Water Treatment – a Regulatory Challenge for Plant Protection Products in the EU

Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009 lays down the rules for the authorisation of plant protection products in Europe with the aim of protecting humans and the environment. It is known that during primary disinfection processes for central water treatment (e.g. ozonation, chlorination) certain active substances included in plant protection products and their metabolites have the potential to form unwanted by-products with e.g. toxic, carcinogenic and genotoxic characteristics.

Notwithstanding that EFSA (European Food Safety Authority), the scientific advisory body of the European Commission, has recently identified data gaps during the approval process of active substances, water treatment processes have not (yet) been implemented in the European data requirements (Reg. 283/2013 or 284/2013) relevant for the authorisation of plant protection products. Further, no guidance document for experimental testing is available. With this information pending, addressing water treatment processes successfully becomes a challenge for applicants of plant protection products.

However the topic is even broader: with implementation of a guidance document it can be expected that other chemical sectors, e.g. industrial chemicals or pharmaceuticals, would also need to set a spotlight on the topic.

knoell environmental fate and regulatory experts Frauke Schnitzler and Sabine Dorn provide an overview of current attempts of addressing ozonation and chlorination for AIR3 active substances and closely follow recent developments in this area.

To read more go to
http://news.agropages.com/News/NewsDetail---28186.htm (English)
http://cn.agropages.com/News/NewsDetail---17299.htm (Chinese)
or feel free to contact us for advice on your active substance applications.