Chemical, pesticide regulations streamlined

The new legislation will streamline the regulation of agricultural and veterinary chemicals and introduce a governance board for the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Chemicals Authority (APVMA).

The reforms provide simpler regulatory processes for chemicals of low regulatory concern, aligning the level of regulatory effort with the level of risk.

The APVMA will identify prescribed registrations of chemical products and prescribed approvals of active constituents and labels. Examples may include consumer products with a history of safe use or existing active constituents described in relevant monographs and standards. Simpler registrations processes apply for these approvals and registrations where minimal or no assessment of technical information occurs.

The legislation allows extensions to limitation and protection periods as an incentive for chemical companies to register new uses of chemical products. This will ensure minor uses are registered, which might otherwise have insufficient commercial returns for chemical companies to add them to the product label. Where such uses are registered, the reforms allow for the extension of the time period in which the APVMA is not able to use innovators' information to support the registrations, variation or reconsideration of another chemical product or active constituent. The maximum period of extension is for five more years.

A key element of the reform is the establishment of a governance board for the APVMA to support its performance and accountability.

The board can:

The government has committed to funding the costs of establishing the board and the first two years.

The legislation also simplifies reporting requirements for annual returns, supports computerised decision-making, and introduces more penalties and information requirements to improve the integrity of the system.