Under a new joint collaboration, Fruit and Vegetable Growers of Canada (FVGC), Ontario Fruit and Vegetable Growers’ Association (OFVGA), and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Pest Management Centre (AAFC-PMC) held the 22^ndAnnual National Pest Management Priority Setting Workshop in Gatineau, Québec from March 19 – 20, 2024. New for this year was a two-day format as opposed to the usual three day, which saw entomology, pathology, and weed science priorities elevated over the course of both workshop days. As a result, the format of the workshops was also changed, such that the goal for Day 1 was to nominate ‘B’ priorities in all disciplines, and for Day 2, to nominate ‘A’ priorities from the ‘B’ list for all disciplines, as well as the selection of five regional priorities.

The meetings brought together a wide range of participants from across Canada and other international partners, including the United States and Costa Rica. Participants included, but were not limited to university and federal researchers, crop extension specialists, private consultants, provincial specialists, provincial minor use coordinators (PMUCs), registrant representatives, Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) and AAFC-PMC staff, growers, grower organization representatives, and delegates from the US IR-4 project and the Global Minor Use Foundation.

The meetings were held to review the top priorities identified by each of the provinces’ horticultural and ornamental crop industries to establish the top national priorities for the minor and specialty crops sectors. Priorities selected in the final ‘A’ round will guide AAFC-PMC’s field research program for the 2025 season, and eventually support future minor use label expansion submissions to PMRA. The goal of this year’s workshop was to nominate 41 ‘A’ priorities for capacity analysis consideration – ten mainstream and two organic projects per discipline, plus five regional selections.

The first day of the workshop was focused on ‘B’ nominations, and began with participant introductions, welcoming remarks from AAFC-PMC’s executive director Marcos Alvarez and submission manager Jennifer Ballantine, as well as from Chris Duyvelshoff on behalf of FVGC and OFVGA. The workshop commenced following a short break, with PMRA’s senior director general, Frédéric Bissonnette and stakeholder engagement section head, Tina Singal giving remarks and a short presentation on the importance of pesticide use information for risk assessments. By day’s end, ‘B’ nominations were completed within the targeted range of approximately 100 nominations per discipline and completed slightly ahead of schedule.

Day two focused on ‘A’ nominations and began with similar introductions, then featured an update on the Global Minor Use Summit IV held in Madrid, Spain in February 2024 by Verónica Picado representing the Global Minor Use Foundation. An update on AAFC-PMC and PMRA’s drone spraying initiatives was provided by AAFC-PMC’s acting entomology section head, Martin Trudeau, and the ‘A’ nominations  began shortly after. As the workshop progressed, 30 mainstream, two organic, and five regional priorities were selected as ‘A’ priorities just after 3:30 p.m., concluding the 2024 Priority Setting Workshop.

Continuing from previous years, the capacity analysis process first introduced by PMC in the 2022 Priority Setting Workshop occurred over the course of several weeks following the end of this year’s meetings. This process was implemented to ensure projects can be  completed in an efficient, and timely process in the coming years according to several factors including: staffing and site resources, funding, and the number of ongoing projects already underway for a particular crop, crop availability in residue crop zones across Canada, whether a selection would support a crop group registration, selected solution product availability, selected pest pressure, registrant support conditions, new, invasive, or emerging pest status, whether or not the priority was selected as an ‘A’ priority but not taken on in previous years, and ‘category A’ new use project statuses.

Following this capacity analysis process, 23 projects were selected as final 2025 projects, broken into 17 mainstream projects, two organic projects, and four regional projects. A further seven food-use projects are expected to be selected as joint projects between the U.S. IR-4 project and AAFC-PMC following the IR-4 Food Use Workshop in September 2024. Projects which were not initially selected through capacity analysis as a final project this spring may still become selected as a joint project this fall should selections align between both organizations, or if the seven joint project targets are unable to be selected.

Finally, the new collaboration formed between AAFC-PMC and industry to continue hosting the workshop in person this year has been largely viewed as a massive success. Much to the delight of industry, a letter of agreement has now been put in place between the collaborating organizations which commits the next two years of workshops to continue in person. Project capacity for the 2025 workshop is expected to be confirmed in late fall or winter 2024–25.

The following table summarizes the projects agreed upon as ‘A’ priorities for the 2024 workshop. Lines which are bolded indicate projects which will move forward as AAFC-PMC projects in 2025. Lines which are italicized were not selected as part of the capacity analysis process.

Ideally, the projects selected this year will have their data requirements completed and submitted to the PMRA with a target of submission by 2029. Subsequent registration decisions for these submissions are expected from PMRA one to two years following submission.

Table 1: Selected ‘A’ priorities for the 2024 workshop. Lines that are bolded will move forward as PMC projects in 2025 while those that are italicized were chosen as an ‘A’ priority but will not move forward at this time.