Additional studies may need to be conducted to help identify viable alternatives to replace an HHP. One can think of local efficacy studies of one of the alternatives, economic (cost-benefit) calculations, assessments of adoption by farmers or other pesticide users, etc.

This step is optional and will not always be necessary.

Procedures

• In many cases, there may be good reasons to conduct further studies. For instance, a thorough understanding of the efficacy of an alternative is needed to ensure that farmers or other pesticide users have confidence in the proposed measure(s). However, this can delay regulatory decisions about the use of the HHP, with possible environmental, human health or economic consequences.
  
  It is therefore important to weigh the need for additional studies against the risks posed by continued use of the HHP. If risks are high, “intermediate alternatives” may be chosen while the agreed recommended alternative pest management measure is being fine-tuned. One can think of temporarily allowing a lower-risk but not ideal synthetic pesticide to replace an HHP, while an appropriate IPM approach is being readied for implementation.
  
  
• If combinations of measures are proposed, such as in IPM or IVM, these may need to be locally tested so they can be tailored to specific conditions in the country.
  
  
• Additional studies do not necessarily have to be local experiments or trials (which tend to be time-consuming). They can also refer to a review of scientific literature on a certain topic, information gathering about alternatives that are operational in other countries, or a desk-top risk or economic assessment.
  
  
• Additional studies can be conducted nationally but can also be set up in a regional framework with neighbouring countries, to speed up the process and obtain more robust results.

The results of any additional studies will generally feed back into Step 4, and assist in identifying viable alternative options.