Abstract Data from the Plant Protection Product (PPP) authorization process in Europe are stored by national institutions and comprise comprehensive datasets on permitted application schemes over time. These datasets provide enormous potential to inform policy and governance. The aim of our study was to inventorize the data from the national PPP registers across Europe, and to appraise the quality of PPP-register data in terms of availability, accessibility, resolution in content, and harmonization. To our knowledge, this is the first attempt to appraise systematically the quality of such PPP-related data. Our analyses show that data quality was better in terms of resolution and availability than in terms of accessibility and harmonization. Accessibility was quite variable, and in general, harmonization was lacking. Four PPP registers representing different European pedoclimatic conditions and regulatory zones were selected following a decision-tree approach. The database from Czechia was used as a prototype showcasing what valuable tools can be derived from the PPP-register data that are of high quality. Then, the Austrian, Portuguese, and Estonian databases were processed in a similar way. The data processing revealed limitations associated with a lack of harmonization across databases and resources. The selected data were extracted and converted into Generalized Application Patterns of PPPs in each country, i.e., databases containing all possible authorized uses (substance-specific and crop-specific application rates, time, and number of applications per year). Using existing large data of high quality, new tools can be derived to assist PPP-related assessments and decision-making. This contributes to achieving the pesticide sustainable use goals embedded in the European Farm to Fork strategy.
Chaideftou et al. (2026) studied this question.