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The opinion of the french on pesticide use in
agriculture 65% of the people interviewed understand the need for the use of pesticides  75% know or suppose that manufacturers need to obtain product registration It is in drinking water and in soil that the French think there might be a very important pesticide hazard
(respectively 58% and 43%) Integrated farming appears as a credible alternative to "all
organic" farming (47%/52%)  More about this survey
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1. Annex I (" Positive list ") In order for a new product to be approved, its active substance must be registered on the positive list in Annex I (European Commission Directive 91/414/EEC published in July 1991). The first step of review procedure resulted in 1994 in the drawing up of a prioritary list containing 90 active substances.
Current
state of Annex I : |
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( following review) |
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2. Temporary Sales Approval In each Member State, derogations have been foreseen by Directive 91/414/EEC allowing a temporary sales approval for 3 years, renewable for speciality products containing active substances not yet listed in Annex I, but which have been estimated to be acceptable by European institutions and assessed on a National level. Conditions required for European acceptability : · An " active substance " registration needs to be presented in one European Union country and agreed by this country’s authorities. The registration has to be transferred to European authorities for confirmation of its opinion and publication of the decision. End of April 2000, 63 pesticide active substances not listed with Annex I were declared acceptable. This explains the temporary sales approvals given in France these past years. For more detailed information, please refere to the article" European registration : positive list, review list, notification calendar…What’up? " in 
Phytoma - La Défense des Végétaux n°527 – May 2000 |
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Environmental tax reforms The general tax on pollutants (TGAP in France) which has been acknowledged under the Finance Law in 1999 that resulted from the government's aim to reform environmental taxation, has been enlarged by the law for financing the social security in 2000 : in future, it will apply, among other products, on pesticides used for agriculture or similar purposes. This new tax, which replaces a certain number of taxes that had previously been collected separately by ADEME (Agency for Development, for the Environment and for Energy Control) was enforced on January 1, 2000. It was supposed to yield 300 million French Francs the first year for the government budget. This tax uses the same calculation method as is used for excise, and is based on a mix of toxicological and ecotoxicological criteria (possibly aggravated by hazard phrases). A scale is associated with it representing 7 categories going from 0 FF/tonne to 11 000 FF/tonne for most heavily taxed products. The amount of the tax is based on the amount of active substance sold on the National market. The tax is to be paid by the manufacturer or the importer . It is of course too early to measure the impacts of the pesticide tax on volumes sold, production costs or commercial cycles. One can, however, regret that the money collected will not benefit any consistent policies on environmental protection asked for by most players in the agricultural sector for the past few years, and which was the initial aim of the Ministry of Environment. |
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There are two ways for a compound to be listed in Annex I :
