Crops and Horticulture
Information on areas of crop growing and horticulture including combinable crops, potatoes, fruits and vegetables, seeds and nursery stock.
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Seeds
Mushrooms
From within this area of the portal you can find information on the latest developments within the mushroom farming sector.
Cut flowers and foliage
Nursery stock, ornamentals and amenity horticulture
Fruit and vegetables
Potatoes
Combinable crops
Seasonal work on farms and horticulture units: guidance for employers
Are you an employer who is actively recruiting?
Farmers and growers - pests and diseases to look out for
Intensive agriculture and horticulture is especially vulnerable to outbreaks of new pests and diseases. Farmers and growers monitoring their crops on a day to day basis play a critical role in detecting new pests and diseases at an early stage. This provides the best opportunity to prevent their establishment in the wider environment and causing serious economic damage.
About the Plant Health Risk Register
The NI Plant Health Risk Register is a tool for government, industry and stakeholders to prioritise action against pests and pathogens which threaten our crops, trees, gardens and countryside.
Ash dieback/Chalara dieback of ash
Chalara causes leaf loss, crown dieback and bark lesions in affected trees. Once a tree is infected the disease is usually fatal.
Potato spindle tuber viroid (PSTVd)
Potato Spindle Tuber Viroid (PSTVd) is an EU listed quarantine pathogen of potatoes which causes stunting of the plant and malformation and cracking of tubers. The main host is potatoes but the disease also affects tomatoes and solanaceous ornamentals.
Ring rot of potatoes (C. michiganensis)
Ring rot of potatoes is caused by the bacterium Clavibacter michiganensis subsp. sepedonicus.
Root knot nematode (M. fallax)
Meloidogyne fallax is root knot nematode which invades and attacks the root systems of host plants. It causes yield losses and may also affect the quality of produce (e.g. skin blemishes on potato tubers, forking and blemishes on carrots).
New Requirements for plant protection product (PPP) record-keeping by professional users
Regulation (EU) 2023/564 introduces more detailed requirements on how professional users must record the use of plant protection products (PPPs) under Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009. This applies to anyone using PPPs such as herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides, in agriculture, horticulture, forestry, or amenity settings.
The Official Controls (Plant Protection Products) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2020 – List of Operators Registration
If your business places pesticides, also known as plant protection products (PPPs), their active ingredients or adjuvants on the market, or uses professional PPPs as part of its work activities, you must be registered with DAERA.
Specified certificates recognised under the Plant Protection Products (Sustainable Use) Regulations 2012, relating to the use of products authorised for professional use
A full list of the specified certificates which meet the legal requirements under the Sustainable Use Directive