Parliament is in favor of adopting EU decisions on plant protection
Published: Tuesday, Feb 27th 2024, 12:10
Updated At: Tuesday, Feb 27th 2024, 12:10
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Switzerland should directly adopt EU authorization decisions on plant protection products. This is what Parliament is demanding. After the National Council, the Council of States also referred a corresponding motion by Philipp Matthias Bregy (center/VS) to the Federal Council on Tuesday.
The small chamber voted in favor of the proposal by 27 votes to 13 with one abstention. Criticism came from the left-green side. The minority argued, among other things, that a change in the system could increase water pollution. The National Council adopted the motion last fall by a narrow majority.
According to the text of the motion, the Federal Council must now ensure that the Swiss authorities recognize EU approval decisions for plant protection products and issue corresponding approvals within the same time frame. The Agriculture Act, for example, could be amended for this purpose.
Bregy justified his proposal by stating that both organic and conventional agriculture are dependent on plant protection products. In Switzerland, however, there are fewer and fewer products available. In neighboring countries, on the other hand, farmers could use new, better and more environmentally friendly active substances. This is no longer acceptable because the Swiss approval procedure is already largely harmonized with the EU procedure.
Federal Council refers to ongoing work
The Federal Council opposed the motion. It had already adopted several measures to facilitate the recognition of authorizations for plant protection products granted in the EU, said Interior Minister Elisabeth Baume-Schneider. If an application is submitted with the corresponding dossier, the results of the assessment of active substances by the EU authorities will be recognized without further examination.
In order to automatically recognize the approval of active substances in the EU or the approval of products, it is necessary to have access to the complete documentation. This would require an agreement that does not currently exist. Without data on the properties of the products and without the assessment report from the EU authorities, it is not possible to define application regulations that are adapted to Swiss conditions.
As part of the reorganization of the approval procedure for plant protection products, the Federal Council is examining further measures, said Baume-Schneider. However, the parliamentary majority was of the opinion that more pressure and further steps were needed to improve the sometimes dramatic situation in the plant protection sector.
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