The EU’s food safety watchdog has launched a consultation on risk assessment guidelines governing agricultural chemicals over concerns that current measures may be inadequate.

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The European Food Safety Authority’s consultation comes after a number of studies showed that exposure to commonly used pesticides at supposedly sub-lethal doses and in field conditions may be having a detrimental effect on Europe’s insect pollinators, particularly bees. The consultation comes after the EFSA announced that it had found potentially serious flaws in current risk assessment procedures in May.    

On Thursday (20th September) the EFSA launched its consultation on draft guidance for the Risk Assessment of Plant Protection Products and their effects on Bees. The Guidance Document will be used as a guideline for companies and states wishing to launch or evaluate new products.

EFSA said last week that the guidance had been worked up in consultation with the EU Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health. The Document, which was developed at the request of the European Commission in light of studies published in the journal Science this May, proposes a tiered risk assessment scheme, wherein a “simple and cost effective” first tier graduates into “higher tier studies under semi-field and field conditions.” The authority said each of the tiers is set up to ensure wildlife is adequately protected.

The watchdog said that, as insufficient data was available on the background mortality rates of bees and differences in species sensitivity, it had used “conservative assumptions” of these criteria in its guidance. Under the new guidance, tests will be required for effects on different wild bee species, including bumble bees and solitary bees, which are suffering dramatic declines.

On Friday (21st September), scientists from the University of Exeter warned that the impacts of neonicotinoid pesticides on bee populations may have been overstated in one of the May studies. The study, conducted by researchers at France’s INRA agricultural research institute, had linked the use of neonicotinoids with colony collapse disorder; however, although the Exeter scientists said this may not necessarily be the case, they acknowledged, “We know that neonicotinoids affect honeybees. [We are] definitely not saying that pesticides are harmless to honeybees.”

The consultation will be open until 25th October. The EFSA’s draft Guidance Document is available here

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