Administrative Trials Permits

You can apply for an Administrative Trials Permit (ATP) if you do not need more than 5 hectares per year per active substance to carry out your research and development work, and can comply with the restrictions.

Restrictions specified on an Administrative Trials Permit

The exact wording of these restrictions on your permit may vary. Further restrictions will be specified if your application is for a microbial pest control agent.

The maximum area to be treated

The total area on which you can carry out the trials work is 5 hectares per year for each active substance specified on the ATP. However, you must carry out the work on the minimum area required to obtain the required data.

For the protection of consumers

You should ensure that the total area on which the trials work is carried out is less than 2% of the treated area to be planted with any following crop at the site in which the trials work is undertaken, unless the trial site is not to be used to grow edible crops in the year of treatment or the year following treatment.
The land on which you have carried out your trials work under your ATP can be subsequently used for growing crops that can be placed into the supply chain for human or animal consumption. However, treated perennial or semi-perennial crops cannot be placed into the supply chain until five years after harvest.
If you have treated crop material that needs to be destroyed, it must be disposed of in an appropriate manner. Burning, burying or disposal at a licensed facility are typical destruction methods but are not always appropriate (contact us for advice if required).. You may desiccate the treated crop, but only before the development of the harvestable portion of the crop.
You will not be able to place any treated annual crops into the supply chain for human or animal consumption. In addition you will not be able to dispose of any treated perennial crops (like apples) or semi-perennial crops (such as strawberries) into the supply chain for human or animal consumption for five years between treatment and harvest. This restriction will not apply if:

you can show that the potential exposure from consuming the annual crop, or subsequent crop from treated perennial/semi-perennial plants, is at or below 1 µg/kg bw/day from a residues evaluation performed by HSE, for either a previous or ongoing application, of the same formulation OR a similar formulation type, which is to be applied at or within the same GAP as proposed for the trials work. This can include standard extrapolation between crop types and formulation types as described in the extrapolations guidance or
you receive a subsequent authorisation for the use of the plant protection product on the crop, or on a crop from which an extrapolation is allowed, at the same or greater rates and timings specified on your Trials Permit. The crop extrapolations as detailed in the extrapolations guidance would be acceptable provided the Good Agricultural Practice for both crops is comparable in terms of application type (such as foliar spray) and application conditions (like outdoor)

Treating perennial or semi-perennial crops that are due to be destroyed may help you minimise any problems you have complying with this restriction for such crops.

Please note that some restrictions above do not apply if you are treating non-edible crops or land not intended to bear vegetation.

For the protection of the environment

The following restrictions apply unless the impact of any of these restrictions is to be the subject of your trials work or is unavoidable like outdoor mesocosm studies. If this is the case, you must indicate in your application whether any of the restrictions will cause you difficulties in performing your experimental work:

for the protection of bees, you must ensure that spray applications are not made immediately preceding or during the flowering stage of the crops or weeds. You must also ensure that spray applications are not made where bees are actively foraging
for the protection of game, wild birds and animals, you must take precautions to protect them from harm such as only making applications when mammals and birds are unlikely to forage in the area being treated and recovering or burying spillages of chemical or treated seed
for the protection of non-target plants, insects or other arthropods, applications must not be made within 6 metres of a field boundary
you must ensure that run-off from the treatment of land not intended to bear vegetation must be prevented from entering surface waters and disposed of safely
for the protection of aquatic life:

you must not contaminate surface waters or ditches with chemical or used container
you must ensure that direct spray from ground crop sprayers does not fall within 5 metres of the top of the bank of any static or flowing waterbody or within 1 metre from the top of any ditch which is dry at the time of application. You must ensure that spray from hand-held sprayers does not fall within 1 metre of the top of the bank of any static or flowing waterbody. In all cases you must ensure that spray is directed away from water. Your experimental product will not be eligible for a reduction in the buffer zone under the LERAP (Local Environment Risk Assessment for Pesticides) scheme
you must ensure that direct spray from broadcast air assisted sprayers does not fall within 18 metres of surface waters or ditches
the buffer zones detailed above must be measured in accordance with the guidance set out in our booklets 'Local Environmental Risk Assessments for Pesticides'– ' Horizontal Boom Sprayers' (PB5621) and 'Broadcast Air-Assited Sprayers' (PB6533), both of which, along with further information, are available from this website: Local Environment Risk Assessment for Pesticides (LERAPs)

For the protection of operators

If you are using an authorised product in an unauthorised situation and you can meet the following criteria, then the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) required for the use of your Trials Permit will be the same as recommended on the authorised product label if:

the proposed dose for the experimental work is the same or within that on the authorised label for the product
the in-use concentration (ie the dilution) of the product for the experimental work is the same or within that on the authorised label for the product
the proposed method of application would be considered acceptable for uses on the authorised label for the product

In all other situations full PPE must be used unless a COSHH assessment indicates otherwise. For further information see the Code of Practice for Using Plant Protection Products.

How to apply for an Administrative Trials Permit

To apply for an ATP then you will need to submit:

a suitable covering letter
a completed CRD 7 application form. Please ensure that the application form is dated. There are no restrictions on the number of active substances that can be included on an individual application form. However, separate application forms will be required for microbial ('biological') pest control agents that are to be used as plant protection products. A separate fee will be required for each application form (see the guidance document on application fees)

If any of the restrictions detailed above will provide difficulties in carrying out the trials work, this should be indicated in the covering letter so that we can consider this aspect when we process your application. In this situation you will need a separate application form for each active substance.

Administrative Trials Permit for use on Genetically-Modified Herbicide-Tolerant crops

If you wish to apply for an ATP for the use of a pesticide on a genetically-modified herbicide-tolerant crop then you will need to submit the following:

a completed CRD7 application form. Please ensure that the application form is dated. Separate application forms are required for each active substance
full details of the active substance(s) and the product(s), the proposed rates and timings and the total area required to carry out the experimental work
a summary of the authorisation status of the product(s) to be used in the trials work
a brief summary of the crop and the associated mechanism of herbicide tolerance
information on the sites where the trials work will be performed
full copies of the consents issued by the Advisory Committee on the Releases to the Environment (including a clear reference to the date of issue and the appropriate reference number) and the associated correspondence which permits the planting of the crops for the areas, manner and purpose proposed. If these are not yet issued, details of the current status of the consent application must be provided. If the release consents have already been submitted to us, please provide a suitable reference for the application under which they were submitted
details of the purpose of the trials work and a full justification for the area required to carry out the trial