On Monday, March 20, 2017, the U.S. House of Representatives adopted by voice vote H.R. 1029, the “Pesticide Registration Enhancement Act” under a suspension of the rules.  Introduced in the 115^th Congress by Representative Rodney Davis (R-IL), the measure was reported favorably out of the House Committee on Agriculture on February 16, 2017.  Among its provisions, the bill would authorize the collection of $31 million in maintenance fees for each of fiscal years 2017 through 2023 (current maintenance fees are set at $27.8 million/year).  In addition, the measure provides for an increase in the maintenance fee cap for large and small businesses and it continues the current prohibition on the imposition of tolerance fees as well as any other registration fee not specifically authorized by PRIA through fiscal year 2023.

In its other provisions, the measure provides for a set-aside of between 1/9 and 1/8 of maintenance fees collected for the review of inert ingredient submissions and me-too pesticide applications.  The bill also adjusts registration service fees and decision review times for product submissions subject to PRIA and provides for two 5% increases in registration service fees during the effective period of the statute.  Finally, H.R. 1029 reauthorizes existing provisions of PRIA for seven years, as opposed to the five-year extensions in previous iterations of the statute.