Luxembourg, 21/12/2007 (Agence Europe) -In a ruling published on 19 December 2007, the European Court of First Instance decided that certain pesticides banned by the European Commission in June 2007 should remain banned until the Court of First Instance reaches a decision about the legality of the Commission's decisions. The President of the Court ruled that the companies in question have not been able prove that they would be caused serious and irreparable damage due the application of the ban.
In 2000, the companies Cheminova, FMC Chemical and Dow AgroSciences notified the European Commission of their request that insecticides and/or herbicides malathion, carbosulfan, carbofuran and haloxyfop-R be added to the list of authorised products on Annex I of Directive 91/414/EC concerning the placing of plant protection products on the market. Following examination of the dossiers, in the month of June 2007 the European Commission adopted decisions not to include the products in question in the Annex and to withdraw the phytopharmaceutical authorisations for products containing these chemicals. The decisions were challenged by the companies in question, backed by several vendors and users, which introduced a joint appeal at the Court of First Instance to have the decisions annulled (combined cases T-326-07 R, T 340-07 R and T-367/07 R).
Awaiting the outcome of the appeal, the plaintiffs called for a stay of application of the Commission decisions, but the Court of First Instance rejected this in its order issued on Wednesday. It pointed out that the products in question probably accounted for less than one percent of the multinationals' turnover and the sales ban therefore did not constitute immediate or serious damage to their profitability. The Court explained in addition that it had not received sufficient proof of any irreparable damage and in the absence of proven urgency, the President of the Court rejected the application for interim measures. The companies will now have to wait for the Court of Justice ruling on the main case. Meanwhile, the sales bans remain in place. (C.D.)