These Regulations further amend the Plant Protection Products Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1995 (S.R. 1995 No. 371), as amended by S.R. 1997 No. 471, S.R. 1997 No. 507 and S.R. 2002 No. 289 (“the principal Regulations”) which implement in Northern Ireland Council Directive 91/414/EEC (O.J. No. L230, 19.8.91, p. 1 to be read with the Corrigenda published in O.J. No. L170, 25.6.92, p. 40) concerning the placing of plant protection products on the market (“the Directive”), as amended.

Regulation 2(2) and (5) simplify the definition provision for the Directive by creating a new Schedule AA1 which lists the instruments that amend the definition of the Directive in Regulation 2 of these Regulations following the listing of active substances in Annex I to the Directive.

Regulation 2(3) amends regulation 7 (provisional approvals) by adding a new regulation 7(5A) to indicate the date by which time the provisional approvals containing active substances that have been included in Annex I to the Directive must be either amended to a standard approval or withdrawn. Regulation 2(5) creates a new Schedule A1 that lists the dates mentioned in the implementing EC instruments for extensions of provisional approvals.

These Regulations implement for the first time certain Directives which have added the following active substances to Annex I: Commission Directive 2002/48/EC (which adds the active substances iprovalicarb, prosulfuron and sulfosulfuron to the Annex on 1st July 2002), Commission Directive 2002/64/EC (which adds cinidon-ethyl, cyhalofop-butyl, famoxadone, florasulam, metalaxyl-M and picolinafen to the Annex on 1st October 2002), Commission Directive 2002/81/EC (which adds flumioxazine to the Annex on 1st January 2003) and amends the definition further on 1st March 2003 when these Regulations implement Commission Directive 2002/37/EC (to add ethofumesate to the Annex on that date).

Council Directive 1999/45/EC (O.J. No. L200, 30.7.1999, p. 1) concerning the approximation of the laws, regulations and administrative provisions of Member States relating to classification, packaging and labelling of dangerous preparations has been implemented by the Chemicals (Hazard Information and Packaging for Supply) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002 (S.R. 2002 No. 301). As a result of revocation of the earlier Chemicals (Hazard Information and Packaging for Supply) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1995 (S.R. 1995 No. 60) regulation 27(3) is deleted (regulation 2(4)).

Certain labelling provisions in paragraph 1 of Schedule 2 have been amended by regulation 2(7) and (8) to reflect the repeal of Directive 78/631/EEC (O.J. No. L206, 29.7.1978, p. 13) by Council Directive 1999/45/EC. This repeal is also now reflected with a reference to the 1999 Directive in paragraph 2(b) of Schedule 1 (regulation 2(6)).

The Regulations revoke the Plant Protection Products (Amendment) (No. 3) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002 (S.R. 2002 No. 289).