These changes have been a long time coming. We've been hearing from industry stakeholders for quite a long time about the concern of having different products with similar risks, similar applications, similar uses and similar claims regulated under different frameworks. We've been hearing from industry for a long time about the desire to have this fixed so that depending on the product they have, they could just go to one single place to get their application. That's one of the key drivers that's been in play for a long time.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted that even further. Some of our earlier pathways would take longer for products to enter the market. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for more flexibility in our different pathways for these products. That was another key driver.
The third one is that the regulations that are in place now, before the biocides regulations come, in have standards that are not quite risk-based. They don't quite fit the need for these products. There was, really, a need to create a new set of regulations that would be able to address all of these concerns.
Certainly during the pandemic, we saw a very high influx of products. Usually we get about 200 to 300 applications for these products per year. During the pandemic, 900 applications came in per year. It really highlighted the need for more efficiency as well.