Sir, - In welcoming the Three Rivers Project which will provide an integrated approach to monitoring and management of the Rivers Boyne, Liffey and Suir and their catchments, Senator Maureen Quill calls on me to ban the use of phosphate based detergents (March 18th).
Your readers will be pleased to know that arrangements are already in place to deal with this matter. Last December, I signed a voluntary agreement with the Irish Detergents and Allied Products Association (IDAPA) - which represents over 90 per cent of the domestic laundry detergent market in Ireland - to provide for the phasing-out of the marketing of phosphate-based domestic laundry detergent products in Ireland by the end of 2002, as follows: by June 30th, 2000, 55 per cent of IDAPA market share to be "zero-phosphate" products; by December 31st, 2001, 90 per cent of IDAPA market share to be "zero-phosphate" products; by December 31st, 2002, 95 per cent of IDAPA market share to be "zero-phosphate" products.
My Department is pursuing the remaining 8-10 per cent of the market with a view to getting similar commitments from what is commonly known as the ownbrand sector. - Yours, etc.,
Dan Wallace TD, Minister of State, Department of the Environment and Local Government, Custom House, Dublin 1.