Article 18 — Controlled vocabularies

1. The Commission and the Agencies shall establish and regularly update controlled vocabularies within their mandate for the data referred to in Article 3(2) and (3), where relevant. 2. The Commission and the Agencies shall prioritise establishing controlled vocabularies for the identification of chemicals and the characterisation of their forms. 3. In establishing controlled vocabularies the Commission and the Agencies shall: (a) avoid the use of proprietary controlled vocabularies to the extent possible; (b) re-use existing substance identifiers and controlled vocabularies or parts thereof to the extent possible; (c) use OECD or other internationally agreed controlled vocabularies to the extent possible; (d) ensure consistency with other relevant controlled vocabularies including by preparing alignment tables. 4. The controlled vocabularies shall be interoperable with the common data platform. 5. Where controlled vocabularies are established, the Commission and the Agencies shall: (a) make them available free of charge through the common data platform as open datasets, supporting their re-use; (b) incorporate them in any submission software or template to be used by duty holders under the Union legal acts listed in Annex I, Part 1 and referred to in Article 3(2); and (c) use them when exchanging data through the common data platform. 6. The Commission and the Agencies shall cooperate with each other in establishing controlled vocabularies. 7. The Commission and the Agencies shall take the necessary and appropriate measures to monitor and identify, at an early stage, any potential divergence between controlled vocabularies. If a divergence between controlled vocabularies is identified, the Agencies concerned shall cooperate to resolve it or, where the divergence is justified, explain the underlying reasons. Where the Agencies concerned are not able to resolve the divergence, they shall draw up a joint report and present it to the Commission. The report shall clearly outline the reasons for the divergence, clarify any underlying technical issue and make a proposal to resolve the divergence. 8. The Commission shall adopt an implementing act to resolve the divergence.