MRLs
Pesticide MRLs are limits set by regulatory authorities to ensure that pesticide use does not cause unnecessary harm to the environment or human health. When agricultural products are imported, border officials test some shipments to ensure that products being imported do not exceed their domestic MRL. When economies have different MRLs, or when economies don’t have an MRL at all, it can pose a barrier to trade that increases food insecurity, makes food more expensive, and hurts the economy of both the importing and exporting country.
The APEC FSCF and FSCF PTIN has done extensive work with regard to MRL harmonization and enforcement over the last several years. Australia had led work aiming to facilitate trade of food products in the APEC region through harmonization of import MRLs for pesticides among APEC member economies specifically via the development of two practical tools. The first is a database that will capture relevant information about government administration of regulatory import MRLs for pesticides in APEC member economies and the other is a template application that will describe the necessary information that will enable an import MRL request to be raised to any APEC member economy. Please click below to view the associated documents.
MRL Application
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MRL Compendium
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MRL Guidelines
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MRL Brochure
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UPCOMING EVENTS
- May 15-16, 2023, APEC Food Safety Cooperation Forum (FSCF) PTIN Workshop on Risk Communication Related to Maximum Residue Limits (MRLs), Detroit, Michigan
- May 17, 2023 FSCF PTIN Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) and Laboratory Capacity Building of Environmental Testing for Foodborne Pathogens Workshop, Detroit, Michigan
- May 18, 2023 FSCF Public Private Innovation Dialogue, Detroit, Michigan
- May 19 2023, FSCF Conference, Detroit, Michigan
RECENT EVENTS
- FSCF PTIN Pesticide MRL Harmonization: A Trade Facilitative Approach to MRL Compliance, December 16-17, 2020, Virtual
- FSCF PTIN Success Stories from FSCF Export Certificate Reductions, Expected February 2021, Virtual
- FSCF PTIN Sanitary Phytosanitary (SPS) Document Digitalization, What Industry and Government Need: Three Seminars to Collect Perspectives on E-Certification in the Past and Future, Expected Spring 2021, Virtual
- FSCF PTIN Whole Genome Sequencing: Laboratory Capacity Building for Environmental Food Safety Testing Workstream
- Virtual Awareness Webinars in early 2021,
- How WGS has revolutionized food safety: from environmental sampling to foodborne disease prevention, response, and mitigation, May 2021, Virtual
- Sub-Regional In-Lab Trainings, July 2021-October 2022,
- Teach-Forward by Training Participants, September 2021-December 2022
- Workshop for Food Safety Experts and Policymakers, presentations by ToTs, May 2023
- Food Safety Cooperation Forum, 2021, Virtual
- FSCF Partnership Training Institute Network Steering Group, 2021, Virtual
Virtual FSCF Framework on Risk Communication, Workshop 2
December 2-3, 2020
Virtual
Virtual FSCF Framework on Risk Communication, Workshop 1
July 24, 2020
Virtual
