Easier access to information on pestcides and their effects

Posted on 30th November 2016

by organicresearchcentre

An important decision from the EU Court of Justice that will make it easier to access information on pesticides and their effects has been announced

Following lobbying from Pesticide Action Network Europe (PAN Europe), and other organisations, The EU Court of Justice has announced that information about pesticides, their ingredients and their effects on the environment can no longer be hidden behind commercial confidentiality clauses and instead will have to be made available to those requesting it. The Court ruled that the use of pesticides falls under the definition of emissions to the environment and should be subject to the same provisions as any other emission to the environment as laid out in the Aarhus Convention.

• “When a person requests access to environmental documents, the concept of ‘information on emissions into the environment’ covers, inter alia, information concerning the nature and effects of the release of a pesticide into air, water or soil, or onto plants
• The confidentiality of commercial and industrial information may not be invoked to preclude the disclosure of such information.”

This ruling will, we hope, allow greater access to information and transparency about the effects of pesticides and allow for far more thorough independent scrutiny of the ways in which people and the environment are exposed to, and affected by, them.

See Court of Justice of the European Union PRESS RELEASE