Important reminder for growers around off-label use of products

IMPORTANT REMINDER FOR

GROWERS AROUND OFF-LABEL USE OF PRODUCTS

Words by Rebecca Fisher : Crop Protection Manager, Market Access Solutionz

Off-label use of crop protection products is needed to manage pests, diseases and weeds in a number of minor fruit and vegetable crops.

While the practice is legal, growers are responsible for ensuring that off-label use is necessary, safe and compliant. There are several important management steps that growers need to follow to ensure that the correct products are used and that residue levels on the harvested crop are within regulatory and customer limits. Off-label use occurs when growers need to use a product to control a pest, disease or weed – but the label does not carry a claim for that crop or target organism. While the flexibility of being able to use crop protection products off-label is critical to New Zealand growers, they are unable to rely on label directions to ensure regulatory controls are complied with. Without label guidance, there is a risk that off-label use may result in exceedance of maximum residue limits (MRLs) or other compliance breaches. Results from residue testing programmes over several years show that where residue levels exceeded MRLs, these incidents were sometimes as a result of products being used off-label. The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) conducts a Food Residue Surveillance Programme (FRSP) which monitors residues on a variety of foods. Residue non-compliance in this project can be as a result of off-label use where no MRL is set and the New Zealand default (of 0.1mg/ kg) applies. Or where off-label use of the product is not allowed and consequently any detection of the active is a non-compliance. MRL non-compliances can have serious and negative financial implications for growers, so ensuring that all growers understand the rules and requirements for each crop protection product used, and how to comply with all controls is important.

New Zealand Good Agricultural Practice (NZGAP) has developed

a Guideline for Off Label use of Agrichemicals in Horticulture

to provide growers with practical information which supports them to meet GAP and regulatory requirements.

The NZGAP off-label guideline has recently been updated (December 2020) and is very helpful for growers, particularly of minor crops. All growers who use products off-label should use this guideline. It provides practical information to help growers meet regulatory requirements under the Agricultural compounds and veterinary medicines Act 1997 (ACVM), Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996 (HSNO), Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 (HSWA), and Food Act 2014. When designing or updating spray plans, growers should carefully consider what products may need to be used off-label. The guidance document provides a simple decision tree for determining if a product can be used off-label as well as a checklist for ensuring compliance. It is recommended that growers’ considerations and decision making around off-label use of a product are documented and lodged in that spray diary entry. WorkSafe and regional plan requirements must also be met. This includes tasks such as complying with neighbour notification, buffer zones, re-entry intervals and signage requirements. These off-label use guidelines are not an exhaustive list of all steps which growers must take to ensure regulatory compliance, particularly with regard to WorkSafe and regional council requirements, where requirements can differ from region to region and because what is a “reasonably practicable” step to take to ensure the safety of your workers and bystanders, will vary between growing operations. Whilst some WorkSafe requirements are specific such as thresholds over which signage is required, others are based around the principle of eliminating and minimising risks to health and safety so far as is reasonably practicable.

The latest version of the NZGAP Off-label Guideline can be accessed here:

www.nzgap.co.nz/NZGAP_Public/Growers/Guidelines/

If you have queries, please contact NZGAP at nzgap@hortnz.co.nz or your Product Group Manager.