COMMISSION IMPLEMENTING DECISION (EU) 2022/1947

of 13 October 2022

amending Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 by updating the multiannual programme of controls for the period 2021-2025 and establishing the programme of controls for 2023

THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION,

Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

Having regard to Regulation (EU) 2017/625 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2017 on official controls and other official activities performed to ensure the application of food and feed law, rules on animal health and welfare, plant health and plant protection products, amending Regulations (EC) No 999/2001, (EC) No 396/2005, (EC) No 1069/2009, (EC) No 1107/2009, (EU) No 1151/2012, (EU) No 652/2014, (EU) 2016/429 and (EU) 2016/2031 of the European Parliament and of the Council, Council Regulations (EC) No 1/2005 and (EC) No 1099/2009 and Council Directives 98/58/EC, 1999/74/EC, 2007/43/EC, 2008/119/EC and 2008/120/EC, and repealing Regulations (EC) No 854/2004 and (EC) No 882/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council, Council Directives 89/608/EEC, 89/662/EEC, 90/425/EEC, 91/496/EEC, 96/23/EC, 96/93/EC and 97/78/EC and Council Decision 92/438/EEC (Official Controls Regulation) (1), and in particular Article 118(1), point (b), and Article 118(2) thereof,

Whereas:

(1) The responsibility to enforce Union agri-food chain legislation lies with Member States, whose competent authorities monitor and verify, through the organisation of official controls, that relevant Union requirements are effectively complied with and enforced. Parallel to this monitoring and verification, Article 116 of Regulation (EU) 2017/625 requires Commission experts to perform controls, including audits, in Member States to verify the application of Union legislation. These Commission controls should be performed in the areas of food and feed safety, animal health and welfare, plant health, plant protection products, and the functioning of national control systems and competent authorities, which operate them, taking into account synergies with control arrangements under the common agricultural policy.

(2) Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 (2) established a multiannual programme of controls to be carried out by Commission experts in the Member States to verify the application of Union agri-food chain legislation for the period 2021-2025, aligned with the Commission’s term of office and reflecting its priorities. During the implementation of that multiannual programme of controls, it has emerged that it was not sufficiently flexible to allow the Commission experts to investigate and collect information in relation to emergency situations, emerging problems, and new developments in the areas governed by the rules referred to in Article 1(2) of the Regulation (EU) 2017/625 and those provided for in that Regulation. A new priority area to cover such eventualities should be added in Chapter 10 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550, as provided for in Article 116(1), point (c)(iii), of Regulation (EU) 2017/625.

(3) Setting a strict timeline for controls in the priority areas for each of the five years of the multiannual programme of controls is not consistent with the level of flexibility required to fulfil the objectives of verifying the functioning of national control systems, including investigating and collecting information on enforcement practices or problems, emergencies and new developments in Member States, and conducting Commission controls on a risk-basis. While keeping the 2021-2025 multiannual programme of controls, Chapter 11 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550, setting the annual break-down of controls for the years 2021-2025, should therefore be replaced by a programme of controls for the following year and should be updated annually.

(4) The introductory text in the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 committing Commission experts to perform controls including on-the-spot verifications and desk-based analyses in each of the priority areas in all Member States should be amended to better align it with the requirements of Article 116 of Regulation (EU) 2017/625.

(5) The area of genetically modified organisms should be introduced separately in Chapters 10 and 11 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 as a new priority area to align the text better with the existing sub-division under Article 1(2) of Regulation (EU) 2017/625. Further references to this priority area should be removed from Chapters 1, 2 and 7 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550.

(6) The results of the previous Commission controls on Salmonella national control programmes and the analysis of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which can be consulted in the 2019 (3) and 2020 (4) zoonoses reports, indicate that most Member States met the Union targets for all poultry categories. Member States report annually to the Commission the results of their Salmonella controls for the Gallus gallus, laying hens, broilers and breeding and fattening turkey flocks. In this context and taking into account the Commission controls on the implementation of the obligations imposed by Commission Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 (5) regarding official samplings related to process hygiene criteria, there is no need for specific audits on Salmonella national control programmes in 2023.

(7) Annual assessments of Member States’ national residue monitoring plans form an integral part of Commission controls carried out under the priority area of residues in live animals and food of animal origin. A separate reference to those assessments is therefore not necessary and should be removed from the multiannual programme of controls.

(8) Two of the priority areas, active epizootic diseases and enzootic diseases, under animal health, should be renamed as Category A and Category B and C diseases, respectively, under Regulation (EU) 2016/429 of the European Parliament and of the Council (6). This will align the terminology used in the multiannual programme of controls with the one introduced by that Regulation.

(9) The Commission has recently covered by its controls the existing national veterinary programmes on non-foodborne zoonoses which it has co-funded. Therefore, there should be no controls on non-foodborne zoonoses in 2023.

(10) The objective for non-foodborne zoonoses in Chapter 3 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 limited the coverage only to those zoonoses, for which national veterinary programmes co-funded by the Commission were in place. In order to allow Commission experts to perform controls on non-foodborne zoonoses including those without such programmes, such as COVID-19 in mink, the objective should be amended in the multiannual programme of controls.

(11) The Commission has prioritised controls on diseases under the priority area of epizootic diseases, of Category A under Regulation (EU) 2016/429, such as African swine fever and highly pathogenic avian influenza in 2021 and 2022. Due to this prioritisation, there were no controls on enzootic diseases, of Category B and C under Regulation (EU) 2016/429, in those two years. The Commission should therefore perform controls under this priority area in 2023.

(12) The Commission committed itself to review animal welfare legislation in the framework of its Communication ‘A Farm to Fork Strategy for a fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food system’ (7). In this context, work under the priority areas on animal welfare on farm and during slaughter should continue in 2023. Welfare of cattle kept for meat production and of fish on farms, during their transport and at killing, should therefore be added to the multiannual programme of controls.

(13) Regulation (EU) 2016/2031 of the European Parliament and of the Council (8) requires Member States to establish risk-based multiannual survey programmes for quarantine pests and introduces annual surveys of priority pests. Commission controls on the implementation of these survey programmes should therefore be added in Chapter 5 of the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550.

(14) Due to COVID-19 restrictions, some of the Commission’s controls in third countries had to be postponed, which allowed the Commission to commence a series of controls under the priority area of plant protection products in 2021, one year earlier than planned in the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550. The Commission controls under this priority area should continue in 2023.

(15) Due to the ongoing discussion on a draft Regulation on the sustainable use of pesticides, which would replace Directive 2009/128/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (9), there were no controls on sustainable use of pesticides in 2022 and there should also be no controls in 2023. Controls on this priority area are to be resumed once a new legal base is adopted.

(16) Due to the postponement of the date of application of the new legislative framework for organic production, Regulation (EU) 2018/848 of the European Parliament and of the Council (10), from 1 January 2021 to 1 January 2022, and in order to give Member States the necessary time to implement new measures before controlling their implementation, there were no controls in Member States in 2022 under the priority area on organics. The Commission should therefore perform controls under this priority area in 2023.

(17) The start of the series of controls under the priority area of monitoring of antimicrobial resistance in zoonotic and commensal bacteria originally planned to start in 2022 in the Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550, should start instead in 2023 to maximise the effectiveness of these controls, given the timeline when the data necessary for this series would be available for analysis.

(18) For the Commission to support the swift implementation by Member States’ competent authorities of the new requirements for risk-based controls aimed at the detection of fraudulent and deceptive practices introduced by Article 9(2) of Regulation (EU) 2017/625, it was important to collect information and examples of good practices in order to provide guidance to Member States. This objective could best be achieved through fact-finding studies rather than audits as this approach would allow for a wider scope, open a dialogue with the Member States’ competent authorities and hold meetings with other law enforcement authorities and fraud investigators. The objective for the priority area on fraud should therefore be amended to reflect this change.

(19) The multiannual programme of controls set out in Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 identified export controls as a priority area warranting a degree of Commission oversight. Food business operators in the Union, exporting animals and goods to third countries, have primary responsibility for meeting third countries’ import requirements. Where consignments of animals and goods require official certification of the operators’ compliance with those requirements, certification is provided by the responsible competent authorities in the Member States. Recognising the roles and responsibilities of food business operators and Member State competent authorities in this regard, Commission controls on this aspect are no longer deemed to be a priority for inclusion in the revised multiannual programme of controls.

(20) The Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 should therefore be amended accordingly,

HAS ADOPTED THIS DECISION:

Article 1 The Annex to Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 is replaced by the text set out in the Annex to this Decision.

Article 2 This Decision shall enter into force on the twentieth day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.

Done at Brussels, 13 October 2022. For the Commission The President Ursula VON DER LEYEN

(1) OJ L 95, 7.4.2017, p. 1.

(2) Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1550 of 23 October 2020 establishing the multiannual programme of controls for the period 2021-2025 to be carried out by Commission experts in the Member States to verify the application of Union agri-food chain legislation (OJ L 354, 26.10.2020, p. 9).

(3) EFSA Journal 2021;19(2):6406.

(4) EFSA Journal 2021;19(12):6971.

(5) Commission Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 of 15 November 2005 on microbiological criteria for foodstuffs (OJ L 338, 22.12.2005, p. 1).

(6) Regulation (EU) 2016/429 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 March 2016 on transmissible animal diseases and amending and repealing certain acts in the area of animal health (‘Animal Health Law’) (OJ L 84, 31.3.2016, p. 1).

(7) Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, ‘A Farm to Fork Strategy for a fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food system’, COM(2020) 381 final of 20 May 2020.

(8) Regulation (EU) 2016/2031 of the European Parliament of the Council of 26 October 2016 on protective measures against pests of plants, amending Regulations (EU) No 228/2013, (EU) No 652/2014 and (EU) No 1143/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council and repealing Council Directives 69/464/EEC, 74/647/EEC, 93/85/EEC, 98/57/EC, 2000/29/EC, 2006/91/EC and 2007/33/EC (OJ L 317, 23.11.2016, p. 4).

(9) Directive 2009/128/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 October 2009 establishing a framework for Community action to achieve the sustainable use of pesticides (OJ L 309, 24.11.2009, p. 71).

(10) Regulation (EU) 2018/848 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 on organic production and labelling of organic products and repealing Council Regulation (EC) No 834/2007 (OJ L 150, 14.6.2018, p. 1).