The European regulatory system for plant protection products-cause of a "Silent Spring" or highly advanced and protective?

Abstract

Current publications that are shaping public perception repeatedly claim that residues of plant protection products (PPP) in the environment demonstrate gaps in assessing the exposure and effects of PPP, allegedly revealing the inability of the European regulatory system to prevent environmental contamination and damage such as biodiversity decline. The hypothesis is that environmental risk assessments rely on inappropriate predictive models that underestimate exposure and do not explicitly account for the impact of combinations of environmental stressors and physiological differences in stress responses. This article puts this criticism into context to allow for a more balanced evaluation of the European regulatory system for PPP. There is broad consensus that the decline in biodiversity is real. This article analyzed current literature for causes of this decline and of chemical contamination. The main drivers identified were land use changes and structural uniformity of agricultural landscapes or multiple contaminants emitted by various sources such as wastewater discharge systems. Comparing measured environmental concentrations from published monitoring studies with exposure predictions from the regulatory risk assessment reveals only slight occasional exceedances for a few environmental scenarios and compounds. Therefore, the call for greater conservatism in the European authorization process for PPPs will not lead to an improvement in the environmental situation. We suggest enhancing landscape diversity through the European Union Common Agricultural Policy and reducing contamination from wastewater and farmyard effluents. The current regulatory risk management toolbox should be expanded to include flexible localized mitigation measures and treatment options to reduce applied amounts and off-target exposure.