Mapa changes priority-setting process for agrochemical registration in Brazil

By Leonardo Gottems, Reporter for AgroPages

The Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (Mapa) announced changes to the priority-setting process for agrochemical registration. According to the Secretariat of Agricultural Defense, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method will be used to propose improvements and consult the production sector regarding pests that require greater needs for new solutions and control alternatives.

In partnership with the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa), a consultation was conducted with the Sectorial and Thematic Chambers. Participants sent their lists of target pests and respective crops in March 2020.

Currently, the criteria for prioritizing products follows the guidelines established by Portaria Mapa 163/2015. The criteria should be used to prioritize the registration processes of pesticides that involve the control of pests that pose the highest phytosanitary risks for different agricultural crops, allowing adequate phytosanitary support for these crops within an integrated pest management system, to ensure market competitiveness and the consequent reduction in production costs, which will stimulate the manufacturing and formulation of products in Brazilian industrial parks.

The AHP method has already been jointly used by the Department of Plant Health and Agricultural Inputs and Embrapa to prioritize absent quarantine pests of the greatest importance to Brazil, which served as the basis for the creation of the National Pest Prevention Program Absent Quarantines - PNPV-PQA, instituted by Ordinance SDA No. 131/2019.