Who we are
We are the Pesticide Survey Unit (PSU) based at SASA, part of the Agricultural and Rural Economy (ARE) Directorate of the Scottish Government. Our contact details are:
PSU
SASA
Roddinglaw Road
Edinburgh
EH12 9FJ
E-mail: psu@sasa.gov.scot
General information
This privacy notice tells you what to expect us to do with your personal information when we contact you, including by phone, email and post.
When we process your personal information, we promise to:
- make sure you know why we need it
- only ask for what we need, and not collect too much or irrelevant information
- make sure it is accurate and up to date
- let you know if we share it with other organisations, unless we have a legal obligation to pass it on without telling you
- protect it and make sure nobody has access to it who shouldn't
- make sure we don't keep it longer than is necessary
Why we need your personal information
The Scottish Government has a legal obligation under the Food and Environment Protection Act 1985 to carry out post-approval surveillance of pesticide use (statutory surveys). Your information is also needed to allow the Scottish Government to carry out its official functions under the Scotland Act 1998 (non-statutory surveys).
How we get information
Most of the personal information we process is provided to us directly by you for one of the following reasons:
- you completed the annual June Agricultural Census of Scottish agricultural holdings run by the Rural Environmental Science & Analytical Services Division (RESAS) of the Scottish Government
- you completed the Single Application Form (SAF)
Providing contact details for another person (for example a family member, agronomist, seed merchant or pest control contractor) is entirely voluntary. Where you choose to give us someone else’s details, you should ensure you have their permission to do so as we will contact them directly to gather the relevant survey information.
What personal information we collect
RESAS provide name, address (including e-mail address), postcode, telephone number, region & size group of holding, parish & holding number, holding description & area of each type of crop grown.
Lawful basis for processing
This data is collected and processed for the purposes outlined above.
We process your personal information because:
- you have given us clear consent for us to process your personal data for a specific purpose
- processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation that applies to us
- processing is necessary for us to perform a task in the public interest or for our official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law
What we do with your information
We will only use your personal information you provide to fulfil our official duties and to carry out tasks which are in the public interest. We will use your personal details to contact you to collect information on the use of pesticides, rodenticides, the uptake of integrated pest management and, on an ad hoc basis, data relating to other topical subjects where there is a need to support Scottish Government understanding and policy making.
Pesticide usage information is presented in published national statistics reports each year and as custom requests to individual data users. The pesticide usage information presented in published reports and custom requests is estimated national use and contains no confidential or personal information.
No personal information is published for any survey and all survey data published is anonymized. To prevent disclosure of information about individual holdings, data relating to fewer than five holdings or where any two holdings contribute over 85% to the total are not disclosed.
Who we share your information with
Anonymised crop and pesticide use data is transferred to Fera Science Ltd once a year for inclusion in the UK Pesticide Usage survey report. Only anonymised holding data with a unique reference number is transferred, no personal data is transferred.
Where you chose to claim BASIS and/or NRoSO points, you understand that by providing your name, postcode and BASIS/NRoSO registration number, your personal details will be transferred to BASIS/NRoSO to award your points.
We use Mailchimp to notify you by email when we publish our reports if you opted into receiving these. Mailchimp’s privacy notice outlines how they collect, use, share and process personal information.
Data retention period
Survey data (which contains no personal data) is retained indefinitely.
Storage of all data, including personal data, is retained for a minimum of six years, and a maximum of eight years for personal data. We ensure that we do not keep data longer than is necessary and that all personal data is held and disposed of in a safe and secure manner.
Changes to this privacy notice
We keep our privacy notice under regular review to make sure it is up to date and accurate. If this privacy notice changes in any way, we will update this page. Regularly reviewing this page ensures that you are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances we share it with other parties.
Data protection policy document
See Information assurance and data protection: data protection policy.
Data Protection Officer's contact details
You can contact our Data Protection Officer at DataProtectionOfficer@gov.scot or via our postal address:
Data Protection Officer
Scottish Government
St. Andrew's House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG
Your data protection rights
Data protection law gives you certain rights that you may exercise in respect of your own personal information. Details are available on the Information Commissioner's Office site and on the Scottish Government's site.
Your right to complain
If you have concerns about our compliance with data protection laws, please contact our Data Protection Officer in the first instance at DataProtectionOfficer@gov.scot. They will look into the concerns you have raised and provide the response.
If you are not satisfied with the DPO’s response you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). The ICO are the supervisory authority responsible for data protection in the UK. You can contact the Information Commissioner at:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Tel: 0303 123 1113
More information is available at make a complaint on the Information Commissioner's site.
SASA