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Joint Statement by FERTILIZERS EUROPE, IVA, EBIC and ECOFI: Urgent need for conformity assessment bodies for fertilising products

July 30, 2021 by Jessica Fitch

The new Fertilising Products Regulation (EU) 2019/1009 (FPR[1]) is set to apply from 16 July 2022 and requires third party certification for many products covered by this regulation.

Accreditation of Conformity Assessment Bodies (CABs) is required so that fertilising and plant biostimulant products are able to gain access to the EU Single Market. According to a recent EU Commission Expert Group on Fertilising Products Meeting[2], very few CABs have applied for accreditation across EU member states to date.

We are concerned that the lack of CABs will prevent products covered by the FPR from accessing the Single Market, which will be detrimental to industries and farmers alike. Considering that we are less than a year from implementation this issue is becoming extremely urgent and demands immediate attention.

First, we urge all concerned parties to reach out to organisations qualified and eligible to act as Conformity Assessment Bodies immediately and encourage them to apply without further delay for notification[3]. Second, we emphasise that we are open to discuss and answer questions from interested organisations and are willing to support them to the best of our knowledge.

To demonstrate the potential demand for CABs, the IVA, Fertilizers Europe, ECOFI and EBIC reached out to their members to make a preliminary, joint estimate of how many products are expected to be submitted for certification under the FPR in the next two years. The data was collected by a third party in full compliance with competition rules and the resulting aggregated figures were made available to the European Commission which had requested associations to submit such relevant data.

To gain access to the data and for further information, please contact:

EBIC ECOFI Fertilizers Europe IVA
Beatrice@prospero.ag Jessica@prospero.ag antoine.hoxha@fertilizerseurope.com hartmann.iva@vci.de

Download and use our ECOFI template letter to contact potential CABs in your country.

 

[1] REGULATION (EU) 2019/1009 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 5 June 2019 laying down rules on the making available on the market of EU fertilising products and amending Regulations (EC) No 1069/2009 and (EC) No 1107/2009 and repealing Regulation (EC) No 2003/2003

[2] For the agenda of the June CEG-FP meeting see: Circabc (europa.eu)

[3] As in: Chapter IV of the Fertilising Products Regulation; see the list of notifying authorities in the EU here: https://ec.europa.eu/growth/tools-databases/nando/index.cfm?fuseaction=na.main