Which MRLs apply in Northern Ireland
EU MRLs apply to food or feed produced in or imported into and marketed within Northern Ireland. Goods moved from GB under the Northern Ireland Retail Movement Scheme (NIRMS) are excluded. The Windsor Framework establishes a route to move pre-packed retail goods from Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales) into Northern Ireland. GB-sourced goods can be legally marketed in NI under GB MRLs, even if the EU MRL is different, when traded via NIRMS.
The NIRMS change does not apply to retail goods produced within NI: EU rules continue to apply to them. HSE advises growers to draw the NIRMS rule to the attention of distributors and retailers, so that EU MRL breaches and any associated enforcement against goods marketed in Northern Ireland are avoided.
Before searching, write down which route you are assessing: NI-grown produce, an import into NI, a GB movement under NIRMS or an onward EU sale. The location of the haulage depot does not tell you the route, so record the origin, the intended market and the movement scheme, and keep the NIRMS eligibility decision and movement documents with the consignment's residue assessment.
For the Great Britain rules, see the GB MRL guide.
What an MRL covers
A maximum residue level is the maximum concentration of a pesticide residue in or on food or feed of plant and animal origin that is legally tolerated when a plant protection product is applied correctly. MRLs apply to most food commodities, but are not currently applied to fish or to produce grown exclusively for animal feed.
MRLs are regulated in Great Britain under Assimilated Regulation No 396/2005. All existing EU MRLs adopted as GB MRLs remain valid until they are amended, and GB MRLs and EU MRLs may become different over time.
MRLs are set at the lowest level consistent with correct application, using the OECD MRL calculator. In a limited number of cases temporary MRLs are set from monitoring data, for example to cover environmental contamination or cross contamination.
EU pesticides database: find MRL data by food or pesticide residue
The database holds three kinds of information in separate sections: active substances used in plant protection products, MRLs in food products, and emergency authorisations of plant protection products in Member States. Emergency authorisations granted under Article 53 of Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009 from June 2016 onwards are present in the database. For a consignment check, use the MRL section; look up the crop authorisation of the product separately when you review the spray programme.
Choose the search by what you hold. If you know the crop, start with Food products; if you start from a laboratory analyte, start with Pesticide residues. Either way, note the other term too, so that the result you save is always a food-and-residue pair, with its full context rather than an isolated number.
Match the commodity as well. Use the food name the database returns in your checking note and keep the farm's usual crop name beside it, so the packhouse, adviser and customer can see the mapping. Say whether the enquiry is about fresh produce, a raw ingredient or a processed food. For a mixed consignment, keep the components apart and tie each result to its batch reference.
Then compare the residue definition in the result with the wording in the laboratory report: reports do not always use the same short active-substance name. Keep the full definition and notes, copy units exactly, and file the original analytical report with the commodity-residue assessment.
Is the database the legal text?
No. The database is made available solely for information and has no legal value. The official information on active substances and pesticide residues is published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The database also links to the latest updates related to MRLs.
So for a dispatch decision, find the regulation in the Official Journal and note its application date. An EFSA opinion, an evaluation or a draft amendment is not the enacted rule, so name the type of each document in your file. For an earlier date use the historical search, and for a future supply use the enacted provision that will apply then.
If an old spreadsheet disagrees with a current result, compare the commodity selection, the residue definition, the document dates and the amendment history before you conclude that a limit changed. Keep both results and say which one applies to the consignment.
Keep your spray records in one place. Free to start.
Processed food
MRLs are not set specifically for processed commodities. The MRLs for the raw agricultural commodities apply, with processing factors applied to determine the compliance of processed goods. If you assess a dried or concentrated product, say so in your enquiry to the laboratory and keep the processing-factor calculation with its basis.
Pesticide residue monitoring in GB and NI
Since the UK's exit from the EU, the legal frameworks and reporting arrangements for the monitoring programme differ between GB and NI. In NI the programme is required under Regulation (EC) 396/2005 and Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/1355. HSE assesses all results against the MRLs for either GB or NI, depending on where the sample was collected.
Codex, EU and GB limits
Codex maximum residue levels (CXLs) are internationally agreed food standards. The FAO/WHO Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR) evaluates pesticide residues annually and each year recommends MRLs to the Codex Committee on Pesticide Residues. HSE is responsible for assessing and recommending which CXLs are adopted in Great Britain, and adopted CXLs are added to the GB MRL Statutory Register. For an EU or NI assessment, look up the matching EU provision for the commodity and residue instead of relying on the Codex figure.
For produce sold onwards, ask the customer which destination requirement actually applies. A buyer's own specification is a commercial request: record it as written, put questions about its meaning to the buyer's named contact, and do not present it as a statutory limit.
Import tolerances and responsibility through the chain
An import tolerance is an MRL set on imported food or feed to meet the needs of international trade. A business involved in production, storage, processing, transport, distribution or sale of food or feed must comply with MRLs, and this includes businesses importing food into the UK.
To import produce into Northern Ireland with residues exceeding the EU MRL, you must apply for an import tolerance before importing treated produce. This excludes produce originating in GB and moved to NI under NIRMS. An application to raise an EU MRL is submitted to the competent authority of an EU Member State.
The EU MRL rules may also apply to residues in animal products where treated crops are fed to livestock. For such consignments, select the animal commodity and its residue definition.
Agree in advance who holds the analytical report and who prepares the destination-market assessment before dispatch.
Tie the residue result to the crop history. Pull the treatment record and harvest information for the actual field and lot from the harvest and spray records and the DAERA template, and keep them with the assessment. If a treatment entry is missing, ask the grower or contractor to explain the gap and file the answer as received; do not invent a date to make the file look complete.
When a replacement laboratory report gives a different result, ask what changed: the sample, the extraction, the analytes covered, the quantification limit or the unit. When a replacement legal measure changes the assessment, note its application date and the commodity-residue pair, so the packhouse can tell a laboratory amendment from a market-rule change.
Risk assessments support MRLs that protect all consumers, including vulnerable groups such as children. HSE evaluates data on residues in treated commodities and the toxicology of the pesticide. MRLs are normally set below, and in most cases well below, the levels that would pose consumer safety concerns.
Download MRL data
EU MRLs are looked up in the EU pesticides database and GB limits in the HSE GB MRL Statutory Register; Codex limits are evidence only, until adopted into the GB register. The database offers data downloads, plus machine-to-machine APIs that retrieve the latest pesticide information programmatically. MRL data can be downloaded for any selected residue and food. For repeated checks, keep the downloaded file, the retrieval date and the residue identities you selected, and compare the food entries with the original laboratory report before you update the dispatch assessment.
Next step
Open the EU Pesticides Database. Related guides: residue testing, harvest intervals and spray records, DAERA spray-record template.