Lula vetoes project that makes the use of pesticides more flexible – 12/28/2023 – Environment

President Lula (PT) sanctioned some points and vetoed others regarding the project to make the use of pesticides more flexible in the country.

Dubbed by environmentalists as the Poison Bill, the text approved in Congress centralized the registration of new products in the Ministry of Agriculture, depriving Anvisa (National Health Surveillance Agency) and Ibama (Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources) ).

By vetoing these points, Lula intends to reestablish the tripartite regulatory model for pesticide registration and control.

According to government members, the veto prevents environmental and health assessments from being conducted exclusively by the Ministry of Agriculture, without technical knowledge for risk analysis.

The president, however, sanctioned articles of law that impose shorter deadlines for analyzing pesticide records. Now, the process for new products must be completed within 24 months, while pesticides with formulas identical to others already approved will have a deadline of 60 days.

Congress will analyze, upon returning from recess, whether to maintain or overturn the vetoes. In 2023, the government tried to block the ruralist group’s advances in the House, but was unsuccessful. Now, this could happen again.

This happened, for example, in relation to the overturning of the veto on the project that established a time frame for the demarcation of indigenous lands.

Lula’s vetoes in the case of pesticides divided the government itself. The Ministry of Agriculture asked for the project to be fully sanctioned. The argument against the veto is that the tripartite model will cause a mismatch, with different deadlines for each body, and that Agriculture technicians would already take into account the analyzes from Anvisa and Ibama.

However, the veto of the superpower was defended by the ministries of Health, Environment, Labor and even Finance.

Lula also vetoed the provision that authorized the Ministry of Agriculture and Ibama to grant requests for products based on active ingredients undergoing reanalysis even before the procedure was completed.

The PT member also removed the section that exempted companies from placing a warning on packaging that the container cannot be reused.

In total, there were 14 points vetoed by Lula. In most of them, the justification presented by the government was that they were unconstitutional measures or that they could pose a risk to the environment and human health.

The PL had been in progress in Congress since 1999, when it was initially presented by the former Minister of Agriculture and former governor of Mato Grosso Blairo Maggi, at the time a senator of the Republic.

The progress of the project was agreed upon during the government transition. At the time, when Congress turned off the lights in 2022, the Agriculture Committee (CRA) even put the proposal on the agenda.