Abstract
At the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), a transparent, scientifically based goal with regard to the management of hazardous chemicals was adopted by participants in their statement, “We aim to achieve by 2020 to ensure that chemicals be used and produced in a way that minimizes the significant adverse effects on human health and the environment by using evaluation procedures.” Aiming to achieve this WSSD 2020 target, the international community is promoting a management policy regarding harmful chemical substances, including persistent organic pollutants such as dioxins throughout their life cycle. In this paper, after determining global trends in chemical substance management and clarifying the position of measures against dioxins, the actual details of risk management for dioxins focusing on the aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) and dioxin-like compounds (i.e. must elicit AhR-mediated biochemical and toxic responses, and must show environmental persistence and bioaccumulation) is summarized and an approach is introduced.
