Use and underlying principles of the EFSA Pesticide Residue Intake Model (PRIMo), revision 4

The EFSA Pesticide Residue Intake Model (PRIMo) has, since its first version in 2007, become the standard tool used at the EU level to estimate the short- and long-term dietary exposure to pesticide residues. It is a deterministic model and is primarily used as a prospective screening tool for dietary risk assessment in the framework of Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 and Regulation (EU) No 1107/2009. Unlike its previous Excel-based versions, PRIMo 4 has been converted to an online web-application. The aim of the present report is to describe the features and functionalities of the latest version of PRIMo and provide guidance to its future users. One of the main novelties is that the model uses individual consumption data from the Comprehensive Food Consumption Database of EFSA, where the foods reported as consumed were disaggregated to their ingredients and converted to their raw primary commodity (RPC) equivalents by means of the EFSA RPC model. This innovation allows to have more detailed exposure assessment results, including results for minor products and processed foods.