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While the US and other industrial countries are seeking exemptions for the phase-out of the dangerous pesticide methyl bromide during a five-day conference in Prague, scientists have expressed doubts about the recovery of the ozone layer.
From 22-26 November, the 16th meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol takes place in Prague. The Montreal Protocol is the United Nations Treaty on substances that deplete the ozone layer.
The most controversial issue on the agenda in Prague is the request by the US and 15 other industrialised countries (among them Germany and the UK) to secure a delay for the phasing out of the agricultural chemical, methyl bromide. If agreed these "critical use exemptions" would allow these countries to continue using the chemical into 2005 and 2006.
Methyl bromide is known to be a significant contributor to the depletion of the ozone layer. Under the Montreal Protocol, the production of methyl bromide should be eliminated by 1 January 2005. But farmers in the US and some other developed countries argue that the alternatives to the pesticide are ineffective and too expensive.
The EU refuses to agree to the proposed exemption.
In the margins of the conference, Mexican Nobel-prize
winning chemical scientist
Mario Molina
said that there is no real evidence yet that the ozone
layer is really recovering. The UN thinks that the hole
in the ozone layer will be repaired by the middle of this
century.
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(October 2004)
(August 2003) 
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