The government’s long-awaited Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP) launched on 1st December. While those concerned with protecting human health and the natural environment will be bitterly disappointed, pesticide companies – and their associates in the industrial farming lobby – must be rubbing their hands with glee. Their lobbying is clearly working! Industry messaging that has been absent from the two previous environmental plans (both published under previous governments) is back with a vengeance, accompanied by a shocking lack of ambition.
What is the EIP?
The EIP follows on from the “25 Year Environment Plan” (25YEP) which was launched with much fanfare by PM Theresa May back in 2018. While the 25YEP had deficiencies, it was generally lauded as a sign that the government might finally be acting to reverse the trends that have made the UK one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world.
In 2023, the UK government – this time under PM Rishi Sunak – launched its first EIP. The document was fairly underwhelming but did include some positive measures and was still broadly based on the vision set out five years earlier in the 25YEP. In contrast, the first EIP from the current government – published this week – reveals worrying backsliding embodied by language taken straight from the pesticide industry playbook.
Here are some examples:
Overarching goal on pesticides
2018: “We will make sure that chemicals are safely used and managed, and that the levels of harmful chemicals entering the environment (including through agriculture) are significantly reduced.”
2023: “Managing exposure to chemicals and pesticides – Tackling sources of pollution in our everyday environments”
2025: “We will minimise environmental risks from chemicals and pesticides. Minimising the risks of pesticides whilst maintaining food security.”
The weakest wording by far is the 2025 goal, which replaces talk of ‘reducing chemicals’ with ‘minimising risk’. There is nothing the pesticide industry hates more than language urging a reduction in the amount of pesticides used. Less pesticides mean less profit. That is why the industry is so keen to push for a focus on risk. In contrast to volume or harms, ‘risk’ is very tricky to measure. This ambiguity allows pesticide companies to argue that it is possible to reduce risk while using the same amount of chemicals. While the word ‘risk’ was not included in 2018 or 2023, it is the focus of the goal in 2025 and all mentions of ‘harms’ and ‘tackling sources of pollution’ are now gone. Unlike ‘reducing’ which is very clear in its meaning, ‘minimising’ is also a woolly, non-definable term and, therefore, one of the industry’s favourites.
A tractor spraying crops with insecticide in Devon. Credit Sebastien Coell / Shutterstock.com
The pesticide industry also loves to spread the long-disproven myth that without agrochemicals we will all starve and they weaponise the term ‘food security’ to push back against any calls for pesticide reduction. While food security was not mentioned in the pesticide sections of the 25YEP and 2023 EIP, the 2025 Plan not only includes it in the overarching goal but presents it as in direct conflict with minimising the risk of pesticides, as if the two are oppositional. In reality, the massive declines in pollinator populations (caused in large part by the overuse of pesticides and habitat destruction) pose a much greater threat to UK food security. However, it seems the government has once again bowed to industry pressure to present the issue in this way. It is either complicit or merely a ‘willing idiot’ in driving this false and dangerous narrative.
Preamble
It is in the preamble to the chemicals section that the government really gives up on any attempt to hide their admiration for the chemicals industry. While all government documents tend to include an obligatory sentence or two on how much we need chemicals and pesticides, the latest EIP takes this to a whole new level.
2023: “Chemicals and pesticides help us achieve many important goals, from securing cleaner water and plentiful food, to thriving industry, and more effective medicines – and using them wisely is key to keeping people and wildlife safe.”
2025: “Chemicals and pesticides are a significant part of our daily lives – they are in our medicines, they clean our drinking water, protect the crops that feed us, and make the products we use last longer. Chemicals, including pesticides, is a major export sector in the UK, with annual exports worth £29 billion (Office for National Statistics (ONS) 2025). The sector contributes £12 billion of gross value to the UK economy annually, employs 100,000 people directly, and indirectly supports a further 162,000 jobs (ONS 2025).”
Why did the UK government include this text? There is certainly no similar reminder in other sections of the 2025 EIP regarding quite how much other polluting industries contribute to the economy. The only other mentions of jobs or employment in the EIP are ‘green jobs’ or employment in nature-based businesses. In other words, mentions of the kind of employment we need to fight the nature and climate crises.
Actions and commitments
And what about the actual promises in the 2025 EIP? On pesticides, there are only two significant commitments included in the Plan and neither are new. In one, the government promises to implement the hugely unambitious target they announced back in March for a 10% reduction in pesticide use in the arable sector by 2030. The second commitment is to introduce legislation which prevents emergency approvals being granted for three pesticides which are particularly bee-toxic (all neonicotinoids). Again, this is a commitment they have made publicly many times and for which they have already received a great deal of kudos. While welcome, it is important to remember that all it boils down to is a promise not to allow emergency permissions for using three specific active substances which are already banned in the UK. Far too little to prevent ongoing nature declines, let alone reverse them.
There are plenty of other ways in which the EIP 2025 fails on pesticides. It repeatedly talks about using pesticides ‘safely’ and ‘responsibly’, industry code for ‘business as usual’. However, beyond these specifics, there is also just a lack of understanding from this government on the importance of nature and how it underpins all our lives. This is starkly highlighted by another comparison related to the EIP:
2018 25YEP: Launched in a speech by the Prime Minister
2023 EIP: Foreword by the Prime Minister
2025: Foreword by Defra Secretary of State. Meanwhile, the PM was busy giving a speech about “fundamentally misguided environmental regulations”.
In her forward in the 2025 EIP, the Defra Secretary of State says “Together, we will create a future where nature flourishes, communities thrive, and our children inherit not the environmental challenges we faced, but the solutions we delivered.” On pesticides, the EIP falls far short of meeting these lofty goals. At best, it feels like treading water and, at worst, a major step backwards. Another opportunity missed. When will this government realise that nature has little time to spare?
