The WSSD Global Partnership for Capacity Building to Implement the GHS*  was launched 10 years ago at the WSSD in Johannesburg, following the call at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit to develop an internationally comprehensible chemical classification and labelling system: the GHS. With the first version of the GHS adopted in December 2002 by the UN Sub-Committee of Experts on the GHS and now 10 years of successful collaboration regarding capacity building for implementation, the GHS can truly be considered one of the success stories “from Rio to Rio’’.  This event has the objective to brief delegates at Rio+20 about the GHS, its achievements, lessons learned, and future directions of the WSSD Global GHS Partnership. It is also an opportunity for governments, industry and civil society to share their experience on GHS implementation during the past decade and consider opportunities for the next decade. At the event, a special publication on 10 years of the GHS Partnership will be launched. The event is organized through collaboration of UNITAR, ILO and OECD (as the founding Partners of the GHS Partnership) and supported by the Government of Switzerland and the EU.

*GHS = UN Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals