EU health officials have rejected claims that the new, stricter system of approving pesticides will limit the availability of products to farmers and adversely affect European food production.

The claims were contained in a letter sent by Farmers Weekly to EU health commissioner Androulla Vassiliou as part of our Save Our Sprays campaign last October.

In it, we set out our concerns at the way the risk-based approach to pesticide approvals was being replaced by a hazard-based system. We also passed on British farmers’ pleas for a full impact assessment into the effect of the policy change on food availability and price.

But in a response received this week, head of department Robert Madelin insists that the new rules will not impose serious restrictions on food production in Europe. “On the contrary, the commission believes that it is an incentive for the development of new, safer plant protection products,” says the letter.

“In addition, the new regulation contains measures, such as the zonal system and obligatory mutual recognition, simplified rules on data protection and facilitated authorisation for minor uses, which will increase availability to farmers of plant protection products.”

Mr Madelin goes on to rubbish suggestions that food prices might increase as a result of the rule changes.

“Monofactorial analyses, which only take into account the availability of a certain plant protection product, but ignore important production factors for farmers, like energy prices or the effects of global warming, are too simplistic to give a realistic picture.”

Independent research by Sean Rickard of the Cranfield School of Management last autumn had suggested that bread prices could go up by 10p a loaf and milk by 3p/litre as key pesticides were removed from the market and crop yields were adversely affected.

The European parliament gave its approval to the new pesticide approvals process in January. It is now left to EU farm ministers to rubber-stamp the regulation, something they will do at their meeting in May or June.