Despite the well-documented risks pesticides pose to biodiversity and human health, the European Union has consistently failed to make meaningful progress in reducing pesticide use, with pesticide sales barely decreasing over the last decade. Back in 2020, the European Commission announced its flagship Green Deal, promising to reform our food and agricultural system, including the objective to halve the use and risk of pesticides by 2030.
However, when a regulation was introduced to turn this goal into binding targets (known as the Sustainable Use Regulation), it became the target of relentless behind-the-scenes lobbying by the pesticide and broader agroindustry. Creating fears of food shortages and perpetuating false narratives around food security, this coordinated lobbying led to the regulation’s downfall, leaving European citizens and nature exposed to toxic chemicals.
This briefing outlines how the agroindustry’s lobbying strategies dismantled this crucial pesticide legislation, the dire consequences that follow – and how to move forward.
