For the first time, the International Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant is being held in India. Running at IIT Hyderabad until 9 October, it is asking a pointed question: ten years after a global treaty, has science been turned into action against one of the world’s most persistent toxins?
Mercury is an unusual pollutant. Released from a coal chimney in one country, it can travel the planet in the atmosphere for months, settle into a distant lake, be converted by microbes into methylmercury, and work its way up a food chain until it reaches a family’s dinner plate in the form of fish. That journey, from smokestack to nervous system, is the subject of the 17th International Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant (ICMGP 2026), which opened at the Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad on Sunday, 4 October, and continues until Friday, 9 October.
The meeting is the first in the conference’s 35-year history to be held in India. Organisers describe it as the first Minamata Convention-linked conference hosted by the country, and they have framed the week around a single theme: ten years of enforcement of the Convention — its achievements, its challenges and a road map for the future.
A treaty named after a tragedy
The Minamata Convention on Mercury takes its name from the Japanese city where industrial mercury discharges in the mid-twentieth century caused severe neurological disease among residents who ate contaminated seafood. The treaty was adopted in Kumamoto, Japan, in 2013 and entered into force on 16 August 2017. It now has 154 parties; India ratified it in June 2018. A delegation from Kumamoto prefecture is attending the Hyderabad meeting, and delegates are scheduled to hear first-hand testimony from a survivor of Minamata disease — a reminder that the science under discussion has a human history.
The conference is chaired by Professor Asif Qureshi of IIT Hyderabad, with Dr Jagannath Biswakarma, adjunct faculty at the institute, also serving as conference chair. Speaking to the Deccan Chronicle at the opening, Professor Qureshi said that bringing the meeting to India for the first time offered a chance to widen participation from Asia and the Global South and to build new collaborations across countries and disciplines. Dr Biswakarma put the challenge more bluntly: after decades of measurement, scientists now have to ask what should change because of what has been learned, and how evidence becomes policy.
What is on the agenda
The programme runs from the atmosphere to the human body. Sessions cover mercury in air, oceans, freshwater and soils; bioaccumulation through food webs; environmental and human health; modelling; and the science–policy interface. Specialised tracks address mercury monitoring, artisanal and small-scale gold mining, cosmetics, biodiversity, the oil and gas industry, wetlands, and — notably for an Indian audience — mercury and lead in traditional Indian medicine.
Artisanal and small-scale gold mining is the single most important target. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), which is co-chairing discussions on gold mining and cosmetics, identifies it as the largest source of human-caused mercury pollution, accounting for almost 40 per cent of anthropogenic mercury entering the atmosphere. Miners use mercury to bind fine gold particles and then burn it off, often in homes and village yards, exposing workers and families directly.
Monika Stankiewicz, Executive Secretary of the Minamata Convention, is leading the treaty-focused plenary programme. Other plenary leads include Dr Elena Jardan of the World Health Organization (WHO) and Dr Lynwill Martin of the South African Weather Service. Two awards will also be presented: the Kathryn R. Mahaffey Lifetime Achievement Award to Professor Mae S. Gustin, and the ICMGP Emerging Researcher Award to Dr Qingru Wu of Tsinghua University.
Why the health stakes are high
WHO lists mercury among the ten chemicals of major public-health concern. Exposure can damage the nervous, digestive and immune systems as well as the lungs, kidneys, skin and eyes. Foetuses and young children are the most vulnerable, because methylmercury crosses the placenta and interferes with the developing brain. The principal route of exposure for most people is fish consumption, which is why monitoring of mercury in fish and in human hair and blood features so prominently in the scientific literature.
India’s own mercury profile is shaped by coal. Coal-fired power stations are among the largest emitters to the atmosphere globally, and India’s dependence on coal for electricity makes emissions control a long-running regulatory challenge. Earlier research from IIT Hyderabad reported that regular consumers of locally caught fish living near active coal-fired plants carried higher mercury levels than people without such exposure — the kind of locally grounded evidence that the conference’s organisers say the Global South needs more of.
What the conference can and cannot do
It is important to be clear about scope. ICMGP is a scientific meeting, not a treaty negotiation; it does not set binding targets. Its influence is indirect but real. Earlier editions have produced synthesis papers and declarations that fed into the scientific basis for the Minamata Convention itself, and the Convention’s secretariat has repeatedly described the conference as a key bridge between researchers and policymakers. The next edition will be held in Toledo, Spain, in 2028.
For Telangana, hosting the meeting is a statement of scientific capacity. IIT Hyderabad’s environmental engineering group has become a recognised node in mercury research, and the presence of UNEP, WHO and the Convention secretariat on a Sangareddy-district campus places the state within a global policy network that rarely convenes in India.
The real test comes after Friday. The questions delegates are asking — how to replace mercury in small-scale gold mining, how to police mercury-containing skin-lightening creams sold online, how to monitor emissions from coal plants and how to communicate safe fish-consumption advice — have practical answers only if regulators, industry and public-health agencies act on them. NSH will report on the conference’s closing outcomes.
– Indraneel Pulijala
Key facts
– Event: 17th International Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant (ICMGP 2026), IIT Hyderabad, 4–9 October 2026
– First ICMGP held in India; theme: ten years of enforcement of the Minamata Convention
– Minamata Convention: adopted 2013, in force 16 August 2017; 154 parties; India ratified June 2018
– Artisanal and small-scale gold mining: almost 40% of anthropogenic mercury entering the atmosphere (UNEP)
– Chairs: Prof. Asif Qureshi and Dr Jagannath Biswakarma (IIT Hyderabad); plenary lead Monika Stankiewicz (Minamata Convention Executive Secretary)
