COPR data protection

Data submitted for the first time in support of biocidal product approvals under the Control of Pesticides Regulations (COPR) is granted a period of data protection. This is intended to protect the interest of companies that have submitted proprietary information. It also allows them to recover some of the cost of generating data from other companies who wish to use the data in support of their own applications.

Under these protections, the data may only be used by HSE for the benefit of another applicant if one of the following conditions is met:

that applicant provides a letter of access from the original data submitter
the data protection has expired

The data protection applies to active substance or product-related data which are submitted for the first time and for the first approval of a product under COPR. It lasts for a fixed period of 10 years and starts from the date the first product approval is granted.

Where new active substance data are subsequently required, either to support the continuing approval of a product or for the purposes of a review of a COPR approval, those data may be protected for a period of 5 years.

If the same data are later submitted in support of an application under the GB Biocidal Products Regulation (GB BPR) in Great Britain or EU Biocidal Products Regulation (EU BPR) in Northern Ireland:

the existing COPR data protection period remains valid
extensions to the existing expiry dates or new data protection periods will not be granted

Once the data protection has expired, HSE may grant permission for subsequent applicants to refer to the data. However, data which are no longer protected are still the property of the original data owner and HSE will not give copies of such data to other applicants.

Data protection cannot be granted for:

data that are published/available in the public domain
data that have already been submitted in support of an active substance or product approval