New Pest Measures legislation for Autumn 2023

In November 2023, Great Britain’s Plant Health Services will start to introduce new pest measures.  

From 24 November 2023, certain pest and trade-facilitating legislative changes will come into force. The proposed changes include:

• Deregulating certain Quarantine Pests (please see details of the stakeholder engagement that is currently open)
  
  
• Regulating certain viroid’s of tomato and/or pepper (please find details of the closed stakeholder engagement)
  
  
• Incorporating the existing derogations of ash wood from Canada and the USA, and certain conifer species of bonsai trees from Japan, into legislation.

From 2 May 2024, the remaining proposed changes will come into force. This includes:

• Listing certain pests, on the basis of a preliminary assessment, as provisional quarantine pests.

• Expanding import requirements to cover plants for planting of potato (please see details of the stakeholder engagement that is currently open)

• Integrating the current trade easement for ToBRFV testing requirements for seeds into legislation
  
  
• Extending a specific import requirement to include EU Member states, Liechtenstein, and Switzerland, treating all countries equally. 

Please see the Q&A document for more information.

The WTO have been notified of the proposals. If you have any comments or questions, email planthealth@defra.gov.uk.