An emergency application for permission to apply a key fungicide to potatoes has been deemed commercially unviable.
GB Potatoes explored the feasibility of progressing an Emergency Authorisation (EA) application to allow a continued use of mancozeb on potato crops following the withdrawal of the product at the end of the 2025 season.
Scott Walker, chief executive of sector body GB Potatoes, said the use of mancozeb for the 2026 season would have delivered a significant resistance management benefit at a time of increasing pressure from blight resistance.
“With support from Horticulture Crop Protection, GB potatoes convened a small group of technical experts to develop an emergency application and to engage with the Health and Safety Executive on what would be required for approval.
Positive engagement with the authorisation holder, UPL, enabled productive pre-application discussions to take place, said Mr Walker.
But he added: “Through these discussions it became clear that, in order to meet HSE risk assessment requirements, any authorisation would be limited to a single application of mancozeb per crop. Such a restriction would not be commercially viable given the additional stewardship requirements that would need to be put in place.”
“The agronomists involved advised that a single application would deliver only very limited resistance management benefit. As a result, and with great disappointment, the decision was taken not to proceed with an emergency authorisation application for mancozeb,” said Mr Scott. “All possible avenues were explored.”
Mr Scott said he was grateful for constructive liaison with the HSE and the time by HCP and by Eric Anderson (Scottish Agronomy), Ruairidh Bain (SRUC), Graham Tomalin (VCS Potatoes) and David Cooke (JHI).