Order — ECLI:EU:C:2003:577
Date: 2003-10-21
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Agriculture and Fisheries;Plant health legislation
Concepts: Application for interim measures: suspension of operation of the contested measure and other interim measures;Appeals
Procedure: Action for annulment;Application for interim measures - successful;Appeal - successful
Origin: Spain

Summary of the Order 
1. Appeals — Grounds — Error of law on the part of the judge hearing the appli­
cation — Effect on the validity of the interlocutory order 
(Statute of the Court of justice, Art. 57(2); Council Directive 91/414, Annex I) 
2. Applications for interim measures — Suspension of operation of a measure — 
Interim measures — Conditions for granting — Prima facie case — Serious and 
irreparable harm — Balancing of all the interests in issue — Commission's general 
interest in having Community legislation applied before the decision on the merits — 
Assessment 
(Arts 242 EC and 243 EC; Commiission Regulation No 3600/92) 
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SUMMARY — CASE C-365/03 P(R) 
1. Where, in circumstances in which a 
producer is the only undertaking to 
support the inclusion of an active 
substance in Annex I to Directive 
91/414 concerning the placing of plant 
protection products on the market, but 
another producer concerned, the only 
producer to have submitted an essen­
tially complete dossier, has withdrawn 
from the procedure, although the rap­
porteur Member State agreed to con­
tinue the examination procedure based 
on that dossier, the Judge hearing the 
application, in his findings as to the 
serious nature of the pleas put forward, 
has not ruled out the possibility that 
that undertaking is not required to 
provide a complete dossier within a 
certain time-limit, he cannot, at the 
same time, without committing an 
error of law, consider that the fact that 
it has not produced a complete dossier 
is a factor against it, in the context of 
his assessment of the interests at stake. 
Since the other factors examined by the 
Judge hearing the application for 
interim measures in the course of that 
assessment do not alone justify a con­
clusion that the result of the assessment 
is unfavourable to that undertaking 
and since, moreover, the urgency of 
the application and the serious nature 
of the pleas of fact and of law put 
forward were recognised in the order 
under appeal, that error of law is 
sufficient reason to set aside that order. 
(see paras 12-13) 
2. In the context of an application for 
suspension of the operation of a 
decision concerning the non-inclusion 
of an active substance in Annex I to 
Directive 91/414 concerning the plac­
ing of plant protection products on the 
market and the withdrawal of auth­
orisations for plant protection products 
containing that active substance, the 
harm to the Commission's general 
interest in having Community legis­
lation, in particular Regulation 
No 3600/92, laying down the detailed 
rules for the implementation of the first 
stage of the programme of work 
referred to in Article 8(2) of Directive 
91/414, applied before the decision on 
the merits must be put into perspective 
in the assessment of the interests at 
stake, since other substances referred to 
by Article 8(2) continue to be auth­
orised for a limited period, without 
being subject to the scientific assess­
ment laid down by the directive. 
(see paras 17, 23) 
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