MEPs on the European Parliament’s agriculture committee have adopted changes to the Plant Health Law which aims to protect the EU against the entry and spread of new pests of plants.
The regulation provides early-stage measures to prevent pests from entering the EU or to eradicate them immediately if found present on EU territory.
Plant diseases can have a devastating effect on the environment and farmers, on food and feed quality and prices, and on the quality of people’s daily lives, the parliament said.
The bacterium Xylella fastidiosa, for example, has been seriously damaging the agricultural sector and the traditional landscapes of some parts of southern Europe for at least ten years.
Plant Health Law
The law entered into application in December 2019 and is the basic legal framework of the EU plant health policy. In October 2023 the European Commission submitted a revision of the rules.
The EU rules on plant health regulate the production, inspection, sampling, testing, import into the EU from third countries, movement and certification of plant material.
In order to be imported into the EU, all plants, including living parts of plants, need a phytosanitary certificate which confirms that they comply with EU rules on plant health.
The commission has adopted a list of plant material, such as pineapple, bananas, dates, coconuts and durians, that is considered “safe” and thus exempt from this requirement.
European Parliament
MEPs propose an emergency team, shorter period for surveys, and better use of an electronic notification system in their report on the revision of the Plant Health Law.
Among a number of amendments drafted, MEPs proposed to create an EU plant health emergency team composed of experts appointed by the commission and nominated by member states.
The team would assist states, or third countries bordering the EU, upon their request, with measures preventing outbreaks of new pests and pests that may fulfil the conditions for quarantine pests.
Pests for which the adoption of measures is necessary to prevent their introduction into and spread within the entire EU territory are referred to in the law as quarantine pests.
The MEPs also proposed a period of five to ten years for multiannual programmes for risk-based surveys that ensure timely detection of dangerous pests.
The law currently states that member states should establish multiannual survey programmes, for a period of five to seven years, for the presence of quarantine pests.
The multiannual programmes should be reviewed and updated based on the phytosanitary situation of the territory concerned, according to the MEPs.
The Plant Health Law requires professional operators to attach physically a passport to the trade unit of the plant, plant product and other objects moving inside the EU.
The passport guarantees that the plant for planting does not host EU quarantine pests, complies with the restrictions relating to regulated non-quarantine pests (pests already present in EU) and increases the traceability of the plant.
Plant passports of plants, plant products or other objects should be issued no later than when it is moved for the first time by an importer to an operator in the EU, MEPs said.
Importers should make use of the Information Management System for Official Controls to provide results of an official control to authorities, they added.
The parliament’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development adopted the new rules today (Tuesday, February 13) by 36 votes to one, and one abstention.
The committee agreed to open negotiations with member states on the final text. The decision is expected to be announced at the next plenary session from February 26-29.