Over the past 3 years, the European Commission has been undergoing " immense pressure" from pesticide manufacturers and their trading partners to allow residues of certain pesticides banned in the EU to be present in food and feed imports, a report by the NGO Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) revealed on Sunday 16 February.
On the basis of documents obtained from the Commission through the transparency rules, CEO assures that the previous Commission was thus confronted with "an endless number of visits, letters and reports, complaints and threats at the WTO by the US, Canada and others".
According to the report of a meeting between EU and Canadian officials held on 26-27 March, 2018 within the framework on the CETA, Ottawa called on the EU to, among other things, amend its pesticide residue regulations, which, according to the Canadian government, would put 1.9 billion euros of Canadian exports at risk.
"The long-term objective is for the EU to move away from hazard-based threshold criteria as the basis for its regulatory decisions", the document states.
Having led the 'Juncker Commission' to abandon its original plan to ban the presence of dangerous pesticide residues in imports, the NGO fears that such pressure will continue and lead the new Commission to fail to meet its commitment to significantly reduce the use of chemical pesticides and the risks associated with them as part of the European Green Deal.
The Commission is expected to unveil its future 'farm to fork' strategy by the end of March (see EUROPE 12398/5). It also provides for an evaluation of the implementation and functioning of the Plant Protection Products Regulation (1107/2009) and the Maximum Residue Limits Regulation (396/2005) in all Member States since their entry into force in June 2011 and September 2008 respectively.
To consult the CEO's report: http://bit.ly/39z5UQW (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)