Public consultation on the update of the risk assessment of hexabromocyclododecanes (HBCDDs) in food

EFSA's Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain (CONTAM) has launched an open consultation on the draft scientific Opinion on the update of the risk assessment of hexabromocyclododecanes (HBCDDs) in food. This document presents an estimation of the human dietary exposure to HBCDDs, and an assessment of the human health risks related to this dietary exposure.

Interested parties are invited to submit written comments by 25 November 2020.

Please use the electronic template provided to submit comments and refer to the line and page numbers. While the template is the only platform to be used for submitting comments, additional information to support your comments can be submitted using the upload function available in the tool (for files with a maximum size of 1 Mb). In case of technical issues in the upload of the supporting files you can contact specific unit’s functional mailbox: biocontam [at] efsa.europa.eu (biocontam[at]efsa[dot]europa[dot]eu).

All comments related to the EFSA draft scientific output shall be inserted in the electronic submission. Comments will not be considered when these are made outside the platform, for instances as part of any attachments.

Please note that comments will not be considered if they:

• are submitted after the closing date of the consultation;
• are presented in any form other than what is provided for in the instructions and template;
• are not related to the contents of the document;
• contain complaints against institutions, personal accusations, irrelevant or offensive statements or material;
• are related to policy or risk management aspects, which are out of the scope of EFSA's activity.

EFSA will assess all comments which are submitted in line with the criteria above. The comments will be further considered by the relevant EFSA Panel and taken into consideration if found to be relevant. Due to time constraints, EFSA cannot use additional data on chemical contaminants submitted during the public consultation for the dietary exposure assessment in this risk assessment. These have to be submitted in SSD format to the EFSA Data Collection Framework (DCF) via the call for collection of chemical contaminants occurrence data in food and feed. Please contact data.collection [at] efsa.europa.eu (data[dot]collection[at]efsa[dot]europa[dot]eu) to obtain further information and the credentials to access the DFC web interface. Occurrence data submitted following this process during the public consultation will be stored and considered for future risk assessments.

Copyright-cleared contributions

Persons or organizations participating in a Public Consultation of EFSA are responsible for ensuring that they hold all the rights necessary for their submissions and consequent publication by EFSA. Comments and any additional information supporting the comments should inter alia be copyright-cleared by taking into account EFSA’s transparency policy and practice to publish all submissions. In case the submission reproduces third-party content in the form of charts, graphs or images, the required prior permissions of the right holder(s) should have been obtained by the PC respondent.

Publication of contributions

The comments and the related supporting information submitted will be published (as part of an EFSA report published together with the final opinion) and may be re-used by EFSA in a different context. It should be noted that comments submitted by individuals in a personal capacity will be published as such, indicating the author’s first and family name, unless a substantial justification for protection is provided by the respondent. Comments submitted on behalf of an organization are also made publicly available and attributed to the organization in question.

Please note that additional information provided to support comments will be published as well. Besides ensuring that the submission is copyright-cleared, PC respondents shall therefore make sure that the material can be published by EFSA as such without any need for further editing or redaction, including the masking or suppression of any personally identifiable information (e.g.: names, contact details of individuals, signatures).