Support for CMC 7 Expansion for Microbial Biostimulants
Support for CMC 7 Expansion for Microbial Biostimulants
A workshop was held on Friday, January 24th, 2025, by the Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT) who are entrusted by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship, and SMEs (DG GROW) to carry out a technical study to evaluate microorganisms used as biostimulants in terms of their potential for significant trade on the internal market, potential risks to human safety and the environment, and agronomic efficiency. This technical study aims to facilitate the incorporation of additional microorganisms into Component Material Category (CMC) 7, as stipulated in Annex II of Regulation (EU) 2019/1009 (Fertilising Products Regulation).
This was the second online stakeholders workshop organised as part of AIT’s contract work for the European Commission. Several members from the AIT presented the three modules that make up the methodology proposed for the assessment of CMC 7 candidate microbial strains using specific assessment tools. The technical study modules are Module 1 – CMC Market potential; Module 2 – CMC 7 risks to human health and the environment and Module 3 – CMC 7 agronomic efficiency. Module 1 is focused on collecting information in terms of market relevance via a 12 step questionnaire (online survey), while Modules 2 and 3 leverage data collection forms to assess available and relevant literature, experimental evidence and genomic analysis of the respective candidate strains.
After each module overview, stakeholders took part in moderated discussions to address questions and concerns they had. Some topics that caused several questions were centred around evaluation at a strain vs species level, invasive species definitions, market potential and separating efficacy from efficiency. Workshops like this one will help the AIT study team to identify potential needs for clarification of the requirements by applicants, to make the assessment criteria easy to apply by both applicants and evaluators, and finally to ensure a fair and transparent CMC 7 assessment process. The next workshop is scheduled to take place in March 2025.
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