Evaluation of the emergency authorisations granted by Member State Romania for plant protection products containing clothianidin, imidacloprid or thiamethoxam

Abstract

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) was requested by the European Commission to provide technical assistance in accordance with Article 53(2) of Regulation (EC) No. 1107/2009 to examine the emergency authorisations granted in 2017 by the competent national authority in Romania for plant protection products containing the neonicotinoid active substances (a.s.) clothianidin, imidacloprid or thiamethoxam for uses on maize, oilseed rape and sunflower that were restricted in accordance with Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No. 485/2013. In particular, EFSA was asked to assess whether the granting of these emergency authorisations and their wide scope were necessary because of danger that cannot be contained by any other reasonable means. In this context, EFSA collected and evaluated the information in relation to the emergency authorisations for clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam in Romania in line with the EFSA insecticide protocol developed in the framework of a mandate concerning the application of Article 4(7) of Regulation (EC) No. 1107/2009. The current Technical Report summarises the outcome of the evaluation of six crop/pest combinations considered in Romania in 2017. The evaluation demonstrated that for three crop/pest combinations no sufficient alternative active substance to clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam are currently authorised in Romania, to provide an alternative mode of action (MoA), whereas for three crop/pest combinations there was an alternative a.s. authorised with the same MoA as the a.s. under consideration. The evaluation included an assessment of non-insecticide alternatives for the presented uses. For the crop pest/combinations oilseed rape/P. atra and oilseed rape/P. chrysocephala, two methods, i.e. crop rotation and soil tillage, are highly effective, considered as feasible and are used on a large scale. For the other crop/pest combinations, three non-insecticidal methods are available, but these do not have the same efficacy as the insecticidal methods, or present some technical or scientific limitations.