Australia: Chemical changes could limit pesticide options

The farm chemical industry is getting nervous about a pre-election promise by the Gillard Government which could undermine overseas manufacturer interest in selling products to Australia.

The plan would require chemical companies to prove products are safe to stay on the market, even if no scientific or user concerns have emerged since rigorous registration protocols first allowed their release here.

Fears are widespread that the unwarranted re-registration criteria will leave farmers with fewer products to fight weeds, pests and diseases and cause a sharp rise in the risk of rampant resistance outbreaks.

Legislation, set to emerge as a draft for public discussion in the next few months, would require manufacturers to do extensive regular reviews of herbicides, insecticides and fungicides under Australian conditions.

The idea of regular reviews follows similar legislation phased in across much of Europe.

But farm chemical specialists warn that in Europe companies have already pulled many formulations off the market because the time and money required for re-registration was not worth going through.

As Australia represents only a tiny two per cent of global agricultural chemical sales, they say there would be even less incentive to go through complex scientific proof of safety processes every decade to keep products on the shelf.

US and European research puts the discovery and development costs for a brand new crop protection product at more than $260 million (up from $150m in 1995), plus the cost of registration research over several years in Australia.

"It's likely to cost many more millions, including crop trials, to go through the registration procedure again for a chemical that may only have a small market here," said Australian stewardship manager with crop protection giant, Syngenta, Peter Arkle.

He said in many cases a manufacturer's patent on its farm chemicals only gave the company sole rights to the formulations for eight to 10 years by the time it was registered in Australia.

"If a chemical's exclusive patent life is about to expire, it's quite likely the company will see more benefit in putting its research budget towards other long term projects," Mr Arkle said.

He said a real concern for farmers and agriculture in general was the potential loss of different modes of action in the farm chemical armoury.

This would concentrate more reliance on fewer registered formulations and hasten the risk of pest and weed resistance - already a bigger problem in Australia than most other parts of the world.

A diverse range of registered formulations provided greater insurance against resistance and offered researchers a pantry of older products that could remain available to complement and enhance the effectiveness of newer technologies, effectively resulting in totally new chemical weapons.

Mr Arkle said smaller industries, particularly in the horticulture sector, would be hardest hit if new registration hurdles encouraged products to be withdrawn from sale.

These industries often relied on products that were not developed specifically for them (because the market was too small to inspire initial research), but were later registered for multiple minor crop uses after wider benefits were discovered.

Chief executive officer with peak farm chemical industry body, CropLife Australia, Matthew Cossey, believed about 70 products had withdrawn from sale in Europe in recent years because of the re-registration expense.

"And that's a market servicing a population base of 400 million people - much, much bigger than Australia," Mr Cossey said.

The dangers of having mainstream manufacturers cut product lines and services in Australia included leaving the market relying on more opportunistic imports from China or other low cost producers, and threatening Australia's world-leading integrated pest management (IPM) achievements.

Mr Cossey said removing just a few low key chemical options from the system could put a big hole in many delicate IPM programs, possibly crippling an industry's sustainability.

Despite the "knee-jerk" political interest in re-registration, any new legislation must acknowledge the effort and cost involved in providing the current strong, safe agricultural service sector environment.

"I'm confident we'll make a good case for what's the best public policy to ensure Australia's promoting a strong agriculture sector, and ensuring those supporting agriculture can thrive, too," he said.