Faster approval of organic products: Now the federal government needs to fire up the pesticide turbo

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When it comes to pesticides, the gap between organic camps and ordinary people is usually wide. But this time Green National Councilor Christine Badertscher (42) and Philipp Matthias Bregy (45), leader of the centrist parliamentary group, are going in the same direction.

The two agree: the farmers face a problem. They should move away from chemical synthetic pesticides. That is what politicians want. But what is the alternative? Even the Greens are clear that this is not possible without means to combat pests and fungi. But for years, authorities have been withdrawing approval for many more pesticides than new products that have less impact on the environment are coming onto the market.

Procedures often take years

Bregy and Badertscher want to help farmers. They advocate that low-risk plant protection products be approved more quickly in the future. Both have submitted a corresponding proposal to the National Council.

Today, an approval process can easily take five years or more, says Deborah Meier, president of the Swiss umbrella association of biological crop protection product manufacturers (IBMA). It doesn’t matter whether a drug is proven to have a low risk or not, she says. Low-risk substances are substances that are, for example, not carcinogenic, acutely toxic or toxic to aquatic organisms.

Faster, but no less accurate

The two National Councils want such substances to be provisionally approved at least within six months. Badertscher emphasizes that faster does not mean that you have to look less carefully.

According to Bregy, biological crop protection products in particular could benefit from the faster process. Meier mentions certain bacteria, viruses and fungi as examples of such substances – “very specific natural opponents that already exist in the environment”. Some of these have already been approved in the EU as low-risk substances. But there are also chemicals that can be absorbed.

WWF is generally open

The proposal has been welcomed by environmental organizations. “In principle, it makes sense to quickly assess active ingredients and low-risk products,” says Eva Wyss, agricultural expert at WWF. However, the initiative must not lead to the assessment being carried out carelessly and inadequately. The federal government must have sufficient time to review the manufacturers’ assessment.

The WWF is therefore reluctant to set a specific deadline. Unless Parliament is prepared to make significantly more resources available to the responsible agency.

The point of contention is the approval of pesticides

The approval of pesticides has long been a topic of discussion in politics. Six months ago, the chemical lobby tried to restrict the right of environmental organizations to have a say. The attempt failed. The proponents had argued that the associations were responsible for the lengthy approval procedures and their objections.

But another problem is that civil servants hardly adhere to this. Last year, the National Council and the Council of States approved six additional full-time positions to process approval applications. While there were still approximately 800 applications pending at the end of the year, today there are still approximately 700 – also because new applications are constantly coming in.

Source:Blick