Plant health

The main objective of a plant health strategy is to prevent the introduction or spread of organisms harmful to plants or plant products. Without appropriate surveillance measures, so-called quarantine organisms can easily be introduced by importations, e.g. with living plants or the wood packaging material, or by transportations, e.g. in intra-EU trade. Phytosanitary measures have to ensure that only healthy material is imported or exported. The key point is to keep the material free from quality-diminishing harmful organisms (phytosanitary quality). Plant health regimes make a major contribution to a sustainable crop production, to the protection of plants in their habitats, and, in more general terms, to the protection of nature and consumers.
For instance, organisms harmful to plants can be insects, microorganisms, and other plants. Once immigrated and threatening the native biological diversity, they are also called invasive alien species.

At the Julius Kühn Institute, plant health issues are the task of the Institute for National and International Plant Health, which is responsible for risk analyses and plant health measures. The institute closely cooperates with the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection, with the plant health services of the Federal States, with the European Union and with other international bodies. In Germany, the institute is primarily responsible for information exchange, coordination on the technical level and the elaboration of scientifically based sanitary and phytosanitary regulations (risk assessment, diagnosis, etc.).