Commission Regulation (EC) No 1451/2007 of 4 December 2007 on the second phase of the 10-year work programme referred to in Article 16(2) of Directive 98/8/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning the placing of biocidal products on the market establishes a list of active substances to be assessed, with a view to their possible inclusion in Annex I, IA or IB to Directive 98/8/EC. That list includes hydrogen cyanide.

Pursuant to Regulation (EC) No 1451/2007, hydrogen cyanide has been evaluated in accordance with Article 11(2) of Directive 98/8/EC for use in the following product types, as defined in Annex V to that Directive: product type 8, wood preservatives, product type 14, rodenticides, and product type 18, insecticides, acaricides and products to control other arthropods.

The Czech Republic was designated as Rapporteur Member State and submitted three competent authority reports, including recommendations, to the Commission on 24 January 2008 in accordance with Article 14(4) and (6) of Regulation (EC) No 1451/2007.

The competent authority reports were reviewed by the Member States and the Commission. In accordance with Article 15(4) of Regulation (EC) No 1451/2007, the findings of the review were incorporated, within the Standing Committee on Biocidal Products on 25 May 2012, in three assessment reports.

It appears from the evaluations that biocidal products used as wood preservatives, rodenticides, insecticides, acaricides and products to control other arthropods and containing hydrogen cyanide may be expected to satisfy the requirements laid down in Article 5 of Directive 98/8/EC. It is therefore appropriate to include hydrogen cyanide in Annex I to that Directive.

Not all potential uses have been evaluated at Union level. It is therefore appropriate to require that Member States assess those uses or exposure scenarios and those risks to human populations and to environmental compartments that have not been representatively addressed in the Union level risk assessment and, when granting product authorisations, ensure that appropriate measures are taken or specific conditions imposed in order to reduce the identified risks to acceptable levels.

In view of the highly toxic and flammable properties of the active substance and the assumptions made during the risk assessment, it is appropriate to require that products are only authorised for use by professionals adequately trained to use them and that safe operational procedures during fumigation and venting are established for operators and bystanders, including the following requirements: products shall be used with adequate personal protective equipment including, where appropriate, self-contained breathing apparatus and gas-tight clothing; re-entry into fumigated spaces shall be prohibited until the air concentration has reached safe levels for operators and bystanders by ventilation; exposure during and after ventilation shall be prevented from exceeding safe levels for operators and bystanders by the establishment of a supervised exclusion zone; prior to fumigation, any food and any porous material with a potential to absorb the active substance, except wood intended to be treated, shall either be removed from the space to be fumigated or protected from absorption by adequate means, and the space to be fumigated shall be protected against accidental ignition.

The provisions of this Directive should be applied simultaneously in all Member States in order to ensure equal treatment on the Union market of biocidal products of product types 8, 14 and 18 containing the active substance hydrogen cyanide and also to facilitate the proper operation of the biocidal products market in general.

A reasonable period should be allowed to elapse before an active substance is included in Annex I to Directive 98/8/EC, in order to permit Member States and interested parties to prepare themselves to meet the new requirements entailed and to ensure that applicants who have prepared dossiers can benefit fully from the 10-year period of data protection, which, in accordance with Article 12(1)(c)(ii) of Directive 98/8/EC, starts from the date of inclusion.

After inclusion, Member States should be allowed a reasonable period to implement Article 16(3) of Directive 98/8/EC.

Directive 98/8/EC should therefore be amended accordingly.

In accordance with the Joint Political Declaration of Member States and the Commission on explanatory documents of 28 September 2011, Member States have undertaken to accompany, in justified cases, the notification of their transposition measures with one or more documents explaining the relationship between the components of a directive and the corresponding parts of national transposition instruments.

The measures provided for in this Directive are in accordance with the opinion of the Standing Committee on Biocidal Products,