Question Period Note: PESTICIDE REGULATION CONCERNS

Q1 – What is Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada doing to support farmers that require access to minor uses of pesticide products?
Q2 – Does AAFC support farmer’s access to novel technologies such as pesticide drone spraying?
Q3 – Why did the Government re-authorize the use of strychnine despite the risks?
Q4 – How will Canada’s National Food Security Strategy support farmers’ access to pest control products?
Q5 – What does Canada think of the EU's approach to pesticides?

R1 - The Government remains committed to supporting farmers by ensuring access to diverse and effective crop protection tools. AAFC continues to collaborate with provincial, territorial, and industry partners through initiatives such as the Federal-Provincial-Territorial (FPT) Pesticide Management Action Plan and the Horticultural Tables Crop Protection Working Group.
In addition, through the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership (Sustainable CAP), the Government funds the AAFC-Health Canada Minor Use Pesticide Program, which generates data to support regulatory approval for grower-prioritized minor pesticide uses.
Federal departments are collaborating with provincial and territorial, as well as industry partners, to ensure regulations reflect agricultural realities and support innovation.

R2 - AAFC’s scientific expertise and leadership helped fill a critical data gap, enabling regulatory progress and positioning Health Canada’s Pesticides Regulatory Directorate (PRD) to advance a regulatory decision.
AAFC remains committed to supporting farmers in adopting innovative technologies, including the use of drones for pesticide application. This is why we worked with the Pesticides Regulatory Directorate on their new policy, which allows for the use of drone spraying for many pesticides.

R3 - The temporary authorization of strychnine reaffirms the Government’s commitment to support farmers, strengthen Canada’s food system, while protecting the environment.
Federal and provincial partners acted quickly in partnership to provide farmers with a critical tool to help prevent crop and pasture losses. This collaboration enhances the competitiveness of our Western Canadian farmers.

R4 - Canada’s Food Security Strategy is our plan to fast‑track pesticide access by clearing the approval backlog and getting products into farmers’ hands sooner.

R5 - Canada has consistently pressed the EU to recognize there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ model for sustainable agricultural production. This concern has become more acute as the EU advances a reciprocity-based approach for pesticides that may diverge from its international trade obligations.
Canada continues to strongly advocate for the EU to adopt a science- and risk-based approach aligned with international guidelines, which recognizes regional differences in the crop protection tools needed by trading partners and does not undermine predictable and transparent international supply chains.
Canada continues to actively engage with the EU through relevant Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) committees, WTO committees, and bilateral discussions at the ministerial, commissioner, and senior official levels to advance these positions.

Pesticides and Health Canada’s Pesticides Regulatory Directorate (PRD)
Pesticides (insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides) are essential tools for producers to secure crop yield and quality each season. Effective April 1, 2025, the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) was formally reclassified from a Branch to a Directorate and is now known as the Pesticides Regulatory Directorate (PRD). The PRD is responsible for registering pesticides for use in Canada. Although possibly subject to change under the Government’s proposed Bill C-31, registered pesticides are re-evaluated every 15 years. The prevalence of pesticides in agriculture and media linkages to environmental and human health have raised the profile of these products within the general public.

As part of the assessment process prior to the registration of a pesticide, Health Canada must determine that the consumption of the maximum amount of residues expected to remain on food products when a pesticide is used according to label directions will not be a concern to human health. This maximum amount is then legally established as a Maximum Residue Limit (MRL) under the Pest Control Products Act. Enforcement of these MRLs is conducted by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency under the Food and Drugs Act and associated regulations.

Changes to the Pest Control Products Act
On April 28, 2026, the Government of Canada tabled Bill C-30 an Act to implement certain provisions of the spring economic update. This Bill proposed to amend the Pest Control Products Act to adjust the Pesticide Regulatory Directorate’s mandate by formally incorporating consideration of national economic security, regional economic security and national food security into PRD’s mandate. The Bill also proposes two new powers that create a mechanism for exceptional, time-limited overrides of regulatory decisions to address urgent or strategic national priorities.

Advancing Drone-Based Pesticide Agricultural Application
Canadian farmers are calling for faster approval of drone-based pesticide spraying to remain competitive with jurisdictions like the U.S., where this technology is already permitted and widely adopted. PRD has reviewed data generated by AAFC to support their regulatory evaluation of drone-based pesticide agricultural application. PRD provided provinces and territories with an advance copy of their post-consultation policy on drone-based pesticide spraying. This policy essentially permits the use of aerial drones for pesticides that can be sprayed by aircrafts. PRD has already allowed drone usage in emergency situations. A final policy decision allowing more widespread drone uses for pesticides is expected by end of June;however, some provinces may have additional regulations that will require updates before drone use can be fully permitted.

Advocacy Against the Loss of Strychnine
Strychnine was widely used in Alberta and Saskatchewan to control Richardson’s Ground Squirrel (RGS), but PRD cancelled its use in 2020 due to risks of poisoning non-target mammals. Both provinces have raised concerns about the ban’s impact on pest management and submitted a revised, joint, emergency-use request to Health Canada, which included additional risk mitigation measures. On March 30, 2026, Health Canada authorized an Emergency Registration to Alberta and Saskatchewan to register strychnine until November 2027. Provinces could also explore accessing cost-shared funding for interprovincial efforts to promote alternative RGS strategies under the Sustainable CAP’s Regional Collaborative Partnership Program.

Canada’s National Food Security Strategy
On June 11, 2026, Canada’s National Food Security Strategy was announced and introduced new initiatives aimed at addressing the structural causes of food insecurity affecting Canadians. A key objective is to reduce food prices for Canadian families by tackling the underlying drivers of food inflation. In this context, efficient pest management and access to effective crop protection tools are considered essential, as they directly influence agricultural productivity, input costs, and ultimately food prices.

The strategy outlines the various ways in which government aims to increase farmers’ access to safe and varied pest control products by:
• eliminating the registration backlog at the PRD and speed up approvals of pest control products at the Pesticide Regulatory Directorate (PRD):
• reducing regulatory burdens and complexities that cause unnecessary delays and hinder the predictable availability of pesticide products through recurring Red Tape Reviews and the removal of mandatory 15-year pesticide re-evaluation requirements;
• working with other trusted jurisdictions to share science and evidence to support expedited registration of critical farm inputs;
• modifying PRD’s mandate to add an economic and food security angle;
• introducing powers to revisit certain regulatory decisions related to pesticides to protect Canada's economic or food security.

FPT Working Group
In July 2023, federal, provincial, and territorial (FPT) ministers discussed the agriculture and agri-food sector’s key issues during their annual conference. The importance of lambda-cyhalothrin was raised during the conference and ministers agreed to create an FPT working group to explore the challenges of pesticide management. A summary of the working group’s discussions and recommendations to improve regulatory outcomes were summarized in a public report. The working group’s report was presented in February 2024 to FPT ministers, and its recommendations obtained unanimous support. The group was also asked to develop an action plan to implement its recommendations. PT officials from the have been actively engaged in the work that the FPT working group has initiated, and there has been good FPT collaboration on this important file.
Although FPT ministers endorsed the Pesticide Management Action Plan in 2024, several provinces and territories called for additional measures, including the creation of a new ministerial Advisory Committee. This PT-led initiative, co-chaired by Saskatchewan and Ontario, met for the first time on May 25, 2026. A second update of the FPT action plan on pesticides will be shared with FPT Ministers of Agriculture at the July 2026 annual conference.

The European Union’s approach to pesticide uses
The European Commission’s Vision for the Future of Agriculture and Food (February 2025) promotes “reciprocity” in agri-food trade by proposing that imports meet EU pesticide and animal welfare production standards. While framed as ensuring fair competition and protecting EU farmers, this approach represents a significant departure from internationally science-based trade rules.
These policy intentions have been operationalized through the Food and Feed Omnibus Simplification Package, proposed in December 2025. The proposal introduces the EU’s first explicit reciprocity mechanism for pesticide maximum residue limits (MRLs), by proposing to eliminate MRLs and import tolerances for pesticides not approved in the EU, effectively repurposing MRLs from a food safety tool into one for extending EU production standards extraterritorially. This could have significant impacts for trade, particularly for grains, oilseeds, and pulses, Canada’s top agriculture exports to the EU. The EU’s approach departs from World Trade Organization (WTO) consistent, science- and risk-based methodologies for setting MRLs. It is widely viewed by like-minded partners as a protectionist measure.

Canada continues to actively engage with the European Union through relevant Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) committees, WTO committees, and bilateral discussions at the Ministerial, Commissioner, and senior official levels. Canada is advocating for the EU to reconsider its proposed reciprocity-based approach to pesticide MRLs and to ensure that measures remain science and risk-based and non-discriminatory, in alignment with WTO obligations.

• We understand that having access to varied and effective crop protection tools is one of the keys to a farmers’ success and to advancing Canada’s food security strategy.
• While we are working across departments to ensure regulations reflect agricultural realities and foster innovation, protection of health and the environment remains paramount and will not be compromised.
• We fully recognize the importance of crop protection products and are actively working with provinces and territories to help farmers overcome the challenges associated with pest control.
• Farmers work diligently to ensure good stewardship practices around the use of pesticides.