Plant Protection Office functions are: To advise the General Management to formulate, prepare and develop policies, plans, programs, projects, measures, and procedures aimed at protecting plant health, to protect the rights of plant variety producers, to verify the quality in production and marketing, in addition to carrying out controls for the safe use of seeds and agricultural inputs, to promote safety production of plant products and by-products.
This Office develops plans, programs, and projects established to achieve the Institute's objectives, seeking to improve the phytosanitary status of plant production through disease control strategies.
It establishes, following the international standards, diagnostics protocols that describe procedures and methods for the official diagnosis of pests of economic, social, and quarantine importance. Pests and diseases notification are mandatory.
More information: https://www.ica.gov.co/areas/agricola
Work plans for the export of fresh vegetables
The export permit for a fresh plant product depends on the phytosanitary measures established to protect plant health in each country. The health authority of the importing country establishes the measures for each product, determined through pest risk analysis.
The National Phytosanitary Protection Organizations (NPPO) (The NPPO entity in Colombia is the ICA) of the interested countries negotiate to establish these measures. Producers and exporters must go directly to the NPPO entity to export fresh agricultural products.
More information: https://www.ica.gov.co/importacion-y-exportacion/planes-trabajo-exportacion-vegetales
Control and Eradication of Phytosanitary Risks
Find here the following services:
- Pest prevention and control.
- Registration of farms and agricultural producers.
- Regulations for the transport of plant material.
Agricultural Epidemiology:
The Office of Phytosanitary Epidemiology develops plans, programs, projects, and procedures on epidemiology and phytosanitary surveillance. It implements activities to improve the execution of national and international technical cooperation agreements to perform specific control of pests, carry out registration of exporting farms, certification of biosafety conditions in farms producing plant material, among other topics.
More information:
https://www.ica.gov.co/areas/agricola/servicios/epidemiologia-agricola.aspx
Seed Certification
The office of Seed Certification controls the production of certified and selected seeds. We also supervise the seed import processes and the research units of seeds produced by conventional and unconventional breeding methods, such as Genetically Modified Organisms, altered by introducing genetic material or manipulating its genome by genetic engineering techniques for seeding.
We protect the genetic, physical, and physiological quality of the seeds produced or imported into the country.
More information: https://www.ica.gov.co/getdoc/08d0b08f-f704-4e0f-bfb2-14f861fb5215/certificacion-de-semillas.aspx
Plant protection and agricultural inputs
The plant protection office develops policies, plans, programs, projects, measures, and procedures to protect plant production and report on: Fertilizers and agricultural bio-inputs, chemical pesticides, agricultural safety, organic farming, physiological regulators, technical control for the marketing and distribution of agricultural inputs, list of banned companies, and imported inputs.
More information: https://www.ica.gov.co/areas/agricola