52nd Meeting of the Panel on Efficacy Evaluation of Fungicides and Insecticides

Paris, 2023-11-21/23

 

 

The Panel on Efficacy Evaluation of Fungicides and Insecticides met in Paris, at the EPPO Headquarters on 2023-11/21-23. The Panel continued its main task of developing Standards for conducting field trials to evaluate the efficacy of fungicides and insecticides.

 

 

 

Revised and new PP1 Standards

The following two Standards were revised and considered ready to be sent for country consultation:

  • Revision of PP 1/011 Eupoecilia ambiguella and Lobesia botrana with a new scope and title ‘Moths of grapevine’ and
  • Revision of PP 1/131 Quadraspidiotus perniciosus with a new scope and title ‘Diaspididae scales on pome and stone fruits’.

 

Two new draft Standards were also studied and considered ready to be sent for country consultation:

  • Efficacy evaluation of mating disruption techniques against Lepidopteran pests in vegetable and ornamental crops under protected conditions and
  • Seed wasps in plums, almonds and pistachios

 

The Panel considered how to undertake the revision of PP 1/314 Evaluation of mating disruption techniques against Lepidopteran pests in grapevine, pome and stone fruits under field conditions and the revision of PP 1/048 Migratory root nematodes. These revisions will be worked on by the Panel and discussed at the next Panel meeting. The Panel agreed that guidelines for efficacy evaluation for fungicides against late blight of tomato and downy mildew of basil need to be prepared because these two crops are no longer covered by the current version of PP 1/065 Downy mildews of vegetables revised in 2021.

 

 

Other topics

The Panel discussed how to compare EPPO Standards requirements for plot and sample size for similar pests or crops. A tool (in the form of an Excel file) has been developed for the insecticides Standards and will be soon extended to fungicides. This tool will allow the Panel to identify Standards for which a revision needs to be considered.

 

The Panel discussed elements of new PP1 General Standards, or their planned revisions, which are relevant for the efficacy evaluation of fungicides and insecticides. Namely they studied the requirements for yield recording in efficacy trials, the principles of efficacy and crop safety extrapolations for major uses, the effect of Plant Protection Products on transformation processes (revision of PP 1/243), the trial design to show the benefit of using PPPs in a spraying program and how to address russeting in efficacy evaluation.

 

The Panel was updated concerning the status of the EPPO Database for extrapolation possibilities for minor uses (the release of the database is planned for summer 2024) and the activities of Minor Uses Coordination Facility  were presented to the Panel.

 

The Panel on Efficacy Evaluation of Fungicides and Insecticides will next meet on 2024-11-26/28, in Vienna at the kind invitation of the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES).