The importer is responsible for ensuring that the goods they intend to import do not contain asbestos. They must ensure they have evidence that the goods do not contain asbestos or arrange testing.
The importer is responsible for ensuring that the goods they are importing do not contain asbestos. Importers purchasing materials and products that could potentially contain asbestos should expect the supplier to provide documents upon request to demonstrate that the materials/products do not contain asbestos.
The only certain way of assuring a material or product does not contain asbestos is for a sample to be analysed by a laboratory accredited for asbestos identification. Australian accredited laboratories can be found at the National Association of Testing Authorities of Australia (NATA) website.
Products and materials to be imported must not contain any asbestos, regardless of any lawful threshold in the country of origin or supply. Further guidance is available on the Australian Border Force website asbestos information page.
If sourcing goods from outside Australia, you should seek appropriate evidence from your suppliers that no asbestos or raw materials that are naturally contaminated with asbestos are used during manufacturing.
Sending samples
In Australia, samples must be sent to a laboratory that is NATA accredited for the testing of asbestos in bulk samples and conforms to the following:
- is accredited for compliance with ISO/IED:17025
- uses test methods:
- AS 4964-2004: Method for the qualitative identification of asbestos in bulk samples by polarised light microscopy (PLM) including dispersion staining (DS)
- AS 5370-2024: Sampling and qualitative identification of asbestos in bulk materials (ISO 22262-1:2012, MOD)
Note: PLM/DS will adequately identify crocidolite, amosite and chrysotile asbestos if present in the samples, however it cannot reliably identify tremolite, actinolite and anthophyllite asbestos.
A laboratory should be able to identify if mineral fibre/s are present, but it may not be able to identify if the fibre is tremolite asbestos, actinolite asbestos or anthophyllite asbestos. This will be reported as: unidentified mineral fibres (UMF).
To determine which asbestos fibres are present requires a confirming technique to be used.
Therefore, the laboratory carrying out the analysis must provide a test report that includes a statement that:
- the laboratory complies with ISO/IEC:17025
- is accredited by NATA for the method used
- states the test method used, and the limit of detection of the analytical method
- includes a unique identifier such as an assigned sample number/description to identify the goods or materials tested.
The report must state:
- if asbestos is present, including the type of asbestos, or
- if no asbestos was detected (NAD), or
- if unknown mineral fibre/s were identified.
If test results are uncertain, there are two options:
- Assume asbestos fibres are present and manage the product as an asbestos containing material.
- If definitive identification of asbestos content is required, have sub-samples drawn from the original samples and analysed using a confirming technique such as Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) (these will characterise the morphology of unknown mineral fibres) or X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis (determines the chemical composition of the unknown mineral fibres).
Go to Sampling and testing for asbestos for a list of Australian laboratories that hold a permit to import asbestos samples for testing.