Michelle Marcotte Files on Methyl Bromide Alternatives

Michelle Marcotte graduated from the University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada in 1977 with a bachelor of arts degree in Home Economics, majoring in Foods and Nutrition. She began her career as an internal food consultant for agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. Next she worked for MDS Nordion as a senior market development specialist for food irradiation applications. This was followed by employment by Inter/Sect Alliance. She established Marcotte Consulting Inc. (Canada) and Marcotte Consulting LLC (Maryland, USA) to provide management consulting services to assist industry, governments, and other organizations. Marcotte's consulting practice focused on market development through regulatory change and communications. This work incorporated nutrition, food technology and regulatory knowledge to affect market development for an emerging system. In addition, she co-chaired the United Nations Environment Program Methyl Bromide Technical Options Committee.

In 1991 after methyl bromide was listed as an ozone depleting substance, Marcotte was asked by the government of Canada to present three papers on the use of irradiation as an alternative to methyl bromide at a conference between the governments of Canada and the United States. The Methyl Bromide Technical Options Committee (MBTOC) was soon created. Marcotte was appointed co-chair in 2005 and when the committee was divided into subcommittees, she became chair of the MBTOC Quarantine, Structures and Commodities.

In the years of 1992-2003, MBTOC's work mainly consisted of obtaining, assessing and summarizing the research on the uses of methyl bromide, the technical efficacy of alternatives and the economic costs. This work was reported twice annually in the May and October reports of the Technical and Economic Assessment Panel reports. Every four years the group prepares an Assessment report which covers in very considerable detail all the research on methyl bromide uses and alternatives for those uses.

As information about methyl bromide alternatives grew, MBTOC was able to identify where adoption of alternatives could take place, and assist the phase-out of this ozone depleting chemical.

However, by 2003, methyl bromide had still not been phased out for most of its uses in developed countries (referred to as Non A(5) countries in the Protocol), which had a phase out date of 2005. (The phase out date for developing countries (referred to as A(5) countries in the Protocol) was 2015. In each case there were step-down reductions which reduced the allowed use of methyl bromide according to the Protocol.

In 2003, MBTOC began to receive critical use nominations from Parties requesting the continued use of many methyl bromide applications under the critical use exemption of the Protocol.

Once the phase out date was reached for methyl bromide (in 2005) for developing countries, MBTOC's role morphed from a technical and economic research assessment and policy advisory role to that of assessing and making recommendations on the critical use nominations submitted by Parties to the Montreal Protocol which then fed into Decisions by the Parties on critical use exemptions to the phase out. This work is done in addition to continuing to assess and report on methyl bromide uses, alternatives and their adoption.