Ecological risk assessment of pesticides in the EU: what factors and groups influence policy changes?

Abstract

For the last couple of years, European environmental risk assessment (ERA) regulations have undergone significant changes. The new 1107/2009 directive which came into effect in 2011 has triggered an on-going debate on defining specific protection goals for ERA. During this period, we conducted a study on policy change among the most influential ERA stakeholders from Europe. We interviewed 43, purposively sampled, participants from the European safety authorities, plant protection product industry and academia. Transcribed interviews underwent thematic analysis conducted separately by two coders. As we followed the advocacy coalition framework, our findings focus on stakeholders' processes, interrelations and values behind the ERA policy change. The main challenges emerging from our analysis turned out to be the slow uptake of scientific developments into ERA and very broadly defined protection goals. The use of safety factors and cut-off criteria left risk assessors with many uncertainties. With ERA in its current form it turned out to be impossible to determine whether the current scheme is over-or under-protective. Still, the study shows that the problem of over-or under-protectiveness lies deep in the perception of stakeholders and depends greatly on their priorities. Academics strive for better ecological relevance as a priority. They have concerns that ERA is oversimplified. Regulators worry that ERA relies too much on risk mitigation and is possibly not protective enough, but at the same time, the majority believes that the assessment is well established and straightforward to follow. Industry representatives would like to see ERA based more on probabilistic risk assessment. Recent changes, according to risk assessment and management practitioners have led to an inevitable increase in complexity, which is not perceived as a positive thing, and does not necessarily translate into better risk assessment.

Quantification of an Adverse Outcome Pathway Network by Bayesian Regression and Bayesian Network Modeling

“…With the probabilistic approach described in our study, we can refine the commonly used risk assessment approach, which is based on the calculation of a single‐value risk quotient (RQ) as the ratio exposure/effect. The binary approach—considering whether the risk quotient exceeds the value 1—has strong traditions in prospective risk assessment such as chemical safety assessment, and is typically the requirement for decision making, for example, for chemical product registration (Hunka et al 2015). Our example shows that an AOP‐BN model can provide a probabilistic prediction of a binary target node with high accuracy.…”

“…Integr Environ Assess Manag 2021:147-164 © 2020 The Authors wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/ieam the value 1-has strong traditions in prospective risk assessment such as chemical safety assessment, and is typically the requirement for decision making, for example, for chemical product registration (Hunka et al 2015). Our example shows that an AOP-BN model can provide a probabilistic prediction of a binary target node with high accuracy.…”

How to increase the uptake of circular public procurement? Lessons learned from local authorities in Sweden

“…ACF has been developed for policy areas best described as having conflicting goals, many actors and high uncertainty. The framework has been applied to highly polarising disputes, such as those surrounding drug policies (Kübler, 2001) but mainly in the field of environmental policies (Hunka et al , 2015; Nohrstedt and Olofsson, 2016). It has several characteristics that make it suitable to study CPP, outlined below.…”

Barriers to evidence use for sustainability: Insights from pesticide policy and practice

“…In the policy arena [2a], for example, actors vary in their priorities regarding European ecological risk assessments of pesticides. While academics strive for assessments with higher ecological relevance, regulators favor sufficiently protective and easy-to-follow assessments, and the industry prefers more probabilistic approaches (Hunka et al 2015). Likewise, in the practice arena [2b], interests may shape evidence communication and uptake.…”