Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans her Department has to support the import of (a) fertilisers and (b) other crop treatments in the event that the UK leaves the EU without a deal.

In preparations for no deal, the Government has taken steps to secure additional freight capacity, guaranteeing the supply of critical goods.

In the event of no deal and with regard to crop treatments, the same pesticide products will continue to be authorised for use in the UK immediately after withdrawal. After withdrawal, businesses who trade with the EU will broadly be subject to customs controls in the same way as businesses who are trading with the rest of the world. HMRC has announced that a number of temporary easements are in place to help businesses make this transition, including measures to simplify tariffs and customs declarations.

Existing EU regulations for marketing fertilisers will be converted into UK law in the event of a no deal departure. Products sold as EC fertilisers can be sold in the UK with the same packaging for two years as long as they continue to comply with the EU regulations. This system has been developed to ensure continuity of supply of fertiliser imports from the EU to the UK farming industry. The information has been published in a guidance document available on gov.uk:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/manufacturing-and-marketing-fertilisers-if-there-is-no-brexit-deal

The UK is a net importer of fertilisers and is consequently a valuable market for exports from other countries. We are expecting the supply of fertilisers to remain consistent, and to continue to use existing trade routes which do not include the Port of Dover.

We will continue to look at all likely EU withdrawal scenarios with a view to limiting consequential impacts on the supply chain and trade.