On November 2, 2022, Taiwan EPA Deputy Minister Shen and US EPA Assistant Administrator Jane Nishida convened the 11th annual meeting of the Asia Pacific Mercury Monitoring Network (APMMN). Over 50 government officials and academics from 26 organizations in 18 partner countries, including the United States, Japan, Australia, and the United Nations Environment Programme, participated in the event. The annual meeting included a demonstration on the latest passive atmospheric mercury samplers by the Environment and Climate Change Canada, a presentation on the current status of APMMN implementation from the Joint Environmental Monitoring Center at National Central University, an expert panel session on the calculation of national atmospheric mercury deposition from the U.S. National Atmospheric Deposition Program, and partner countries update on the current status of atmospheric mercury monitoring.

To protect human health and the environment from anthropogenic emissions of mercury and its compounds, the Minamata Convention on Mercury came into force in 2017. As a member of the global community, Taiwan and US EPAs launched the APMMN in 2012 to assist partner countries in the Indo-Pacific region to improve the capacity of atmospheric mercury monitoring in response to the Minamata Convention on Mercury. The analysis results gathered by the APMMN showed that the rainwater mercury concentration of APMMN partner countries in the past three years has been decreasing year by year, which demonstrates the effectiveness of implementing the Minamata Convention on Mercury in partner countries.

Environmental monitoring is a long term and important task, and Deputy Minister Shen paid special tribute to our partner countries for their outstanding contributions to the long-term atmospheric mercury monitoring over the past 11 years. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation of Australia, which officially joined APMMN in August this year, completed its first sample collection on October 28, strengthening the capacity of the Southern Hemisphere’s atmospheric mercury monitoring network. Taiwan EPA looks forward to working with the U.S. EPA and its partners in the Indo-Pacific region to improve regional atmospheric mercury monitoring through the APMMN to implement the Minamata Convention on Mercury and build a sustainable future for the next generation.