Mr. Ravi Agarwal has worked tirelessly on issues related to chemical safety and healthy communities in the developing world for two decades. A catalyst for change, he is the founder and director of Toxics Link, a non-profit organization based in New Delhi, India. Toxics Link works on areas of toxics, waste and chemical safety and has a strong information outreach program that uses research and advocacy to strengthen citizen campaigns against toxic pollution, to help to push industries towards cleaner production, and to link groups working on toxics, waste and chemical safety issues.

Toxics Link has been part of the International POPs Elimination Network (IPEN ) since its inception in 1998 and is an IPEN Regional Hub for the South Asia region. Mr. Agarwal serves on both the Steering Committee and the Executive Board of IPEN, bringing his experience and perspective to a network that regularly participates in international processes that shape chemical safety discussions and policies. As the IPEN Hub for the South Asia Region, Toxics Link and Mr. Agarwal have helped increase NGO knowledge about POPs and other chemicals by, for example, holding capacity-building and skill-sharing workshops on POPs that are attended by participants from varied sectors and numerous countries throughout South Asia and other regions.

In addition, Toxics Link and Mr. Agarwal participate in other international networks including Healthcare Without Harm, GAIA (Global Anti-Incineration Alliance/Global Alliance of Incinerator Alternatives), Basel Action Network, and the Zero Mercury Working Group. Mr. Agarwal is also on both the advisory board of Khoj Artists Association (a well-known not-for-profit for the arts in India) and Tactical Tech, an UK-based international initiative to use new media techniques for advocacy in the social sector.

Toxics Link's role in helping form Indian national legislation on bio-medical waste in 1998 was important and far-reaching. The legislation came about after four years of campaigning and research, and was the first legal recognition of the link between dioxin and waste in India. Toxics Link's assistance in shaping the Indian law on this issue was innovative in a developing country and was subsequently replicated in other developing countries.

Additionally, Toxics Link and Mr. Agarwal began work on e-waste issues in 2002, and this work will result in a new Indian policy on e-waste shortly.

In early 2006, Toxics Link took the lead on a report about toxics in toys (Toying with Toxics: An Investigation of Lead and Cadmium in Soft Toys in Three Cities in India), exposing the fact that unsafe heavy metals can be found in toys that children play with. This pioneering report elevated local and national consciousness about an issue that subsequently became newsworthy in other areas of the world.

Confronting existing unsafe practices and their intertwined interests has had personal risks for Mr. Agarwal. In 2001, Toxics Link, in association with local farmer organizations, compiled the field case study, "The Killing Fields of Warangal," which suggested the role that pesticides may have played in the death of farmers in Warangal. Mr. Agarwal then filed the study (along with a large body of data) as evidence of poor farming practices that resulted in unacceptable levels of pesticides and heavy metals contamination in food in India, imploring that "food safety" be better institutionalized in the country.

Mr. Agarwal regularly contributes articles to various publications, including, for example: The Curse of Tech Trash, found in Businessworld Online. He also frequently authors position papers such as Comments on the Draft Hazardous Materials Rules 2007, which he collaborated with the Basel Action Network.

Mr. Agarwal's ability to build an institutional presence through the development of Toxics Link took a great deal of work and planning, and has resulted in a presence in the field that allows him to positively affect the chemical safety issues he focuses on. He has committed his life to the pursuit of chemical safety and environmental justice for the most vulnerable in society (women and children, peasant farmers and the poor and disadvantaged) by providing both research and advocacy to help ensure that they are protected against the worst of toxic impacts. He has worked vigorously to highlight the unsafe chemical practices inherent in many of India's waste practices, as well as in toy production and pesticide use. This work has helped to elevate local and national consciousness about these issues, and has been integrated into national policy that has resonated internationally. Mr. Agarwal's dedication to chemical safety and healthy communities is reflected in the work he has done over the past two decades and in how he continues to stand up for positive change both in India and around the world.

IFCS award acceptance speech, September 15th, 2008, Senegal, Dakar

Dear all,

It is indeed a surprise, and a very pleasant one to have received this award from the IFCS. I am highly undeserving of it, and feel humbled by this honour. And it is in all humility that my colleagues and I do consider this accept this award.

I would like to thank all my colleagues at Toxics Link and at all the networks I work in including the International Pops Elimination Network and Health Care Without Harm. In particular I would like to thank my friend Jack Weinberg for being a friend and mentor.

I would also like to thank the IFCS for the unique opportunity it provides to civil society to participate on an equal footing with Governments and all other stakeholders, and to contribute to chemical safety. I would also like to personally thank Judy Stober for her help in provide these platforms and for constantly encouraging our participation. Often we as civil society have ears where the voices are the feeblest.

Working on chemical safety in a developing country can be a lonely job, and it is these networks that become our community.

Over the past two decades my colleagues and I have been fortunate to participate and contribute in the development of new chemical safety frameworks both at home as well as internationally. These frameworks are less than two decades old, and the issue of recognizing chemical safety very new.

At this moment, I would like to take the opportunity to ask the question “what is sustainable development”, and if we really understand that term, in terms of chemicals and chemical safety.

It should however be recognized that in developing countries the challenge of chemicals safety needs to be understood and responsibilities accepted accordingly. For example in India alone over 600 million people earn less than 50 US cents a day (as per a recent governmental report), even as our economy grows at over 9%. Of course the middle class is now growing and this could be the situation in many developing countries.

These citizens include agricultural workers, small farmers, daily wage workers, mining workers, urban recycling workers and many others. A significant percentage of them are women and also children. Such people do not have any access to markets or information or any ability to protect themselves from adverse chemical impacts.

These citizens cannot be the new markets for toxic chemicals and waste and their bodies cannot be the repositories for contamination.

Simultaneously the largest production of toxic chemicals is shifting to new economies, precisely where such people have the least ability to protect themselves, or have access to any health facilities.

For example, I find it indeed very sad to see computers, made using space age technologies, being broken by hand in dickensian and victorian conditions, even as the IT industry grows at over 30% annually.

I find it very sad to see paints being marketed in developing countries with high levels of lead which end up in children’s bodies, scarring them for ever, even as they are marketed without lead in developed countries, often by the same industry. It is no secret that majority of such impacted children live in developing countries.

I find it very sad that asbestos is exported and inhaled by the poor who use it for cheap housing, even as it is not used in those exporting countries.

The question is, can we blame the impoverished for not knowing better, when even those of us who are more educated and fortunate, and are looking for next generation technologies, still do not know the impacts of nano technologies or genetically modified foods?

Surely the responsibility must lie with us, all of us, who are the more fortunate citizens of the planet, to make human society truly sustainable.

We must make products which use safer chemicals, minimize and deal with our own waste and not dump it on the poorest. We must not shift toxic chemicals production to those communities who cannot protest this or and we must not hide information from our consumers.

Such responsibility lies as much with Governments as it does with the Chemicals Industry, and as it does with all of us. There cannot be any real talk of sustainability where there is little choice available or an ability to choose. The responsibility of sustainability must lie with those of us who have such choices.

This should not be a fight, it is only real progress to move forward together. It is with this hope we participate in these discussion at the IFCS and other forums.

Of course markets are very important, but surely they cannot be more important than human society. Human society cannot be subservient to markets. Markets cannot factor in individual pain and loss, but we all, as human beings can, and do. At best markets are imperfect indicators of the human condition.

I plead, that as we continue to grow markets, we must not forget that the roots of our existence is as much an ethical question as it is an economic one. This cannot be imposed merely by new laws and regulations, there must also be an internalized desire to do so.

Meanwhile we have to pay attention to issues of substitution, information, minimization and remediation where needed. These are the only way ahead for sustainable development.

Before I end, I would like to thank my late mother and my father, who never stood in my way and always supported the less than conventional choices I made about my life.