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AgVetLink June 2005

MRL Update

The annual MRL process as of 2 June has gazetted its first amendment of the year.  This round contained five MRLs to be set and three MRL exemptions. These MRLs and MRL exemptions will come into legal effect on 30 June 2005.

We are currently consulting on a second amendment to the NZ (MRL) Food Standards. This amendment, as mentioned in the April AgVetLink, is considerably larger than any put forward before and contains several changes to the standard including:

• a reformatting of the MRL table, including adding a CAS number and residue definition column, and altering terms to be consistent;

• a proposal to include limit of quantification MRLs for 40 plant compound active ingredients; and

• removal of three obsolete plant compounds and their MRLs from the standard.

As well as the above changes, this amendment proposes to set three MRLs and one MRL exemption.  Because this is such a large amendment to the NZ (MRL) Food Standards we actively invite anyone to view this consultation and return comments or queries on it to NZFSA. The consultation document can be viewed at the following link: http://www.nzfsa.govt.nz/policy-law/consultation/consultation-web.htm

Upon the gazettal of this amendment round (expected July-August) we will consolidate the entire standard to bring it up to date with the changes made in the amendment.

We are planning a third amendment to the NZ (MRL) Food Standards which again seeks to remove several obsolete MRLs, set Limit of Quantification MRLs or other below the default MRLs for approximately 30 more reassessed plant compounds, and set several MRL exemptions. The content for this round is not as yet confirmed, however, so further changes may occur. We intend to begin public consultation for this amendment when consultation on amendment 2 is completed.