ENV IPMHUB

National Policies

Many countries regulate the use of plant protection products or crop protection in national laws and regulations. National IPM policies are part of such national legislations

Australia• Belgium • Canada • Denmark • Germany • Estonia • Ireland • Japan • Netherlands • New Zealand • Portugal • Slovenia • Spain • United Kingdom • United States

Belgium

Belgium has already a long experience in Integrated Fruit Production (IFP). In 1996 a royal and ministerial decree was published to define IFP and organise the recognition of integrated fruit growers. In 2003 the system was maintained by the Flemish and Walloon Region.

Flanders: Almost 90% of the fruit growers follow the principles of IPM (read more). Recently, in March 2013 the Flemish action plan for sustainable pesticide use was published.

Canada

Canada is a vast country politically divided into ten provinces and three territories with a central federal government. Agriculture sector in Canada is a shared responsibility, with well-defined roles and scope between the federal and provincial jurisdictions.

Canada’s Agricultural Policy Framework

Since 2003, Canada has had in place agricultural policy frameworks to govern the federal and shared federal- provincial programming in agriculture. The current policy framework, Growing Forward 2 covers the 5 year period from 2013-2018, and focuses on enabling innovation, competitiveness and market development for the agricultural sector, with a strong emphasis on sustainable production.

Government support for IPM is represented across a range of programs delivered by AAFC and the provinces as part of this policy framework.

Some provinces have put in place policies to govern their agricultural programming as well. Those which have relevance to IPM are indicated below.

Province of Québec: Stratégie phytosanitaire aims to reduce risks to health and environment from use of pesticides in agriculture by 25% by 2021 through increased adoption of IPM by farmers.

Provinces of New Brunswick: Potato Disease Eradication Act aims to enforce a series of measures to prevent and eradicate potato diseases.

Province of British Columbia: the Integrated Pest Management Act establishes regulatory requirements based on risk to human health and environment and aims to promote IPM and environmental stewardship.

Denmark

Denmark has a long history of pesticides action plans (5 pesticide action plans since 1986) but the term IPM was mentioned the first time in the fourth action plan named Green Growth. Until then the overall goal was only to reduce pesticide use. The main focus of the policy was on the protection of groundwater and surface water and the aims were to be achieved by supporting the advisory service as well as providing funds for relevant research such as the development and improvement of decision support systems for specific pests in specific crops. More information about the Environmental policy objectives and National Action Plans can be found here.

Germany

The German Plant Protection Act lays down the provisions for crop protection and takes into account the IPM concept since 1987. The new German Plant Protection Act (BGBl. I S. 148) was adopted in February 2013 and refers in §3 to good farming practice which in particular includes provisions on IPM with regard to the General Principles of IPM as laid out in the Directive 209/128/EC. The National Action Plan on the Sustainable Use of Plant Protection Products is referred to in § 4 of the German Plant Protection Act.

Germany has a history of reduction plans with the first programme adopted in 1994 and a revised version with the scope of risk reduction in the NAP2008. The new NAP, adopted in April 2013, implements the requirements of the Directive 209/128/EC, sets the goals for risk reduction and provides a set of measures for achieving them.

Netherlands

The first action plan of the Netherlands was carried out from 1990 – 2000. The main focus of the plan is the stimulation of IPM and the reduction of emission to the surface water. IPM was stimulated by the development of new IPM-techniques and training. The reduction of emission was increased by the development of new drift reducing techniques and the introduction of an obligatory crop free zone. In 2012 the Netherlands published their third action plan as an implementation of directive 2009/128/EC. More information (in Dutch and English) find here.

United States

General Information