Crop Protection
Background
Crop protection tools, such as pesticides, biopesticides and beneficial organisms, are essential to the
fresh produce industry to ensure not only crop health, but also the safety of Canadians and Canada’s
overall food security. These tools are used to improve yields and reduce food waste by safely controlling diseases, insect pests, weeds, and invasive species that affect the quality and availability of Canadian-grown fruits and vegetables.
The Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) is responsible for regulation, registration and re-evaluation of all active ingredients in crop protection products. The fruit and vegetable industry supports a modernized approach to the regulatory work of the PMRA, and ensuring it has up-to-date data to support continued science-based regulatory decisions.
The Pest Management Centre (PMC) under Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) has successfully
demonstrated its ability to work with fruit and vegetable growers on challenging pest management issues. The PMC’s grower-supported Minor Use Program has helped register over 2,300 new applications of crop protection products since 2003. The Pesticide Risk Reduction program has been another core activity of PMC, with the important mandate of developing innovative alternative management solutions for agricultural pests.
What FVGC is Asking For
- Provide essential funding to support PMRA and their initiatives, especially the new Integrated Approach to pesticide re-evaluation. More than 340 re-evaluations and special reviews are either underway or will commence in the next 10 years. Without the time or sufficient resources needed to conduct thorough scientific reviews and to make science- and data-based conclusions, hurried decisions can be made that are detrimental not only to growers, but to the Canadian economy. The new approach will increase both the efficiency and scientific accuracy of the PMRA’s decisions.
- Provide a $5 million budget increase, with appropriate inflationary increases annually, to the PMC to both support new uses of crop protection products and pest management strategies, and address the supporting research backlog caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Encourage science-based harmonization of phytosanitary requirements and MRLs with our trading partners which will ease technical barriers to trade.
Resources
For more information
For more information, please contact Caleigh Hallink-Irwin, Crop Protection Manager.
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