Silent Death

Timeline of the EU Sustainable use of pesticides regulation

By Marta Portocarrero

On 22 June 2022, the EU Commission presented a long-awaited proposal for the first binding law to reduce pesticide use by 50% by 2030. Its label is SUR, short for "Sustainable use of pesticide regulation". How did we get here? It hasn't been an easy journey. The timeline below summarises a path marked by opposition to various political attempts to make Europe's agricultural sector greener and increase transparency about pesticide use across the continent.

1991

Launch of common rules on the authorization and use of plant protection products, pesticides.

2009

The EU directive on the Sustainable Use of Pesticides (SUD) comes into force to make Europe less dependent on pesticides. It obliges Member states to report on aggregated pesticide sales data.

11 December 2019

The EU Commission presents its Green Deal, a roadmap to a climatic and environmentally sustainable Europe.
 

20 May 2020

The EU Commission presents its 2030 targets for Farm to Fork:
 

Reduce by 2030:
– 50% the use and risk of chemical pesticides.
– nutrient losses with at least 50%.
– fertilizers with 20%.

Increase by 2030:
 – organic farming area to 25% of total farmland

19 October 2020

The EU Council approves the F2F strategy.

2 November 2020

Report from the US Department of Agriculture’s research service states that F2F reduction targets can have consequences on food security worldwide.

2 February 2021

The EU Commission publishes the proposal for a framework regulation on Statistics on Agricultural Input and Output (SAIO) to ensure consistent data collection.

27 September 2021

Copa-Cogeca, the main farmers’ lobby organization, holds an internal briefing on how to organise resistance to the F2F goals. 

19 October 2021

The European Parliament votes in support of F2F.

24 February 2022

Russia invades Ukraine.

21 March 2022

The European Parliament passes a resolution demanding an impact assessment of the F2F objectives taking into account the potential consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine for food security.

23 March 2022

The EU Commission is due to present the SUR proposal, but postpones it to “before summer”.

2 June 2022

The EU Council, the Commission and the Parliament agree on a compromise draft regulation for measuring use of pesticides, SAIO, to start from 2028.

22 June 2022

The EU Commission presents the SUR proposal to cut pesticides.

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