Indian Pesticides Agency to Waive Some Costly Safety Tests

India’s pesticide regulators agreed to waive certain costly animal tests and accept some non-animal methods in safety studies.

The new guidance, likely to be issued by the end of August, will reduce the number of animals used in toxicological evaluations in India and potentially save millions of rupees for companies seeking to register new formulations of pesticides for which new toxicology data has to be generated to meet Indian requirements.

The guidelines will mostly benefit companies seeking to register alternative formulations of existing pesticides rather than those registering new chemicals for the first time. Pesticides being ...