „New Approach“

In the context of the “new approach” of the European Single market, the EU Commission has recasted several CE directives. It’s the aim to harmonize the obligations for economic operators and the structure of the directives.

The new approach as an example, has different obligations for manufacturers, importers and distributors of relevant products, requires a risk analysis, harmonizes labelling obligations and specifies the necessary action in case of determination of suspicion of non-compliance.

From April 20th, assuming that EU member states have transposed the directives in time, the obligations of the new CE directives come into force, e.g. on electromagnetic compatibility (2014/30/EU) or low voltage (2014/35/EU). Already in 2011, the directive 2011/65/EU on restriction of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS) was published, ruling stricter obligations on labelling and language-requirements in the context of the new Approach.

It’s always the national transposition that is the applicable law for economic operators. Enterprises have to proof which directives, respectively their national transpositions are relevant for their products and what obligations they have to comply with.  Not till then, the EU-declaration of conformity can be issued and the CE marking affixed.

Tags | CE marking

WEEE: Debate About the Planned Treatment Ordinance

Compared to the German ElectroG of 2005, the revised ElectroG foresees important changes. One difference refers to the fact that according to §§ 11 and 24 governments are empowered to establish more detailed legal requirements via ordinances.

Based on § 24 ElectroG and asked by the Federal Environmental Ministry, the Federal Environmental Agency (UBA) kicked off the preparatory work for a so-called treatment ordinance. For doing so, UBA organized a working committee and four working groups. Stakeholders such as the Federal Environmental and the Federal Ministry for economic affairs, representatives of the German Bundesländer, the associations of the municipalities, industry associations and representatives of the academia were invited to join them.

It is the political objective of the new treatment ordinance to establish requirements for the treatment of WEEE aiming at improving the recuperation of critical secondary raw material such as rare earth metals and the withdrawal of harmful substances. The first draft of the treatment ordinance shall be available within the next 12 to 18 months.

We will keep you updated about this new legislation Project.

UAE: RoHS Draft Legislation Submitted to the Federal National Council

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has been working on a new legislation for the restriction of the use of hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment. Three different draft versions have been discussed since last summer. Now, a finalized draft version has been submitted to the Federal National Council and is expected to be approved soon. According to the draft regulation, the final law shall enter into force one year after its publication in the UAE Official Gazette.

Basically, the UAE RoHS draft regulation is based on EU RoHS Directive 2011/65/EU. As in the EU, the following substances are intended to be restricted, with identical thresholds: Lead, Mercury, Cadmium, Hexavalent chromium, Polybrominated biphenyls (PBB), Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE) as well as the four phtahaltes which were added in March 2015: Bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), Butyl benzyl phthalate (BBP), Dibutyl phthalate (DBP), Diisobutyl phthalate (DIBP).

Despite the similarities, there are differences with respect to transition periods and compliance requirements, as e.g. registration and certification duties. It is prohibited to display or sell any products in the UAE unless they are registered under ECAS or have a certificate or mark accepted by ESMA.

For more information please contact us at info@1cc-consulting.com.

REACH: Reimbursement systems mandatory for Letter of Access (LoA)

Publishing the implementing regulation 2016/9 of January 5, the EU Commission has laid down strict rules on joint submission of data and cost-sharing in conjunction with REACH registration.

REACH regulation requires the cost-sharing to be handled in a fair, transparent and non-discriminatory way – these nonspecific requirements have often lead to misunderstanding and disputes in the past: costs have not been broken down into details, no reimbursement was planned although, at same time, charging of follow-up costs was established, deeper insight of Dossier was not allowed, and much more.

As laid down in the new implementation regulation, all agreements within a SIEF (Substance Information Exchange Forum) have to incorporate the following rules:

• Detailed break down of jointly used data including individual data costs as well as details how data complies with requests for registration. (Data-costs)
• Detailed break down and justification for administrative costs
• Cost-sharing model including a reimbursement system

Existing agreements can be kept, however only if parties agree unanimously. A party, joining an existing agreement, e.g. for registration period 2018, can insist on the break down of costs as well as installation of a reimbursement system.

In the past, LoA (Letter of Access) costs have often been calculated at a rough estimate, e.g. on basis of number of expected Co-registrants. Now, costs have to be disclosed and, following a yearly check, to be reimbursed in case. e.g more registrants join the Agreement.

1cc supports consortia and lead registrants breaking-down and surveilling the costs of a joint registration as well as handling and administration of letter of access and installation and handling of reimbursement systems.

Copyright levies in other countries – a look outside the box

In cooperation with industry association Bitkom, 1cc GmbH is offering a webinar series with respect to copyright levies legislation in Europe.

Wolfram Kühn, Senior Consultant at 1cc GmbH, will provide an insight into the multifaceted and complex matter of copyright levies in selected countries.

Dates and Time:

• 22 March 2016, 10:30 CET

Sign up at Bitkom Akademie: Copyright levies in other countries – a look outside the box

These live online webinar series will be held in English. Participation is free. However, the number of participants in each webinar will be limited.

Partially extreme high levies are claimed in most EU-Countries from manufacturers, importers and retailers for every computer, tablet, printer, hard disk, memory card and smartphone sold. The list of levied products is growing steadily. Obligations of manufacturers, importers and retailers are quite complex and different across countries. However, international companies have to be aware of their liabilities wherever they do business. They have to meet formal obligations, consider correct amount of levies within their pricing and adjust their marketing. Cross-border trade makes one thing compulsory: Information, preferably independently checked, comprehensive, up-to-date and reliable.

The live online webinar from BITKOM and 1cc is meant to discuss the following topics for Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom:
• Legal requirements for liability
• Process to determine levies
• Concerned products, amount of levies, development of tariffs
• Liability for direct cross-border trade (distance selling)
• Current developments