CEMAC member countries spend more than 22 billion CFAF every year
on pesticides to enhance agricultural production. Unfortunately, these chemicals may also constitute a permanent threat to all life-forms as well as to the environment, especially when their management is not well regulated. The present situation in the Central African zone is characterized by a
diversity of phytosanitary legislations and regulation agencies, most of which are far from complete and adequate. There is also an insufficiency of expertise and infrastructure for conducting chemical analyses in this zone.
The absence of a common regulatory system in the sub-region poses the problem of consumer safety, of the competitiveness of the region’s agricultural products on the international market and of compliance with international measures and conventions. In order to minimize the hazards related to the use of pesticides, and maximize the advantages drawn from them, the regulation of these pesticides clearly appears to be a decisive factor. The diversity of analysis and control procedures in this sub-region where borders are highly permeable has led the States to work towards the conformity and harmonization of such procedures.
The CPAC initiative is therefore the manifestation of the political will of member states to unite their efforts for the streamlining of the agricultural sector in the CEMAC zone. This political will was manifested all through the process of setting up of CPAC, and involved the active participation of all the member states, culminating in the putting in place of the administrative office of CPAC, through the signature of the common document for the regulation of pesticides in the CEMAC zone by the Ministers in charge of Agriculture, and its adoption by Ministers of the Union of Central African States (UEAC).
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