With respect to the technology gap, and I think that's of very much interest to you, we're really taking two approaches. We do have a bit of a retrospective approach. We do recognize that there's some significant catch-up to do in terms of the kinds of registration approvals available in the United States versus Canada, particularly in the area of minor uses, particularly for the horticultural uses. So this pilot program that we've been talking about is heavily focused on trying to encourage submission to Canada of those active ingredients that hold a huge minor use potential, a huge promise for additional minor uses for Canadian growers.
We've been trying to identify, with help from the Canadian Horticultural Council and others, what exactly the priority chemicals are that we need to encourage to come to Canada. We're going to, in a way that we've tried to do in the past, largely base our evaluations using the U.S. EPA data packages. All the data and information that was submitted to the EPA will be provided to Canada. We will base our decisions largely on that information when we can.
I and others have often described the situation of Canada with the United States in a way that says we're substantially harmonized when it comes to the agricultural chemical requirements for registration. I think I've occasionally got into trouble for using that adverb “substantially”, because then people want to know what I mean by “substantially”.
Over the last number of years we got to a point right now where the kind of information that we need to make our decisions in Canada is so close to the U.S. information package that this will be a real test of our ability to use those U.S. EPA packages, and what specifically, in addition, do we actually need for Canada? We've narrowed that down to a point where it really is hopefully just at that point where, as Karen says, there are certain areas, like endangered species, where we may have to have specific information, but we're really hopeful that we can move ahead with the U.S. EPA data package. So we're really putting a lot of our eggs in the basket of this pilot program over the next year.
Prospectively, looking ahead, we're also very active in promoting and encouraging joint reviews, not just Canada and the United States, but globally. As Karen mentioned, we have global reviews, in-house, coming into PMRA this summer that are going to be...Canada, the U.S., and Australia. We have one in-house now, and we have another one coming in June. In September we'll be working on a joint review with Canada, the United States, and Austria on behalf of the European Union. In January of next year, the first truly global review will come in, which is Canada, U.S., Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Hungary, Italy. It's very global, so we're really encouraging that as a way of moving ahead and trying to encourage those minor uses to come into Canada at the same time as those other countries.