CPA to assess European pesticides approvals legislation

Assessments of the impact of the European pesticides approvals legislation on specific minor crops, such as carrots, are being planned, Dominic Dyer of the Crop Protection Association said at Cereals 2009.

The results would be used to help push for derogations for continued use of products that might be removed from the market, he said.

"We're looking at doing more impact assessment work for individual sectors, and DEFRA has indicated there might be some funding for that," he explained at a breakfast meeting on the Velcourt stand.

"We can then use more accurate information on the economic impact on these crops to help push hard for derogations where necessary."

Seeking derogations where there were no viable alternatives for products was a key plank in the CPA's strategy, he said.

CPA was also keen to use its members to feed technical information into the discussion on how endocrine disruption is defined. Endocrine disruption is one of the hazard criteria the EU is proposing to use to assess whether a product should be safe to use, but it hasn't yet been decided how this criteria will be measured.

"The European Food Safety Authority has been given the role, and has four years to come up with a definition. We want to capture information from other bodies too, and feed into the discussion. It is a key focus point," Mr Dyer said.