The ‘Plants and Plant Products’ Competence Division is both a portal and an exchange platform for all mat-ters to do with plant production and its downstream stages. It is also responsible for the real-world research, extension and enforcement activities associated therewith.
The Division aims to refine technologies, methodologies and infrastructures for plant production and plant products, and to strengthen knowledge exchange with practitioners, the industry and the government.
Its main tasks include safeguarding the quality of seed and planting stock, testing field-crop varieties under Swiss growing conditions, and refining cultivation techniques for the same. Practitioners’ research concerns are noted and addressed. In addition, the Division aims to find ways and means of increasing the im-portance of plant foods – especially fruit and vegetables – in the human diet.
Other core activities consist in coordinating plant-protection product testing, producing expert reports within the context of PPP authorisation, and coordinating the diagnosis, monitoring and risk assessment of new/ particularly dangerous organisms.
