(Beyond Pesticides, October 2, 2025) This year marks an advancement of various state-level neonicotinoid laws and regulations, including in Maine, Vermont, and Connecticut—emphasizing surging public support for pesticide reforms.

The Maine legislature passed, and Governor Janet Mills (D-ME) signed into law on July 22, 2025, LD 1323, which advances the state’s neonicotinoid laws to prohibit the use, distribution, and sale of neonicotinoid insecticide products—going a step further than most states in terms of prohibiting neonic-coated seeds for soybeans and cereal crops (with exemptions). Meanwhile, after years of grassroots advocacy, the Connecticut legislature advanced, and Governor Ned Lamont (D-CT) signed into law SB 9, which will partially restrict the nonagricultural use of neonicotinoids on turf grass, starting in 2027. There was a more comprehensive effort that failed to move forward (HB 6916), which would have gone further by restricting or prohibiting the use of neonicotinoids on trees, shrubs, and treated seeds (see here for Beyond Pesticides comments).

Maine and Connecticut join eleven other states (California, Nevada, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, and Vermont) in restricting or prohibiting the use of neonicotinoids. (See Daily News here.) Whether it is a campaign to ban glyphosate, paraquat, chlorpyrifos, atrazine, or any of the hundreds of individual active ingredients registered with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), environmental and public health advocates grow concerned that the whack-a-mole approach to pesticide reform fails to meet the moment of cascading crisis on stability of planetary boundaries, including public health, biodiversity, and climate resilience.

Maine

The recent Maine legislation has four fundamental changes to neonicotinoid restrictions in the state:

1. Crop-specific bans for outdoor applications for crops “during bloom.” There is also a prohibition of post-bloom use on leafy vegetables, brassicas, bulb vegetables, herbs and spices, and stalk/stem/leaf petiole vegetables. The ban is also extended to soybean and cereal grains (all these stipulations are subject to “emergency” exemptions (discussed below). This will go into effect on January 1, 2026.
2. Bans the sale, distribution, or use of neonicotinoid-treated seeds for soybeans and cereal grain, making Maine the third state, after Vermont and New York. This will also go into effect on January 1, 2026.
3. Similar to New York and Vermont, there is an exemption process where the Commissioner of Agriculture can issue exemptions based on “agricultural” or “environmental” emergencies for the use of neonicotinoids once this law goes into effect. To be eligible for exemption, farmers are required to go through integrated pest management training, conduct a pest risk assessment, and maintain use records for treated seeds (if approved). Exemption orders do not last longer than a year, and they are specific to a certain geographical area, “which may include specific farms, fields or properties.”
4. Exemption orders must be reported to the Committee on Agriculture, Conservation, and Forestry, mirroring Vermont’s approach but distinguishing itself from New York’s failure to incorporate this specific measure for accountability. (See Daily News here.)

The law also requires the Board of Pesticide Control to study the impacts of neonicotinoid-treated seeds and neonicotinoids broadly on public health and pollinator health. The Board is required to submit a preliminary report by January 15, 2026, to the Joint Standing Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry; a final report with recommendations is due by January 15, 2027. (Learn more here.) Before this law, Maine had already taken a leadership role by eliminating all outdoor (nonagricultural) uses of these chemicals, even by lawn care companies, back in 2021. (See Daily News here.)

There is a grassroots movement across the state that is not only standing up for community health but also actively defending local laws against industry influence and public complacency. Just earlier this year, the South Portland City Council was considering an exemption for their municipal pesticide and fertilizer ordinance to permit the use of the diamide insecticide chlorantraniliprole/acelepryn to address issues of grub control. A campaign to reject the waiver was led by Avery Yale Kamila, cofounder of Portland Protectors, and supported by Beyond Pesticides. The proposed change was soundly defeated on Monday, March 3, 2025, after public engagement and a near-unanimous city council vote [6-1 vote]. The adoption of the Portland pesticide ordinance followed the adoption of similar laws in Ogunquit, neighboring South Portland, and other jurisdictions like the City of Takoma Park and Montgomery County, both in Maryland. Thirty-four jurisdictions throughout Maine have restricted pesticides, including on public and private property (See Daily News here.)

Connecticut

The Connecticut legislation (both SB 9, which passed, and HB 6916, which did not) fails to address the broad scope of pesticide contamination across agricultural and non-agricultural uses; more concerning, however, is the failure to incentivize a transition to organic land management. In testimony, Beyond Pesticides lays out four main changes it says are needed for a neonicotinoid (or any individual or class of pesticides) prohibition in legislation:

• To this end, the following provision in italics (below) in the bill should be stricken: Section (c) (1) The Commissioner of Energy and Environmental Protection may issue a written order to suspend the provisions of subsection (b) of 1 of this section if the commissioner determines that: . . (C) the use of a neonicotinoid will not cause unreasonable adverse effects on the environment, including on nontarget organisms, surface water quality and groundwater quality.”
• Similarly, the following text in italics in the same section should be stricken: “(D) no other less harmful pesticide or pest management practice will be effective to address such environmental emergency.”
• Provision (D) should be replaced with the following language: (D): “no other pest management practice, including organic management practice with delineated allowable substances, will be effective to address such environmental emergency.”
• The following new section should be added to define “delineated allowable substances:”
  • Natural, organic or “non-synthetic.” A substance that is derived from mineral, plant, or animal matter and does not undergo a “synthetic” process as defined in the Organic Foods Production Act, 7 U.S.C. § 6502(21), as the same may be amended from time to time.
  • Pesticides determined to be “minimum risk pesticides” pursuant to the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) and listed in 40 C.F.R. § 152.25(f)(1) or (2), as may be amended from time to time.

Based on data collected from government sources and independent monitoring, a multidisciplinary team of researchers at the University of Connecticut finds that 46% of Connecticut waterway samples are contaminated with levels of the neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid—one of the most widely used insecticides in the United States on lawn and golf courses. The authors relied on federal data from EPA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), state-level data from Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (CT-DEEP), and a small-scale data collection study by the Clean Rivers Project funded by the nonprofit Pollinator Pathway, Inc. In their report, Neonicotinoids in Connecticut Waters: Surface Water, Groundwater, and Threats to Aquatic Ecosystems, the researchers provide the most comprehensive view to date of neonicotinoid levels in Connecticut and offer critical recommendations for future testing within the state and nationally, given glaring data gaps. (See Daily News here.)

Vermont

The Vermont legislature passed H.706 in June of last year—a bill that narrows and reduces the use of neonicotinoid insecticides and neonicotinoid-treated seeds. The legislature came together to override a bill vetoed by Governor Phil Scott (R). At the time of passage, there were still major questions regarding best management practices for neonicotinoids and neonicotinoid-treated seeds that would be promulgated by the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets (VAAFM) moving into this year.

Beyond Pesticides submitted comments on proposed Rule 25P031, Best Management Practices for the Use of Neonicotinoid Treated Article Seeds and Neonicotinoid Pesticides, urging VAAFM to adopt the implementation of an Ecological Pest Management (EPM) or strongly defined Integrated Pest Management (IPM) program for indoor environments, and Organic Land Care (OLC) practices in the outdoor environment. The specific additions for the best management practices include the following:

• Add the definition of EPM (or Strong IPM) to include:
  • “Eliminates or mitigates economic and health damage caused by pests;
  • Minimizes, or eliminates to the extent possible, the use of pesticides and the risk to human health and the environment associated with pesticide applications; and, c. uses integrated methods, site or pest inspections, cultural practices, pest population monitoring, an evaluation of the need for pest control, and one or more pest management methods, including sanitation, structural repairs, cultural practices, habitat manipulation, mechanical and living biological controls, other nonchemical methods, and, if nontoxic options are unreasonable and have been exhausted, a defined set of least-toxic pesticides.”
• Add the six EPM Program essentials, including Prevention, Identification, Monitoring, Record-Keeping, Action Levels, Tactics Criteria, and Evaluation (more details in the next section).
• Add definition for what is considered a “least-toxic pesticide” to include: a. EPA-classified minimum risk pesticides (7 CFR 205.601) and b. USDA organic certified pesticides. (40 CFR § 152.25)
• Add definition for what is not considered a “least-toxic pesticide” to include: a. An EPA-registered pesticide that is not organic certified.

As stated in the comments, it is important that the proposed rule prioritize ecological pest management practices, best defined in federal law as “organic,” as the alternative that must be assessed relative to the use of neonicotinoids and related compounds because of the numerous deficiencies in the EPA pesticide registration process on which Vermont relies for determinations of safety.

Previous Research

There continues to emerge a variety of peer-reviewed scientific literature on the human, wildlife, and ecosystems-wide impacts of neonicotinoids.

A recent study conducted in Pennsylvania and published in Environmental Entomology earlier this year highlights threats to nontarget organisms from neonicotinoid insecticide exposure. Carabid beetles, the target of the current study, are, according to the researchers, “some of the most common predaceous, soil macrofauna found in Mid-Atlantic agroecosystems, and they are active throughout the growing season.” (See study here.) This causes these beetles to frequently encounter neonicotinoids through multiple exposure routes. The authors continue: “In systems where neonicotinoids are applied to leaves (i.e., foliar sprays on many vegetable crops), carabids may experience topical exposure at rates up to 100 to 1,000 ng [nanogram] of active ingredient,” the authors say. (See Daily News here.)

Additionally, a recent study published in Insects finds honey bees experience sublethal effects when exposed to the neonicotinoid insecticide thiamethoxam that threaten the survival of bee larvae and the health of bee colonies. “Our finding reveals that thiamethoxam exerts sublethal effects on larvae, significantly impairing the fitness of reproductive bees,” the authors explain. “Specifically, exposure altered juvenile hormone III, ecdysone titer, and acetylcholinesterase activity [enzyme activity necessary for nervous system and cognitive functioning] in reproductive larvae, with these effects showing a negative correlation with pesticide concentration.” (See Daily News here.)

Inaction on neonicotinoids and the broader pesticide addiction continues for nonagricultural and agricultural forms of pest management. A recent analysis of agricultural neonicotinoid insecticide regulations, published in Pest Management Science, evaluates the varied approaches being taken for bans and exemption-based restrictions. Despite the proliferation of peer-reviewed research linking neonicotinoid exposure to adverse environmental and health effects, “regulations have spread from the EU to Canadian provinces and, subsequently, to specific US states, becoming increasingly voluntary and less restrictive over time,” the authors highlight. (See Daily News here.)

Call to Action

For additional analysis of peer-reviewed science on neonicotinoids, see here. What The Science Shows on Biodiversity provides access to scientific studies organized by pesticide impacts on bees, other pollinators, and beneficial organisms. There is also a subsection on parasites and viruses that impact pollinators.

You can also put the science and policy findings into action by subscribing to Action of the Week and Weekly News Update, as well as registering to become a Parks Advocate for the Parks for a Sustainable Future Program—providing in-depth training to assist community land managers in transitioning two public green spaces to organic landscape management, while aiming to provide the knowledge and skills necessary to eventually transition all public areas in a locality to these safer practices.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources: LD 1323 , SB 9, HB 6916

(Beyond Pesticides, October 1, 2025) A novel study in Scientific Reports combines computational analyses with toxicological data to identify pathways affected by exposure to the weed killer glyphosate. The analyses identify glyphosate targets that correlate with kidney injury and kidney cancer, revealing pathways with significant glyphosate-induced alterations, including the dysregulation of nitrogen metabolism that leads to ammonia accumulation and oxidative stress, both of which contribute to renal (kidney) damage and carcinogenesis (development of cancer).

“This study provides a comprehensive investigation into the molecular mechanisms by which glyphosate may contribute to kidney injury and kidney cancer, employing an array of bioinformatics tools for target prediction, toxicity assessment, pathway enrichment analysis, molecular docking and molecular dynamics simulation,” the researchers state. The results of the analyses and simulations highlight the molecular mechanisms underlying glyphosate’s nephrotoxic (damaging to kidneys) and carcinogenic (cancer-causing) effects.

Study Importance and Background

Glyphosate, known as a broad-spectrum systemic herbicide, has been used for agricultural and nonagricultural purposes for decades and is the most extensively used herbicide worldwide. This widespread use is largely due to its application to genetically engineered, glyphosate-tolerant crops. Both glyphosate and its main metabolite (breakdown product), aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA), are detected in water, soil, and food, which then represent multiple pathways for exposure to nontarget organisms, including humans.

There is a wide body of science connecting glyphosate to threats to public health, wildlife, and the environment. Both research and litigation provide evidence of the carcinogenic potential of glyphosate, as well as toxicity to kidneys. Studies show both acute and chronic effects of glyphosate exposure, “triggering oxidative stress, inflammation, and apoptosis [cell death] in renal cells, culminating in structural and functional kidney damage.” (See scientific literature here, here, and here.)

Additional epidemiological research links glyphosate exposure with higher rates of renal diseases, including chronic kidney disease (CKD) and renal cell carcinoma. “Both in vitro [in a test tube or petri dish] and in vivo [in a living organism] studies reveal glyphosate’s capacity to disrupt mitochondrial function, modulate gene expression involved in detoxification, and generate reactive oxygen species (ROS), collectively contributing to renal cell injury,” the researchers point out. (See here and here.) They continue, “Given these findings, there is an urgent need to unravel the molecular pathways by which glyphosate may drive kidney injury and cancer progression, especially under conditions of prolonged exposure.”

Methodology

To better understand the mechanisms through which glyphosate can impact kidney function and cancer development, without the limitations seen in traditional toxicological approaches with complex substances like glyphosate, this study utilizes network toxicology as a “transformative framework for dissecting the complex biological interactions triggered by chemical exposures.”

As the authors explain, “Unlike traditional toxicology, which often focuses on individual molecular pathways or isolated targets, network toxicology employs systems biology to analyze the chemical’s impact across interconnected molecular networks.” This approach allows for analysis of glyphosate’s cellular and systemic effects that result in deleterious impacts on health.

Utilizing computational approaches allows for “the prediction and prioritization of potential interactions between small molecules like glyphosate and complex biological systems,” the researchers state. They continue, “Specifically, methodologies such as molecular docking and simulation analysis are employed to predict the binding affinity and favored orientation of glyphosate with proteins implicated in critical cellular processes—particularly those related to renal function and carcinogenesis (e.g., key enzymes, receptors, or transporters identified from network analyses).” For more information on the specific databases and computational tools within the study, see the methodology section for more details.

Study Results and Implications

Through network toxicological analyses and simulations, this study predicts glyphosate’s ability to incite kidney toxicity and carcinogenicity, which adds to the current body of science with existing toxicity data that indicates that increasing doses of glyphosate heighten risks of adverse health effects. The results include:

• The prediction of 47 drug targets of glyphosate, 20 of which overlap with kidney injury and 31 with kidney cancer, represents how glyphosate can modulate specific pathways through key targets to cause diseases, shown through the creation of a “drug-target-pathway network.” (See here.)
• Additional predictions from databases indicate “that glyphosate’s co-toxicity primarily involves kidney injury. Additionally, the databases predicted carcinogenicity, neurotoxicity, respiratory toxicity, and ototoxicity [ear poisoning] for glyphosate.”
• Analyses of protein-protein interaction networks involving glyphosate-induced effects show ten targets for glyphosate-induced kidney injury and ten targets for kidney cancer. These targets include matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) that play crucial roles in processes such as tissue remodeling, wound healing, and embryonic development, as well as in diseases such as cancer and chronic inflammation. The authors note, “While MMPs are known targets in cancer biology their specific implication in glyphosate-induced renal toxicity represents a significant mechanistic advancement elucidated by our network-based approach.”
• Gene Ontology analyses reveal prominent biological processes, including proteolysis (breakdown of proteins), extracellular matrix disassembly, negative regulation of apoptosis, and collagen catabolic process for glyphosate-induced kidney injury and cancer.
• Significant signaling pathways involved in glyphosate-induced kidney injury include bladder cancer, adherens junction (provides adhesion between cells), endocrine resistance, relaxin signaling pathway, estrogen signaling pathway, fluid shear stress and atherosclerosis, nitrogen metabolism, proteoglycans in cancer, diabetic cardiomyopathy (heart muscle disease), and lipid and atherosclerosis. The pathways related to glyphosate-induced kidney cancer include nitrogen metabolism, metabolic pathways, bladder cancer, adherens junction, endocrine resistance, relaxin signaling pathway, estrogen signaling pathway, and fluid shear stress [frictional forces impacting blood flow] and atherosclerosis. As a note, nitrogen metabolism is the pathway with the highest enrichment [higher statistical significance] in both glyphosate-induced kidney injury and kidney cancer, which offers insight into less-explored mechanisms of glyphosate toxicity.

“In summary, this study employed a robust computational strategy to propose that glyphosate may exert nephrotoxic and carcinogenic effects primarily through disrupting extracellular matrix integrity via interactions with MMPs and PLG [plasminogen, an enzyme involved in breaking down blood clots and other processes such as inflammation], and by dysregulating nitrogen metabolism,” the researchers state. These results advance the mechanistic understanding of glyphosate toxicity, beyond general oxidative stress, which is crucial in understanding the health risks from both short-term and long-term exposure.

Previous Research

Studies upon studies highlight the adverse effects associated with the widely used weed killer glyphosate, ranging from endocrine disruption and reproductive dysfunction to neurotoxicity and developmental impacts, among others. As shared in previous Daily News, in 2013, the Center for Public Integrity highlighted that glyphosate bonds with toxic heavy metals in the environment, such as cadmium and arsenic, forming stable compounds. These compounds are present in food and water for consumption and do not break down until they reach the kidneys. Thus, farmworkers exposed to glyphosate are likely to have these toxic metals in their kidneys. Additionally, in 2019, researchers Sararath Guanatilake, MD, and Channa Jayasumana, PhD, were awarded the Freedom and Responsibility Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science for their work in uncovering the link between glyphosate and chronic kidney disease. (See Daily News coverage here.)

A previous Daily News, entitled “Kidney, Liver Damage Linked to Chronic, Low-Dose Glyphosate Exposure,” highlights a research study published in Environmental Health that links chronic, ultra-low dose exposure to glyphosate in drinking water to adverse impacts on the health of the liver and kidneys. Further research finds glyphosate causes changes to DNA function, resulting in chronic diseases such as kidney and liver diseases, diabetes, and Parkinson’s. Multigenerational effects from glyphosate exposure are also documented, with research associating cancer development with DNA alterations through oxidative stress mechanisms. (See Weed Killer Glyphosate Linked to Multi-Generational Adverse Health Effects and EPA Overlooks Glyphosate and Roundup Ingredients’ Cancer, DNA Damage, and Multigenerational Effects for more information.)

Mitigating Health Threats: The Organic Solution

As Beyond Pesticides has advocated for over 40 years, organic agriculture and land management practices offer a holistic approach that protects health and the environment from the harmful effects of petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers. Adopting organic methods mitigates health threats in the current case of glyphosate and kidneys, as well as all other toxic chemicals that are not allowed under organic standards.

As stated in previous Daily News, kidneys are one of the most important organs for filtering waste out of the body. However, kidneys are often the main target of pesticide toxicity mediated through oxidative stress, as well as other mechanisms elucidated in the current study. Therefore, human and ecological health must be protected by shifting to organic systems and supporting the organic movement by buying and growing organic food.

Organic methods provide many health and environmental benefits, eliminating the need for chemical-intensive practices. Research shows that switching to an organic diet has health benefits, even showing that glyphosate levels in the human body can decrease by 70% after one week. (See here and here.)

Get involved! Contribute your voice and help protect organic integrity through continuous improvement of organic standards. The Fall National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meeting is scheduled for November 4 – 6, 2025. The public meeting of the NOSB is preceded by an opportunity for public comments in writing and via online webinars on October 28 and 30, 2025, from 12 pm to 5 pm ET, that concern how organic food is produced.

Please copy Beyond Pesticides’ comments and fill out the form here before clicking the blue button “Click here to go to Regulations.gov.” After pasting comments into Regulations.gov, we encourage you to please consider personalizing and adding text before final submission! For a complete discussion of topics, see Keeping Organic Strong and the Fall 2025 issues page.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Dong, Y. and Zhu, J. (2025) Network toxicology reveals glyphosate mechanisms in kidney injury and cancer, Scientific Reports. Available at: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12375789/.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 30, 2025)  A pioneering study has measured the concentrations of pesticides in clouds. Prior to this, rainwater has been tested and found to be a common depositor of pesticides. But there is far less information about the role of clouds themselves. The findings add to general scientific understanding that pesticides go everywhere: into soils, water bodies, and the bodies of plants and animals—even when they are not intentionally applied. There are many studies of pesticide concentrations, including their metabolites, so-called “inert” ingredients, and degradation products, in soil, water and the atmosphere. The study was published in Environmental Science & Technology last August by a team of scientists from the University of Clermont Auvergne and the Laboratoire Phytocontrol in France and the University of Torino in Italy.

Clouds are collections of water droplets, as opposed to molecular gases or aerosols, which are simply fine particles or liquid droplets of any substance capable of becoming airborne. Aerosol and gas-phase chemicals are known to travel widely in the atmosphere and do not require the presence of water to do so. Contaminants in rain have been studied to some extent, but rain is a separate analytical category from clouds. A study published last month found 14 pesticides in rainwater in an agricultural area of Brazil. The authors noted that rainwater must be considered a source of pesticide exposure and should not be used as drinking water, but did not report on whether the pesticides arrived by atmospheric transport. Local sources are more likely—Brazil leads the world in pesticide usage, at more than 800 tons a year.

No environment, no matter how pristine it seems, escapes atmospheric pollutants. The more volatile a chemical is, the more it will spread in the atmosphere. For example, one study found endangered marmots on Vancouver Island contaminated with PCBs, PBDEs, hexachlorobenzene, and other industrial compounds, likely originating in Asia. There is also a well-known conveyor belt of atmospheric pollutants from lower latitudes to the Arctic, where the local environments become reservoirs: tundra, permafrost, ice, water, plants and animals. The exposure of polar bears to PCBs notoriously leads to endocrine disruption and failing reproduction in the species. One of the manifold concerns about climate change is that these Arctic reservoirs are releasing long-sequestered chemicals back into the atmosphere for further transport. For details, see Beyond Pesticides’ June 2023 analysis of an important study in Nature Communications.

The French cloud study analyzed six cloud water samples collected at an atmospheric station in south-central France in late summer 2023 and spring 2024. The samples were collected from the upper margin of the boundary layer, which is the air mass closest to the Earth and influenced by planetary factors, and from the free troposphere, which is the next highest layer where the air behaves with less terrestrial influence. The scientists searched for 446 compounds categorized as “pesticides, biocides, their transformation products and additives.” They found 32 compounds comprising three fungicides, seven insecticides, one biocide and eight transformation products. Among the pesticides were atrazine, cypermethrin, DEET, metolachlor, tributyltin, and fipronil. Mesotrione (a broadleaf herbicide for field corn), DMST (a metabolite of the fungicide tolylfluanid, used on apples, grapes, hops and tomatoes), and triphenyl phosphate (a plasticizer related to the fungicide tributyltin) were found in the highest concentrations. Two samples had total pesticide concentrations above the European drinking water limit. See Beyond Pesticides’ Gateway on Pesticide Hazards and Safe Pest Management for information on all of the above pesticides. The biocide, anthraquinone, is used as a bird repellent at golf courses and airports and as a seed treatment to discourage birds from eating them. According to EPA, anthraquinone is classed as “likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

The authors note that there was no correlation of any class of pesticide with either sampling period, which would have been likely had the pesticides been locally applied. This point, along with the presence of pesticides banned in France, supports the idea that long-range transport from countries where those pesticides are legal is involved. Other studies of aerosols and rain have come to the same conclusion. Further, neither the concentrations nor the types of pesticides found in clouds resembled those in local streams, adding support to the long-range transport concept.

Intriguingly, the study analysis includes “back-trajectory” tracing of the history of various air masses crossing the sample site. In one sample, part of the air mass originated in Spain. This sample had relatively high pesticide concentrations. Other sources included the Atlantic Ocean and northwest France. Samples with air masses coming from the ocean or from land areas covered by forest, natural grasslands and vineyards had the lowest concentrations.

The authors also compare results from aerosol studies with their cloud samples, finding significant differences. In one aerosol study, 58 pesticides were found in boundary layer sites, but only eight of those were found in the cloud samples. Two pesticides in cloud samples (fipronil and cypermethrin) did not appear in any aerosol samples. The authors also note that pesticide transformation products were found in clouds but not aerosols, suggesting that chemical processes in the clouds are converting the actual pesticide formulations in a way that does not occur to aerosols circulating freely in the atmosphere.

Atmospheric transport of pollutants has been acknowledged in science for decades, but its recognition in regulation and policy is much less discernible. One important indicator from a study of persistent organic pollutants in blood and breast milk samples from Arctic populations is that levels of regulated pollutants, such as certain “forever chemicals,” the DDT breakdown compound DDE, and PCBs have declined over time, while the unregulated pollutants have increased. The consequences of exposure to pesticides are as well known as those to PCBs, PFAS, and numerous other chemical bad actors.

According to public health and environmental advocates, the evidence that pesticides are traveling the globe in clouds, as well as in gaseous and particulate form, descending as rain, fog, snow and ice, and adding to the damage from direct exposures, spray drift, food consumption, and other sources, should be the straw that breaks the camel’s back of corporate regulatory capture. It is a sad moment, advocates say, to realize that clouds and rain are not the natural refreshment they used to be. But that same evidence—that eliminating pesticides makes a significant difference in human and ecosystem health—shows that changes can be made. Harmful trends can be reversed. Speaking out to regulators and elected officials, local and national organizing, changing your domestic ecosystem by going organic—all of these push the planet toward healing. See the multiple resources at www.beyondpesticides.org for ways to accomplish all of these things.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources:

Are Clouds a Neglected Reservoir of Pesticides?
Bianco et al.
Environmental Science & Technology September 2025
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.est.5c03787

Pesticides in rainwater: A two-year occurrence study in an unexplored environmental compartment in regions with different land use in the State of São Paulo – Brazil
Dias et al.
Chemosphere March 2025
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0045653525000335

Climate Crisis Unleashes Pesticide Contamination from Thawing Permafrost, Elevating Global Emergency
Beyond Pesticides, June 8, 2023
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2023/06/climate-crisis-unleashes-pesticide-contamination-from-thawing-permafrost-elevating-global-emergency/

Arctic Glaciers Entrap Pesticides and Other Environmental Pollutants from Global Drift and Release Hazardous Chemicals as They Melt from Global Warming
Beyond Pesticides, August 20, 2020
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2020/08/arctic-glaciers-entrap-pesticides-and-other-environmental-pollutants-from-global-drift-and-release-hazardous-chemicals-as-they-melt-from-global-warming/

Pesticides Found in Marine Atmosphere Over Deep Atlantic Ocean, Documented for the First Time
Beyond Pesticides, April 16, 2025
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2025/04/pesticides-found-in-marine-atmosphere-over-deep-atlantic-ocean-documented-for-the-first-time/

(Beyond Pesticides, September 29, 2025) With the theme “Our Home Outdoors,” the National Environmental Education Foundation (NEEF) launched National Public Lands Day this past Saturday—defining this year’s event as follows: “Our public lands are more than just places to visit—they are woven into the fabric of our everyday lives. From the trails we hike to the parks where we gather with family and friends, these spaces are our collective backyard, our shared front porch, our natural playground.” At the same time, people are asking their local governments whether they are using petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers on their parks and playing fields that are known to threaten the health of children, pets, wildlife, and the environment. Beyond Pesticides led a nationwide action to “Tell your local officials to make your parks organic.” 

For those engaging with their local elected officials and parks departments, Beyond Pesticides, through its Parks for a Sustainable Future program, offers technical support to transition parks to organic land management through analysis of soil health, development of a plan to improve soil biology to cycle nutrients for healthy plants, training of staff to implement the organic plan, and ongoing consultation for plan adjustments when necessary. Organic systems focus on building organic matter and microbial life in the soil to solubilize nutrients for plant uptake, eliminating the use of petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides and increasing plant health and resilience. 

Through this program and with supporters, including the Parks for a Sustainable Future program, Beyond Pesticides has assisted local leaders in converting the following parks and recreational areas exclusively to organic practices. Last month, as a part of a nationwide push to stop the use of petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers, the City of Excelsior, Minnesota, joined Kansas City, Missouri, and dozens of communities across the country to begin its organic transition of demonstration sites on city park land. In addition, Beyond Pesticides has worked with dozens of communities to adopt land management policies in jurisdictions of nearly every state in the country. The goal is to create models that show the viability and cost effectiveness of organic management systems that eliminate petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers that contribute to the current health crisis, biodiversity collapse, and the climate emergency.

Beyond Pesticides invites people nationwide to become a Parks Advocate. The organization advises the following actions:  

• For residents who live in a community that is one of a growing number across the country that has taken action to protect people and environment by adopting organic policies and practices in its public spaces, please take this opportunity to thank community leaders. However, be aware that the pesticide industry is seeking to take those policies away from you.  
• For communities that have not yet taken action to protect its residents and environment by adopting organic policies and practices in its public spaces, please tell them how much you want them to do so. ℹ️ In the event that your local mayor is not in the system and/or you receive an error message that reads “Please provide a valid residential address,” we invite you to copy/paste the sample message below and send an email with a personalized message!   
• Create pesticide-free yard space. Educate the community with a Beyond Pesticides “Pesticide Free Zone” Sign. Please share pictures of organic yards or local parks with Beyond Pesticides and explain why they are so important.  

Sample Letters: 

Thank you letter to community leaders (Please personalize): 

Thank you so much for implementing pesticide-free, organic policies and practices in our parks and public places! I love to spend time in our parks, knowing that I will not be exposed to toxic chemicals. It is great to know that toxic chemicals will not run off from our public spaces into streams and other water. It is wonderful to know that flowers in our parks can provide nectar to pollinators who face so many threats these days.

As I celebrate National Public Lands Day, I thank you on behalf of our local community. 

Letter to community leaders for organic policies (Please personalize): 

When I learned about how many communities protect their citizens and local environment by transitioning to organic landcare in parks and other public places (https://www.bp-dc.org/tools-for-change), I asked why we can’t do the same in our own community.  

Pesticides used in parks, playing fields, and other public places threaten our health—especially that of our children, who are closer to the ground and have greater exposure. Pesticides and chemical fertilizers run off, finding their way to streams. They also threaten pollinators, who are at risk from multiple threats. 

Communities no longer need to figure out how to do this alone. Beyond Pesticides’ Parks for a Sustainable Future (https://bp-dc.org/sustainable-parks-land-care-training) program aims to bridge the gaps resulting from staffing constraints and tight budgets, allowing communities to pilot the transition to organic land care on two public sites. As we celebrate National Public Lands Day, I urge you to email (mailto:[email protected]) or call Beyond Pesticides at 202-543-5450 to get started. 

Thank you. 

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides. 

(Beyond Pesticides, September 26, 2025) National Public Lands Day on Saturday, September 27—first established in 1994 and held on the fourth Saturday of September—is organized by the National Environmental Education Foundation (NEEF) in partnership with the U.S. National Park Service and participating federal agencies. Events are planned at neighborhood, state, and national parks nationwide, and entrance to National Parks will be free for the day. Coinciding with National Organic Month, this year’s theme, ”Our Home Outdoors,” is explained by NEEF as: “Our public lands are more than just places to visit—they are woven into the fabric of our everyday lives. From the trails we hike to the parks where we gather with family and friends, these spaces are our collective backyard, our shared front porch, our natural playground.”

Beyond Pesticides began its work on organic land management in national parks nearly a decade ago at National Historic Sites in Arkansas, Kansas, and Iowa. The program, now the Parks for a Sustainable Future program, partners with local communities in pursuit of a future where (1) public lands, from parks to playing fields, are managed without toxic pesticides, (2) children and pets are safe to run around on the grass, and (3) bees and other pollinators are safeguarded from toxic chemicals. The program to establish model sites nationwide, now operating in 11 states, shows that petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers are not needed to manage parks and playing fields cost-effectively. With the current existential health, biodiversity, and climate threats, communities participating in the program exemplify the important role of organic land management.

Parks for a Sustainable Future

By underwriting the development of organic transition plans and staff training on organic land management practices, the Parks for a Sustainable Future program advances practical, resilient, cost-effective techniques that confront urgent threats to the current health crisis, biodiversity collapse, and the climate emergency, which are exacerbated by petrochemical pesticide and fertilizer use. In doing so, the program establishes practical models that demonstrate the viability and cost-effectiveness of organic management systems and offers community land managers site-specific, science-based guidance for a successful program.

Last month, as a part of a nationwide push to stop the use of petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers, the City of Excelsior, Minnesota, joined Kansas City, Missouri, and dozens of communities across the country to begin its organic transition of demonstration sites on city park land. As featured by Harvest Public Media and reporter Héctor Alejandro Arzate, Jen Schroeder, a mother of two children in Kansas City, wanted her neighborhood park, where her children play, to be free of toxic chemical use. She saw a flier in her local Natural Grocers [a lifetime sponsor] about the program and reached out to her Parks and Recreation Department. The result: the City is moving ahead to transition two pilot sites to organic practices.

Since laying the groundwork for the program in the early 1980s, Beyond Pesticides has also worked with communities to adopt land management policies in jurisdictions of nearly every state in the country to ensure continuity and accountability. Click here for access to a template for a local pesticide-free model ordinance or policy!

A prime example showcasing the integration of program and policy is the City of New York, where a partnership of environmental, public health, and advocacy organizations— Eco-Friendly Parks for All (EFPA)—teamed up with Beyond Pesticides, New York City Parks and Recreation Department, and Stonyfield Organic Yogurt to celebrate the success of pilot organic land management programs at eight sites across the five boroughs. The program was initiated by the coalition after the city council adopted new legislation on Earth Day in 2021, prohibiting the use of chemical pesticides at all New York City parks.

To incorporate a scientific basis for the transition to organic for local communities, Beyond Pesticides leverages a broad range of tools and resources for the benefit of stakeholders, including the organization’s Gateway on Pesticide Hazards and Safe Pest Management database to provide decision makers, practitioners, and activists with easier access to current and historical scientific literature on pesticide hazards and safe pest management. In addition, Beyond Pesticides tracks the overall hazards associated with pesticide exposure through its Pesticide-Induced Diseases Database, which documents independent peer-reviewed studies that link pesticides to a range of chronic diseases, including cancer, reproductive harm, neurological illness, respiratory disease, autism and learning disabilities, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and diabetes. For additional tools and educational materials on the website, please see the Resources page.

Why Go Organic?

The benefits of transitioning to organic land management extend far beyond individual health! Beyond Pesticides believes in building organic communities:

• For health and safety: Organic food and parks are free from harmful pesticides, fossil-fuel-based substances, and toxic chemicals, making them safer and healthier for all ages. Visit Beyond Pesticide’s 40 Common Lawn and Landscape Chemicals page to delve into the health impacts of pesticides in communities, and the factsheet Children and Pesticides Don’t Mix, which highlights data establishing elevated rates of pesticide-induced illnesses among children.

• For environmental stewardship: Opting for organic parks and products supports practices that protect pollinators, improve soil health, increase biodiversity, and eliminate toxic runoff into water bodies. Learn more about how to protect pollinators in your community by reading BEE Protective, and see our archives in the Daily News Blog on soil health, biodiversity, and water runoff.

• For trust and transparency: The USDA Certified Organic label ensures strict standards and regulations for organic products, providing trust and transparency for consumers worldwide. We provide oversight for parks that use organic land management. Take Action via the Keeping Organic Strong page to keep USDA accountable to the principles and values in the Organic Foods Production Act.

• For just communities: Supporting organic farming practices can benefit local communities and economies, as well as promote responsible animal welfare, and protect farmworkers who are at disproportionate risk from pesticide exposure in marginalized communities. Organic parks are the ethical choice to promote environmental justice. Please see the Black Institute’s Poison Parks report, which shines a spotlight on New York City’s previous reliance on glyphosate-based herbicides and how people of color communities bear the burden of health impacts.

• For climate resilience: Organic farming typically exhibits better performance during droughts and challenging weather conditions. Watering needs are very site-specific, and the type of soil impacts drainage. Once established, a deep root system from organic land management and healthy soil with increased water retention requires less water. Additionally, organic soil management results in the drawdown of atmospheric carbon, contributing to efforts to reduce the adverse effects of carbon on climate.

How To Go Organic

As outlined in Beyond Pesticides’ previous Daily News post, autumn is an ideal season to transition to organic land management, with a focus on the cultivation of healthy soil and proper maintenance practices. High-quality lawns and landscapes can be achieved with practices that build soil health through natural fertilization and cultural practices, such as soil aeration, mowing height, and timing and volume of water.

Image by Sara Grantham, “Vine and Dandy.”

This method, which eliminates synthetic fertilizers and nurtures soil microorganisms, is a “feed-the-soil” approach. By helping to prevent problems that typically arise from chemical-intensive practices via nurturing a soil environment rich in microbial life, it is not only feasible but also economically viable to produce a healthy lawn able to withstand pressures from heavy usage, insects, weeds, drought, and heat stress.

Below are a few steps that can be taken to transition toward organic landcare! For more information, please see Beyond Pesticides’ guides on how to establish and maintain a pesticide-free lawn, as well as the Organic Land Care 101 factsheet!

• Fertilize without fossil fuels: Fertilizing in the early fall allows for plant growth and root development. Nitrogen, the most abundant nutrient in lawn fertilizers, promotes color and growth; however, too much can weaken the grass, alter the pH, and promote disease, insect, and thatch build-up. If applied too late, nutrients can leach directly into nearby surface waters. Be aware of local phosphorus or nitrogen loading concerns. Use safer fertilizers, such as grass clippings, tested compost, and compost tea. Learn more from Beyond Pesticides’ page on Fertilizers Compatible with Organic Land Management under the Tools for Change.

• Analyze the soil: It is highly recommended to test the soil to determine specific needs. In addition to nutrients and pH, ask for organic content analysis and request organic care recommendations. The ideal soil pH should fall between 6.5-7.0, with over 5% organic matter content. Soil test results will ensure that only the materials that are needed are applied. Read Maintaining a Delicate Balance: Eliminating phosphorus contamination with organic soil management for in-depth information on the problem of fertilizer contamination and how to apply fertilizer properly.

• Aerate: If a lawn is hard, compacted, and full of weeds or bare spots, aerate to help air, water, and fertilizer enter the soil. If a screwdriver cannot be easily pushed into the soil, it is too compacted. Getting an aerator on the turf will be especially helpful. Once you have an established, healthy lawn, worms and birds pecking at your soil will aerate it for free!

• Mow high and keep the blade sharp: Mowing with a dull blade makes the turf susceptible to disease, and mowing too close invites sunlight in for weeds, so be sure to sharpen your mower blades frequently. For the last and first mowing, mow down to two inches to prevent fungal problems. For the rest of the year, keep it at three/three-and-a-half inches to shade out weeds and foster deep, drought-resistant roots.

• Overseed with the right grass seed: Grass varieties differ enormously in their resistance to certain pests, tolerance to climatic conditions, growth habit, and appearance. Endophytic grass seed provides natural protection against some insects and fungal disease—major benefits for managing a lawn organically. A local nursery would know the best seed for the area. Remember to check the weed content of the grass seed and that there are no pesticide coatings.

• Develop your tolerance: Many plants that are considered weeds in a lawn have beneficial qualities. Learn to read your “weeds” for what they indicate about your soil conditions. Monocrops do not grow in nature and diversity is a good thing. See more information on our Least Toxic Control of Weeds factsheet.

How To Take Action

There is no better time than the beginning of a new season to reflect on what can be done individually and collectively to have a meaningful effect on health, the health of families and communities, and the legacy to be left behind. Let this weekend’s celebration, and National Organic Month, serve as a reminder of the need to create an equitable and sustainable world for all. This can be achieved by seeking the adoption of a transformative solution that recognizes the urgency to address disproportionate harm caused by toxic pesticide production, transportation, use, storage, and disposal with the organic alternative.

🆕  All national parks that charge an entrance fee will offer free admission this Saturday! We encourage the public to use the National Park Service’s “Find a Park” page and enjoy a trip to our nation’s public lands with friends and family!

Does your community have a pesticide-free park managed with organic practices? Do you wish it did? The time to take action to protect parks and create new ones is now!

 Beyond Pesticides is reaching out to its network and urging people and organizations to tell their mayor to implement pesticide-free, organic policies and practices in local parks and public spaces. See our Action page for additional ways to take action locally in your community!

ℹ️  For more information, please email our team at [email protected] or click here to sign up to take the first step towards becoming a Parks Advocate!

Help defend organic standards against USDA changes weakening public trust in the organic food label!

From the very beginning, with the passage of the Organic Foods Production Act in 1990, “organic” has meant “continuous improvement.” The primary mechanism for continuous improvement in organic production is the high level of public involvement that comes from twice-annual meetings of the National Organic Standards Board.

ℹ️  See this past weekend’s Action of the Week to submit written comments in preparation for the in-person and virtual meeting from November 4-6, 2025. Beyond Pesticides provides draft language via the Keeping Organic Strong webpage and urges public participation, including the opportunity to provide oral testimony virtually in late October. Register here.

  The public can sign up and access the site to leave a message for the NOSB by clicking here to go to the Action page! Please feel free to “copy and paste” Beyond Pesticides’ comments when submitting.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources: National Public Lands Day [NPS]; National Public Lands Day [NEEF]

(Beyond Pesticides, September 25, 2025) Reinforcing numerous studies’ findings of widespread environmental contamination with PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), heavy metals, pesticide metabolites, and pharmaceuticals, researchers detected the chemicals in noncommercial backyard eggs laid in Greece, according to a study published in Science of The Total Environment.

The researchers found that “[o]nly 9 out of 17 samples were compliant to the limit….set by the [European Union] for the sum of PFHxS [perfluorohexanesulfonic acid], PFOS [perfluorooctanesulfonic acid], PFOA [perfluorooctanoic acid], and PFNA [perfluorononanoic acid].” They continue: “[A]s regards PFOS, PFHxS, and PFNA, seven, six and one out of 17 samples, respectively, were above the ML (maximum limit) as set by the EU.”

With current regulatory standards focused on evaluating exposure to individual chemicals and, in some instances, cumulative risk associated with chemicals that have a common mechanism of effect, this study points out the importance of looking at mixtures of chemicals and the potential synergistic effects. There are some fluorinated pesticides defined as PFAS due to their molecular structure and high toxicity, which makes the chemicals highly persistent in the environment. Center for Food Safety, Center for Biological Diversity, and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility reviewed the full list of active ingredients registered with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and found that 66 of the 471 (or 14 percent) qualify as PFAS (see Daily News here); in 2025 alone, EPA approved at least four new active ingredients–Cyclobutrifluram (Herbicide for nematodes), Diflufenican (Herbicide for corn and soybeans), Isocycloseram (Insecticide seed treatment), and Trifludimoxazin (Herbcide for oranges, apples, peanuts, etc.)–that also share the chemistry of forever chemicals, according to reporting by Civil Eats. 

Background and Methodology

“The main objectives of this study were to examine the occurrence of PFAS in home-produced eggs collected from various areas of Greece, to identify potentially contaminated regions and to estimate the probable risk of PFAS intake through egg consumption,” according to the researchers. The sampling of eggs for this study was conducted between April and October 2023, with 75 eggs collected from seventeen backyard coops across five Greek prefectures (local political subdivisions). There were 4-5 eggs gathered from each group, resulting in 17 pooled samples from the chicken coops. The target chemicals for this study included 46 PFAS, as well as any other detectable levels of heavy metals, pesticides, and pharmaceutical residues. The health risk assessment was based on estimated weekly intakes (EWIs) for PFAS and heavy metals from egg consumption. The methodology focuses on screening rather than deriving dietary exposure values for pesticides and pharmaceuticals.

The authors acknowledge this as one of the limitations of this study, however it is important to emphasize that this separation of scientific analysis on exposure levels based on individual classes of chemicals (e.g. pesticides, fertilizers, heavy metals, pharmaceuticals, other petrochemical substances, and their breakdown materials or metabolites) speaks to a broader challenge of regulatory systems failing to engage in comprehensive scientific research that addresses ongoing concerns about public health and ecosystem threats. Considering that researchers used a methodological screening method that emphasizes breadth (detection of pesticide compounds) over actual exposure (quantity of exposure), a recommendation for future studies would be to consider concentration data through tools like liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) with multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) that “can measure many chemical species quantitatively in the same analysis.” (See here for a widely cited primer on modern mass spectrometry techniques in the clinical diagnostics context.) With a stronger screening tool, quantified residues on pesticides and pharmaceuticals could be integrated with the existing EWI data on heavy metals and PFAS to estimate chronic dietary chemical exposure.

It is noteworthy that the authors did not assess quantitative exposure estimates for all of the contaminants in this study (just PFAS and heavy metals) for a number of reasons explored below, one of the most important being that regulatory frameworks for multiple classes of chemical exposure in the U.S. and European Union (and most other nations) are fragmented and fail to assess targeted quantification of pesticide exposure and drift more specifically. Simultaneously, cumulative impacts with other potentially hazardous substances listed under other U.S. environmental statutes are not evaluated in combination with pesticides (e.g., Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act [CERCLA], Resource Conservation and Recovery Act [RCRA], Clean Air Act [CAA], Clean Water Act [CWA], Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, Endangered Species Act, Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act [EPCRA], among others).

The researchers are based at Greek universities, including National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and University of the Aegean. They declared that they “have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.” The work in this study was supported by the European Commission through various grant programs, including HORIZON-RIA (Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Actions), AgriDataValue, and Horizon 2020 research project Zero Pollution of Persistent, Mobile Substances (ZeroPM).

Results

The researchers were able to confirm their hypothesis that backyard chicken eggs found across multiple regions led to exposure to a cocktail of contaminants, opening the potential for significant long-term health burdens based on existing regulatory thresholds.

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), the EU counterpart to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), has established a regulatory threshold for the estimated weekly intake of numerous PFAS (PFOS, PFOA, PFNA, and PFHxS), with various regions facing contamination. Attica and Ilia had the highest concentrations, where the average PFAS concentrations for the four tested examples were high enough to exceed EFSA’s tolerable weekly intake (4.4 ng/kg bw/week) and therefore faced the most significant degree of contamination.

The researchers detected six pesticide residues in the gathered samples, including the herbicide dinoterb, insecticides DEET and fipronil sulfone (transformation product), industrial wood preservative pentachlorophenol, pesticide synergist piperonyl butoxide, and fungicide tricyclazole. They also detected the residue of various pharmaceutical products (antibiotics like enrofloxacin, anti-parasitic drugs like ivermectin, and other random residues like carbamazepine, an anticonvulsant, that were detected more sporadically. Pesticides and pharmaceutical residues, however, were found below quantification limits based on the restraints identified in the methodology analysis.

Several toxic heavy metals (e.g., cadmium and lead) and other elements that are toxic at high levels (e.g., iron, zinc, and selenium) were also detected, with the estimated weekly intakes above EFSA’s health-based threshold for cadmium and lead in certain regions (Magensia and Ilia).

“The exposure pathways responsible for the PFAS found in Greek egg samples were not studied in the current article,” say the authors. “However, according to the literature, the potential PFAS exposure pathways for hens living in chicken coops seem to be soil, water, and food.” See a recent related Daily News, Review of Science on Glyphosate Weed Killer in Poultry Production Highlights Extraordinary Health Threats, for additional context on the threat of chemical exposure via poultry products.

Previous Research and Actions

For backyard gardeners and farmers, one of the most direct exposure pathways to the full range of chemical soup that is described in this study is through the sourcing of compost.

One of the more elevated fights in recent memory between the National Organic Standards Board and industry interests looking to weaken regulations is on the issue of allowed materials in compost used on certified organic operations. A petition submitted by industry-aligned Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI) sought to allow “compost feedstocks” that might include, for example, “compostable” plastic food containers. It is the position of Beyond Pesticides that compost in organic production should contain only plant and animal waste, and not synthetic materials that could introduce hazardous contaminants like PFAS and microplastics, the latter of which have been found to have synergistic impacts with chlorpyrifos (see Daily News here) and proven evidence of adsorption of additional active ingredients. (See Daily News here.) The current regulations require compost to be made from manure and plant wastes, allowing only synthetics on the National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances —that is, those that have specifically been approved by the NOSB and USDA through a public comment process. The only synthetic inputs into compost that are currently allowed are newspaper and other paper. (See Daily News here.) See here for a copy of Beyond Pesticides Spring 2025 comments to the NOSB Crops Subcommittee on the proposal on synthetic feedstocks.

This issue has emerged as lawsuits continue to be brought forward to federal courts on PFAS contamination impacting farmers (organic and non-organic) and consumers across the United States, including farmers in Texas and Maine, and consumers nationwide. In July 2024, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on behalf of a group of ranchers and farmers in Texas harmed by PFAS-contaminated biosolids. The plaintiffs charge that their health and livelihoods were severely damaged due to contaminated biosolids leaching from neighboring properties onto their land. (See Daily News here.) In the spirit of environmental and agricultural justice, the discovery of widespread contamination of farmland in Maine and years of grassroots advocacy led to the development of the first-in-the-nation PFAS Fund, a $70 million federal-state partnership aimed at providing compensation for commercial farmers whose health, business, and land have been impacted by PFAS contamination—offering a potential roadmap for other states and Congress to adopt remediation efforts more broadly. (See Daily News here.) Beyond Pesticides has also engaged in litigation efforts on potentially contaminated products, as we filed a lawsuit against The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company and GreenTechnologies, LLC last fall for allegedly misleading consumers on the hazardous nature of their fertilizer products, which contain sewage sludge (often referred to as biosolids). (See Daily News here.)

For more information and context on the potential for compost as both a threat and an ally to organic food systems, see its dedicated Daily News section here.

Call to Action

Federal law on pesticides and organic farming only goes so far as the public is willing to engage in the process and prove that it is of broader public interest. The value of U.S. federal organic law, as defined by the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA), is that there is a requirement to host biannual NOSB public meetings to hear from the public on a suite of various issues.

Beyond Pesticides has developed and actively maintains the Keeping Organic Strong resource hub, a one-stop shop for you to learn about changes in organic regulations, see the Fall 2025 issues, and review our written comments for all issues that will be raised before the NOSB and five associated subcommittees. The Fall National Organic Standards Board meeting will be held both in person in Omaha, Nebraska, and virtually, via live-stream from November 4, 2025, to November 6, 2025. The deadline for written comments on the Fall 2025 issues is 11:59 pm EDT on October 8, 2025, and the Public Comment Webinars will be held on October 28 and 30, 2025, from 12 pm to 5 pm EDT.

There is currently an opportunity for the public to weigh in on the integrity of national organic standards, as the National Organic Standards Board convenes to discuss key issues and allowed materials in organic agriculture. The public can see a discussion of issues before the board and submit comments (using Beyond Pesticides’ positions) by October 8. To submit comments, please click HERE. For more background, see Keeping Organic Strong and the Fall 2025 issues page. 

You can also take action here by contacting your members of Congress to co-sponsor and support organic bills that have recently been introduced in the first year of the 119^th Session of Congress.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source: Science of The Total Environment

(Beyond Pesticides, September 24, 2025) A novel study of chronic toxicity of the neonicotinoid insecticide thiamethoxam to honey bees (Apis mellifera), published in Insects, finds sublethal effects that threaten the survival of bee larvae and the health of bee colonies. “We evaluated the effects of thiamethoxam on the entire larval development cycle of reproductive bees and conducted a comparative analysis, demonstrating that thiamethoxam significantly alters ecdysone [a hormone that controls molting in insects] and juvenile hormone titers [hormones for insect growth] in both queen and drone larvae, impairing metamorphosis and reproductive development,” the authors state.

Risk assessments and scientific literature focus primarily on honey bee workers, rarely including how pesticides can impact queen and drone bees that are necessary for stable colonies. In focusing on this data gap, the researchers reveal that the survival rate of bee larvae decreases gradually with increasing doses of thiamethoxam, adding to the wide body of science on pesticide-related threats to honey bee health. (See Beyond Pesticides’ What the Science Shows on Biodiversity page for more information, as well as Daily News coverage on risk assessments here, here, and here.)

Honey bees provide crucial ecosystem services as pollinating insects and play a vital role in maintaining biodiversity. “In healthy colonies, the reproductive success of the queen and the genetic contribution of drones are essential for long-term survival, directly affecting brood production, genetic diversity, and environmental adaptability,” the researchers note.

This study assesses effects on reproductive bees (queens and drones) with exposure to thiamethoxam for key developmental and physiological parameters, including survival, pupation rate (ratio of immature insects that successfully develop into pupae, the stage between larva and adult), eclosion rate (the speed or proportion of insects that emerge from their pupal cases to become adults), hormone titers, and detoxification enzyme activities. “Our finding reveals that thiamethoxam exerts sublethal effects on larvae, significantly impairing the fitness of reproductive bees,” the authors explain. “Specifically, exposure altered juvenile hormone III, ecdysone titer, and acetylcholinesterase activity [enzyme activity necessary for nervous system and cognitive functioning] in reproductive larvae, with these effects showing a negative correlation with pesticide concentration.”

Pollinators and Pesticides

The delicate balance seen in nature, with proper ecosystem functioning, relies on rich biodiversity. Insects, such as honey bees, are particularly crucial for pollination, which many plants depend on for survival and reproduction. The role of pollinators in global crop yields and biodiversity in natural ecosystems is threatened by environmental contaminants.

Research in the early 2000s documented the phenomenon of Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), which is “characterized by the abrupt and widespread disappearance of worker bees from a colony, resulting in hives inhabited solely by the queen and immature brood, while honey and pollen stores remain intact and unplundered.” As the researchers describe: “This syndrome typically results in the eventual collapse of the colony. Declining honey bee populations and CCD are spreading globally, raising concerns about food supply shortages and diminishing biodiversity in ecosystems.” (See study here.)

The role of hazardous chemicals in CCD is widely documented in scientific literature, with research highlighting the multifactorial stressors that impact bees, including climate change, parasite infestations, pathogenic infections, inadequate nutrition, and pesticide exposure. (Learn about how pesticides exacerbate effects of parasitic Varroa mites in Daily News articles here and here.)

Study Methodology and Results

With research on thiamethoxam and bees mainly focused on worker bees, gatherers in particular, this study offers valuable insight into impacts on drones and queens that contribute to the stable reproduction of bee colonies. The quality of bee colonies is determined by the reproductive bees (drones and queens) as the mated drones transfer semen to queens. “As a result, elements that affect drone fecundity will also have an immediate impact on the colony’s offspring,” the authors point out. They continue, “Although a drone’s lifespan is short and its function is simple, the drone holds significant value in bee breeding because of its unique genetic structure.”

To investigate the sublethal effects of thiamethoxam on the reproductive bees, the researchers added three concentrations of the compound alongside fresh royal jelly (a substance produced by worker bees as a food source for queen bees and larvae) and supplied it to larvae obtained from honey bee colonies. To determine the dosages for the study, additional research was utilized, where levels of thiamethoxam in nectar, pollen, and plant secretions range from 1 to 100 mg/kg (equivalent to 1,000 to 100,000 μg/L), to provide environmentally relevant concentrations.

Within the study, the low, medium, and high concentrations of 3 μg/L, 25 μg/L, and 2300 μg/L all fall well below the highest values referenced above. After exposure, statistical analyses of survival rate data, larval enzyme activity, hormone titer, larval mortality, pupation rate, eclosion rate, and pupal weight and length were performed and analyzed.

The results reveal sublethal effects of thiamethoxam on the overall survival of queen and drone honey bee larvae that lead to chronic impacts impacting development into adulthood. All concentrations significantly reduce the total survival rate of queen bee larvae. However, in drones, only the highest concentration results in a significant reduction in the overall survival rate of larvae. At this dosage, pupation rates of drones also significantly decrease.

Exposure to thiamethoxam at the medium and high concentrations leads to pronounced detrimental effects on pupal development. In the queen bees, they significantly reduce pupal weight. Drone pupae at these levels also exhibit a significant decrease in pupal length, indicating impacts of thiamethoxam on growth and morphogenesis during pupal development. In drones, all three concentrations significantly lower pupal weight, “suggesting that even low thiamethoxam concentrations could negatively affect nutrient accumulation or metabolic processes during development,” the researchers explain.

At the high level, both emergence and eclosion rates significantly decline when compared to the control group. Enzyme activity, particularly in those related to oxidative stress and detoxification, is impacted, with both drone and queen larvae experiencing dose-dependent decreases. The hormones related to insect development and growth also exhibit dose-dependent effects in all treatments.

“We showed that the exposure of the reproductive bee larvae to thiamethoxam may influence the survival rate, pupation rate, eclosion rate, hormone titer, and enzyme activity when present in the field,” the authors summarize. They continue: “Pesticide exposure resulted in the spreading of poor-quality semen and affected the offspring, although the physical integrity of the drone was maintained. If the physiology and detoxification enzyme system of queens is strongly impacted and jeopardizes their survival, the mating success rate might be compromised and generate a shortage of healthy workers in congregation areas, which would be highly detrimental to the species.”

The findings of this study demonstrate how thiamethoxam adversely affects the growth and development of reproductive bees, thereby threatening colony stability and success. “Collectively, these interactions form a vicious cycle: pesticide-induced stress perturbs detoxification and neuroendocrine functions, which in turn exacerbate metabolic deficits and ultimately lead to behavioral abnormalities, reduced longevity, and colony decline,” the researchers conclude.

Previous Research

There are a large number of studies highlighting the effects of neonicotinoids on honey bees, as well as other species of bees. Many studies highlight the impacts of various chemicals within the class of neonicotinoids on the learning and foraging of honey bees that impair colony fitness, while additional studies specifically involving thiamethoxam report effects on visual learning, altered decision times, and increased abnormal behaviors. (See examples of scientific literature here and here.)

One experiment in a colony feeding study of honey bees demonstrates how thiamethoxam exerts significant sublethal effects on larval development. As the current study authors note: “Their experimental findings indicate that chronic exposure to environmentally relevant concentrations of thiamethoxam severely impairs larval viability and leads to a marked reduction in adult emergence rates, particularly in queen-rearing colonies. Our current findings on chronic toxicity in reproductive bees corroborate and extend these observations, revealing that elevated thiamethoxam concentrations induce statistically significant reductions in emergence success for both queen and drone.”

Previous Daily News coverage further highlights risks from neonicotinoid exposure that extend to other species, including humans. See Study Adds to Findings of Neonic Insecticides’ Threat to Soil Communities; Ground Beetles at Risk for an analysis of a study conducted in Pennsylvania and published in Environmental Entomology that reveals threats to nontarget organisms from neonicotinoid insecticide exposure. Neonicotinoid Exposure Threatens Fish Health, Highlighting Cascading Effects to Humans as Consumers reports on a study in Environmental Pollutants and Bioavailability that finds genotoxicity, oxidative stress, and changes in tissue structure, among other threats to organ function and overall fish health, from thiamethoxam exposure that can lead to impacts throughout the entire food web.

Organic Solution

Sublethal effects from thiamethoxam to drones and queens, as documented in the current study, threaten their essential role in the life cycle of a honey bee colony. To mitigate these effects, as well as numerous others to pollinators and other insects, Beyond Pesticides urges the widespread adoption of organic agriculture and land management. Not only does this holistic solution remove the use of petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, including but not limited to neonicotinoid insecticides, that threaten honey bees, but it also protects and enhances biodiversity and mitigates both the climate change and public health crises we are currently experiencing.

For more information on the direct impacts of organic practices on pollinators, see Study Adds to Wide Body of Science Highlighting Benefits of Organic for Insect Biodiversity. Additional health and environmental benefits are available here and here.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Li, M.-J. et al. (2025) Systemic Assessment of Chronic Toxicity of Thiamethoxam on Honeybees (Apis mellifera), Insects. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4450/16/9/936.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 23, 2025) A study published in European Journal of Agronomy, based on a 16-year, long-term experiment (LTE), finds that organic crops (cotton production with wheat and soybean rotations) in tropical climates are competitive with chemical-intensive (conventional) systems when evaluating systems’ resilience (to weather and insect resistance), input costs, and profitability. One of the underlying assumptions of continuous pesticide use is that they will continue to serve as effective weapons in the never-ending war against insects, weeds, and fungal diseases that threaten the economic viability and sustainability of the farming operations. While organic systems faced reduced yields due to pest pressures from pink bollworm infestations, their relative decline was much smaller than that of the chemical-intensive operations. This study’s findings indicate that a different direction is not only possible, but necessary, for the long-term financial viability of farms. Farmers understand that the health of the soil is a compounding investment that will help or hurt you depending on the actions taken yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

The authors state in the study introduction that the long-term study is critical when studying organic productivity and profitability because short-term studies fail to capture. “Critical variables like soil health, pest dynamics, and nutrient cycling often change slowly and can have cumulative effects over the long term,” the authors note.

The authors note that the study does not explore in detail the adverse impact of chemical-intensive farming on water, biodiversity, and climate, and the costs associated with these “externalities.” The authors write: “It is important to note that this study focuses on farm-gate transactions and does not account for the broader environmental and social externalities associated with each production system. A true cost accounting framework, which incorporates the internalization of these externalities – deemed crucial for achieving the sustainability of agri-food systems (Sandhu, 2021, Sandhu et al., 2019) – would likely alter the perceived balance of productivity and profitability between organic and conventional production systems.” See the previous Daily News, Study Shows Value of Organic Practices in Lowering Environmental Impact of Agriculture, which addresses the benefits of organic land management as a public good.

Background and Methodology

This study was conducted in Madhya Pradesh, India, a climate known for roughly 1,200 millimeters (or 47 inches) of annual rainfall, largely in the monsoon season (June to September). This tropical environment was selected because of the gap in research on LTEs in tropical farmland “managed by smallholders with limited resources who face economic challenges, including price volatility and crop failure.” Many pesticide products and genetically engineered seeds (in this study, for Bt incorporated plants) are marketed in tropical regions to farmers who disproportionately face the effects of environmentally induced illness, biodiversity loss, and the climate crisis, despite the opportunity with organic practices to move away from the very petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers associated with these threats.

The study followed a 16-year rotational crop cycle between 2007 and 2022. The experimental design of the plots was randomized with four systems: BIOORG (organic according to European Union and U.S. standards), BIODYN (biodynamic standards that run stricter than organic certification), CON (conventional without the use of Bt Cotton, using local practices alongside synthetic inputs), and CONBtC (conventional with the Bt cotton and synthetic inputs). Each treatment was replicated four times for posterity and data gathering reassurances. The management practices for CON and ConBtC include synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, as well as fertilizer inputs aligned with regional recommendations. The organic system practices included pest management (botanicals and biological methods) and nutrient augmentation (farmyard manure, compost, and green manures), consisting of no synthetic inputs in accordance with organic principles. The rotational cycle moved in the following chronological order: Corn, soybeans, wheat (with a second wheat or chickpea rotated in after a set number of years). The cotton varieties were non-Bt hybrids for CON and organic systems, and it was a Bt hybrid for CONBtC.

In terms of data collection, the yields were measured annually for each crop and harvested from central subplots to avoid potential spillage and subsequent potential data distortion. The production costs were recorded and largely based on local market prices. The profitability was generally calculated as gross revenue subtracted from the variable costs, with the market premiums of organic products assumed after the standard 3-year conversion period.

This study was published in partnership with Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), Bern University of Applied Sciences (Switzerland), and the organic farming research and advocacy group bioRe Association (India). The researchers disclosed that funding for this study was provided by the Coop Sustainability Fund, as well as additional support from the Biovision Foundation for Ecological Development, the Liechtenstein Development Service (LED), and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). The authors declared that “the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.”

Results

The main findings of this study in terms of performance of organic systems can be broken down into three main categories: crop yields, production (input and labor) costs, and gross margins (profitability).

Crop Yields

1. Organic cotton was more stable during pink bollworm outbreaks relative to the other three farming models in terms of conventional options. Additionally, organic cotton was not as competitive relative to conventional yields (although yields were sometimes comparable in non-Bt conventional plots).
2. Organic soybeans yielded on average 102%  of chemical-intensive yields, which researchers note as an intrinsic benefit of biological nitrogen fixation, permitting organic soybeans to thrive without synthetic fertilizer in this system.
3. Organic wheat generally underperformed compared to chemical-intensive alternatives (77-80% of conventional yields), with the critical limiting factor being the slow release of nutrients and nitrogen deficiency post-cotton harvest. A follow-up experiment could intercrop leguminous plants, grasses, and/or other natural nitrogen fixers for one season before planting the wheat crops to see if there is a positive difference in yields.
4. The diversification of chickpeas as the second rotation instead of wheat reduced potential risk and strengthened the profitability of the organic system as a whole.
   

   Production Costs

1. Organic soybeans were found to have 28% less production costs compared to chemical-intensive counterparts due to no need for synthetic fertilizers or pesticides.
2. Organic cotton was cost-competitive in earlier cycles due to lower input costs; however, labor and input costs increased in later cycles, making it less competitive than chemical-intensive plots.
3. Organic wheat had 6% lower production costs than conventional wheat; however, the reduced yields in the researchers’ experimental design negate these gains.

   Profitability

   1. A combination of wheat and chickpea intercropped on shared plots could help compensate for challenges with the former’s yield challenges.
   2. The profitability of organic soybeans is greater than chemical-intensive farming because of the significant reduction in production costs.
   3. Organic wheat and cotton margins fall below chemical-intensive counterparts.
   
   Previous Research

The U.S. is currently the fourth largest cotton producer (domestic and export) and the largest cotton exporter in the world, accounting for 30% of all cotton produced, valued at $5.7 billion (2021). The farm value of U.S. organic cotton is $35.55 million (2021). There are 83 certified organic cotton farms in the United States compared to roughly 7,724 non-organic farms (2022). According to the Organic Trade Association, organic cotton comprises approximately 0.95% of global cotton production. Despite its small size, there are viable organic alternatives to the chemical-intensive status quo, even for commodities like cotton, which face significant pest pressures regardless of the land management system.

There are efforts to increase organic certified cotton production. In August 2024, the Center for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI) earned the 2024 Innovators Award from The Better Cotton Initiative (Better Cotton) for its leadership in developing capacity and expansion of organic standards and practices in the Pakistani cotton sector, according to a press release by Better Cotton. Given the millions of pounds of some of the most toxic chemicals used to produce cotton, and Pakistan being an exporter of $3.5 billion worth of cotton (2021), including $240 million to the U.S. (2022), cotton production is a worldwide contamination problem. (See Daily News here.)

While eliminating the toxic pesticides, organic cotton processing is still reliant on the toxic hydrogen chloride to delint cotton seeds before planting. Under the banner of “continuous improvement,” Beyond Pesticides has called for more urgency in supporting research on alternatives that are more compatible with organic principles. “It is our understanding, from conversations with a representative of the Texas Organic Cotton Marketing Cooperative, that organic cotton growers in the U.S. currently do not have a lot of choice about how their seed is prepared for planting,” says Terry Shistar, Ph.D., Board of Directors at Beyond Pesticides. See Beyond Pesticides’ full NOSB comments on relisting hydrogen chloride to support organic cotton growers and the call for less toxic alternatives.

A significant barrier to accessing or maintaining organic transition for aspiring, transitioning, and existing organic farmers is the lack of trained experts in organic production at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), including other agricultural support grants, initiatives, and programs including the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) and Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) (administered by Natural Resources Conservation Service), and crop insurance (administered by Risk Management Agency).

Crop insurance serves as an important example of the deficiency in assistance. “Many of the farmers who had diversified operations did not purchase crop insurance and expressed little to no interest in doing so in the future,” according to the survey of 34 individual farmers and organic advocates interviewed for a study conducted by researchers at New York University (NYU). For the handful of farmers who did participate in insurance, they were disappointed in the benefits. “A key recommendation from this study is the creation of specialized, highly trained crop insurance and conservation agents with expertise in organic farming systems to facilitate the application process and program use for conservation programs and crop insurance,” according to the researchers. 

Call to Action

The future of organic depends on the public’s willingness to advocate for its continued success and growth through public comments. It becomes more challenging for elected officials to ignore the broad support for organic farming, land management, and unrestricted access to toxic-free spaces and products on the open market when people, businesses, farms, and communities speak up.

You can demand change by signing up here to become an advocate for the Parks for a Sustainable Future Program. Organic is not just a food label, but a set of criteria and practices codified in federal law and enforced by USDA that can be applied to other forms of land and pest management, including public green spaces. See here for one of our newest pilot projects in partnership with the City of Excelsior, Minnesota, written in Environment+Energy Leader. You can also contact your U.S. Representative and Senators to cosponsor relevant legislation, including Organic Science and Research Investment (OSRI) Act, S.1385, the New Producer Economic Security Act, S.1237, (previously Increasing Land, Security, and Opportunities (LASO) Act, H.R.3955, in 2023-24), the newly-introduced Organic Imports Verification Act (OIVA), S.1398, and Local Farmers Feeding our Communities Act, (H.R.4782).

There is currently an opportunity for the public to weigh in on the integrity of national organic standards, as the National Organic Standards Board convenes to discuss key issues and allowed materials in organic agriculture. The public can see a discussion of issues before the board and submit comments (using Beyond Pesticides’ positions) by October 8. To submit comments, please click HERE. For more background, see Keeping Organic Strong and the Fall 2025 issues page.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides. 

Source: European Journal of Agronomy

(Beyond Pesticides, September 22, 2025) Comments are due by 11:59 pm ET on October 8, 2025!

When the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meets twice a year, it is an opportunity for the public to weigh in on the integrity of organic standards, a process referred to among stakeholders as “continuous improvement.” There are major issues before the board at the upcoming October remote public hearing and in-person in November.

As a means of taking on the challenges of health threats, biodiversity collapse, and the climate emergency, the review and updating of organic standards requires the public’s involvement in the current public comment period—to keep organic strong and continually improving.  

The Fall National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meeting is scheduled for November 4 – 6, 2025. The public meeting of the NOSB is preceded by an opportunity for public comments in writing and via online webinars on October 28 and 30, 2025, from 12 pm to 5 pm ET, that concern how organic food is produced. ℹ️ A draft meeting agenda is available here; a more detailed document with proposals and discussion documents is available here.

• Sign up for a 3-minute oral public comment timeslot by Wednesday, October 8! Remember, sign-ups fill up fast! 
• Written comments must be submitted through Regulations.gov by 11:59 pm ET on Wednesday, October 8, but please get them in as early as possible!
• Links to the virtual comment webinars and the public meeting will be posted on this webpage soon after the comment deadline.

The NOSB is responsible for guiding the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in its administration of the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA), including the materials (substances) allowed to be used in organic production and handling. The role of the NOSB is especially important as we depend on organic production to protect our ecosystem, mitigate climate change, and enhance our health. 

The NOSB plays an important role in bringing the views of organic producers and consumers to bear on USDA, which is not always in sync with the principles and values that have built the organic market. There are many important issues on the NOSB agenda this Fall. We also encourage you to use the Beyond Pesticides organic webpage and comment on as many issues as you can. ℹ️ For a complete discussion, see the Keeping Organic Strong and the Fall 2025 issues page.

Beyond Pesticides has identified many key issues that are before the board. Four of these issues, and Beyond Pesticides’ positions, include the following:

1. Keep synthetic “compostables” out of organic compost. 
   Please support the proposal of the Crops Subcommittee (CS) to keep synthetic compostable materials out of organic compost. Compost from plant and animal materials is of fundamental importance to organic practices. Composting is one way that organic growers meet the requirement in law to “foster soil fertility, primarily through the management of the organic content of the soil through proper tillage, crop rotation, and manuring.” The integrity of organic production must be maintained by preserving the integrity of compost. Contaminants in broadly defined “compost feedstocks” cannot be predicted, but history suggests that more persistent toxic pollutants will be found. The NOSB must maintain control over synthetic materials allowed in organic production, as required by the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA). Research continues to raise alarms about the hazards associated with the use of plastic, including the microplastic particles that are distributed in alarming amounts throughout the environment and taken up by organisms, including humans. Only synthetic materials that are specifically added to the National List through the prescribed process should be allowed in compost destined to be an input into organic production. The NOSB should reopen the workplan item on contaminated inputs that is currently on hold.
   
   
2. Keep synthetic hormones out of organic milk production.
   Oxytocin is available as a synthetic hormone and currently allowed in organic dairy. A vague annotation has resulted in some producers using it inappropriately for milk letdown. Oxytocin is a hormone and, even if rarely used, it leaves organic dairy farmers open to valid criticism that they can still use hormones. For this reason, the two largest organic milk buyers in the U.S. did not support it remaining on the National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances. Alternative treatments are available. The NOSB should allow oxytocin to sunset or be removed from the National List. If it remains on the National List, the NOSB should adopt the recommended annotation, “use in post parturition therapeutic applications within 3 days after birth. It may not be administered to increase an animal’s milk production or for milk letdown.”
   
   
3. Eliminate the blanket allowance of “inert ingredients.” 
   Despite repeated recommendations from the NOSB, the National Organic Program at USDA has not moved to evaluate individual “inert” ingredients, which may be more toxic than active ingredients allowed in organic production and make up the largest part of pesticide products. The NOSB should delist them unless individually reviewed under the National List review standards.
   
   
4. Ensure that online organic consumers have full information.
   The law requires that organic products are labeled with the organic seal, ingredients, and identification of the certifier. This labeling is not always visible to online consumers. The NOP must require full labels to be provided in online sales platforms. 

📣  The public can sign up and access the site to leave a message for the NOSB by clicking here to go to the Action page! Please feel free to “copy and paste” Beyond Pesticides’ comments, or parts of the comments, when submitting.

For more information on organic, see Beyond Pesticides’ organic agriculture webpage.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 19, 2025) In Water Science and Engineering, a study investigating the occurrence and distribution of agricultural pesticides in a river–lake system of the Taihu Lake Basin in China through surface runoff finds adverse effects on nontarget organisms that threaten ecological security. In evaluating the risks to aquatic organisms, the researchers highlight how pesticide residues in surface water and sediments jeopardize the entire food web, as risks are present throughout multiple trophic levels (positions in the food chain).

The results show that in surface waters, the fungicide carbendazim is the dominant pollutant with 23.66% of the contamination. Within the sediment samples, the fungicide tebuconazole is the primary contributor at 28.57%. Overall, fungicides are the main type of pesticide present in the tested river water and sediments. These compounds account for 76.86% and 85.10% of contamination, respectively. The authors also note that pesticide concentrations in both water and sediments in the rivers increase while moving downstream.

“Ecological risk assessment revealed high mixed risks to algae, daphnia [water fleas], and fish, with risk levels rising along with trophic levels of aquatic organisms,” the researchers state. They continue, “[C]ertain pesticides posed high risks to algae even at low concentrations, indicating more targeted toxicity for lower trophic organisms.” This is concerning, as pesticide residues from agricultural areas around the world enter aquatic environments through surface runoff, atmospheric deposition, rainfall, and other pathways. These chemicals then pose a risk to aquatic organisms and entire ecosystems, as they create toxic health effects and destabilize ecosystem functioning.

As the study notes, China is among the largest producers and consumers of pesticides worldwide, with previous research finding the country applying pesticides at rates 1.5-4.0 times higher per hectare than the global average. Studying river–lake systems, which are interconnected ecosystems where rivers connect to lakes, allowing for the transport, transformation, and storage of water, nutrients, and sediment, highlights how hydrological conditions in these bodies of water can affect the levels of pesticides that then expose aquatic organisms.

In summarizing the need for this research, the authors say, “While many studies have examined the storage characteristics of pesticides in surface water, research on the transport dynamics of pesticides in rivers and lakes remains insufficient, limiting accurate assessment of pesticide exposure scenarios and ecological risks.”

Study Methodology and Results

The researchers established 23 sites throughout Gehu Lake, Taihu Lake, and the rivers connecting them, taking water and sediment samples to analyze. In performing chromatographic and mass spectrometric analyses, the study was able to identify pesticide residues present and perform ecological risk assessments.

In the surface waters, a total of 34 pesticides are detected, with fifteen pesticides, including the fungicides carbendazim and hexaconazole, in 100% of samples. Twenty-five of the pesticides have detection rates above 50%. Within the sediment samples, a total of 20 pesticides are detected. Notably, pesticide pollution is more severe in the sediments of Gehu Lake, followed by the connecting rivers and then Taihu Lake. The levels within the sediment reveal carbendazim and tebuconazole in 100% of samples, while the fungicides prometryn, hexaconazole, and propiconazole are detected above 90%. Fungicides are the most detected contaminants in both the water and sediment samples.

“Pesticide contamination in rivers within the river–lake system intensified downstream, with average total concentrations increasing by 33%,” the authors write. They continue: “Notably, the concentrations of key pollutants carbendazim and hexaconazole increased by 19% and 65%, respectively. Propiconazole, isocarbofos [insecticide], and ten other pesticides exhibited concentration increases exceeding 50%. In river sediments, carbendazim concentrations increased by over 80% in downstream sediments, while prometryn levels rose more than fourfold. These results highlight the critical role of rivers as conduits for pollutant transport to the lakes and water exchange in the river–lake system.”

In terms of risks to aquatic organisms, the study finds propiconazole, carbendazim, phorate sulfone (metabolite of the organophosphate insecticide phorate), and forchlorfenuron (synthetic plant growth regulator) all pose high ecological risks to algae. The researchers note that, “Chronic exposure to such pesticides can alter algal community composition, destabilizing the foundational food webs of aquatic ecosystems and threatening biodiversity.”

In daphnia, tebuconazole and carbendazim constitute the highest calculated ecological risk, jointly accounting for over 80%, and represent the risks to aquatic invertebrate populations from pesticide exposure. In determining the ecological risk values in fish, the data show that tebuconazole poses a consistently high risk at all sampling sites, contributing 69.34% to the overall risk. Imidacloprid (neonicotinoid insecticide), carbendazim, hexaconazole, propiconazole, and tetraconazole also present high risks at more than 60% of the sampling sites.

Overall, the ecological risks of pesticides to aquatic organisms increase throughout the trophic levels. “Tebuconazole, identified as the primary pollutant in both surface water and sediments, contribute[s] to ecological risks across three trophic levels in the descending order of fish (69.37%), daphnia (17.55%), and algae (0.12%), indicating strong bioconcentration potential of pesticides in aquatic organisms,” the researchers state.

Previous Research

Scientific literature cited within the current study adds to a wide body of science connecting pesticide exposure to deleterious impacts on nontarget organisms. Results include:

• Exposure of Oryzias latipes to the herbicide atrazine “induces transgenerational genetic abnormalities such as hermaphroditism and organ feminization.” (See study here.)
• A study finds that the insecticide parathion-methyl inhibits photosynthesis and impairs cyanobacterial growth.
• “Glyphosate [herbicide] has been shown to destabilize aquatic plant community structure, and metolachlor [herbicide] exposure leads to reduced aquatic population richness and biodiversity loss.” (See here, here, and here.)
• Tebuconazole is toxic to daphnia, significantly inhibiting their reproduction, and “exhibits cumulative toxicity, potentially accumulating in fish via the food chain and causing liver toxicity.” (See research here and here.)
• Carbendazim induces heritable DNA damage in daphnia populations.
• Fenbuconazole (fungicide) and metolachlor exposure in fish causes developmental toxicity and hepatotoxicity. (See here, here, and here.)

Resources and Daily News coverage from Beyond Pesticides on waterway contamination highlights how water is being polluted at unprecedented rates, with pesticides, industrial chemicals, nutrients, metals, and other contaminants. Environmental and health advocates say it is essential that these pesticide contaminants not invade waterways and drinking water. Improper oversight and lax enforcement mean that many of these pesticides do, in fact, continue to contaminate the environment. (See the Pesticides and You article entitled Poisoned Waterways here and additional Daily News articles here, here, here, and here.)

Take Action

To prevent the deleterious health effects to aquatic organisms from pesticide exposure, as outlined here, as well as the broader impacts on biodiversity, human health, and the environment, a widespread transition to organic agriculture and land management is necessary. (See more on the health and environmental benefits of organic practices here and here.)

Help support the organic solution by buying organic products (on a budget!), growing your own organic food, becoming a Parks Advocate with the Parks for a Sustainable Future program, and taking action with Action of the Week.

For more information, see Beyond Pesticides’ previous action: >> Tell your U.S. Representative and Senators to ensure that agencies reaffirm U.S. commitment to restoring and maintaining the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of all the nation’s protected water resources.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Qin, Y. et al. (2025) Occurrence and ecological risk of typical pesticides in a river–lake system, Water Science and Engineering. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674237025000833.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 18, 2025) Published in Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology, a study of earthworms (Eisenia fetida) evaluates the toxicity of environmentally relevant levels of three fluorinated pesticides (fluxapyroxad, fluopyram, and bixafen) through a 56-day soil exposure experiment. The dose- and time-dependent results reveal that effects on growth and reproduction occur at elevated concentrations, with weight loss and reduced offspring occurring from energy depletion and reproductive organ damage. Other implications escalate with concentration as well, including antioxidant system failure and DNA damage. As the authors summarize, “These findings highlight the mechanisms of fluorine-containing pesticide toxicity in earthworms, emphasizing their potential to disrupt soil ecosystems.”

Fluorine-containing pesticides are widely used in agriculture, yet the chronic effects on soil and soil organisms are not fully considered in regulatory review. Research comparing the similarities and differences in the impacts on nontarget organisms from fluorinated pesticides is lacking, with the current study beginning to address the urgent need to close this gap.

“Data indicate that among more than 100 newly developed pesticides, fluorine-containing pesticides constitute nearly half, making them a focal point in the development of the global pesticide industry,” the researchers state. As representatives of the fluorinated pesticides class, particularly succinate dehydrogenase inhibitors (SDHIs), this study focuses on the fluorinated pesticides fluxapyroxad, fluopyram, and bixafen.

SDHIs are “the third largest class of fungicides followed by methoxyacrylates and triazoles,” with long residual periods in the soil, and “can interfere with the electron transport chain of complex II in the mitochondrial acid cycle, thereby inhibiting mitochondrial function, preventing energy production, halting pathogen growth, and ultimately causing the death of the pathogen.” As earthworms can act as bioindicators of soil health, impacts on these organisms from SDHIs give insight into wider implications for soil ecosystems and ecosystem functioning.

As covered in Daily News, the definition of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), also known as “forever chemicals” due to their persistence, continues to be debated in regulatory agencies, with many scientists arguing that certain types of chemicals in this vast group are not accurately captured in risk assessments such as those that fall into the broad category of fluorine-containing pesticides. Recent research, documented in a literature review in Environmental Science & Technology, highlights the importance of a universal, cohesive definition of PFAS that incorporates all fluorinated compounds and would include the three pesticides in the current study.

Beyond Pesticides’ recent comments to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regarding a new active fungicidal ingredient fluoxapiprolin, a fluorinated compound, highlight how fluorine-containing pesticides are often resistant to degradation, are linked to endocrine disruption, and may be more likely to be immunotoxic than other types of active ingredients, but are not properly researched as a requirement of registration. (See additional information in the comments here.)

Study Methodology and Results

The earthworms from each test group were analyzed after exposure times of 7, 14, 21, and 28 days. By exposing earthworms to different concentrations and exposure times of fluxapyroxad, fluopyram, and bixafen, the authors’ aims were to:

1. Assess the effects on the body weight and reproduction of earthworms;
2. Evaluate the effects on enzymatic biomarkers;
3. Investigate the pathological effects on the epidermis, intestine, and seminal vesicle tissues of earthworms; and
4. Comprehensively analyze and compare the toxicity of the three fluorine-containing pesticides to earthworms in soil ecosystems.

Studying effects on earthworm growth and reproduction is accomplished by measuring changes in body weight and offspring numbers. The results show that “medium and high concentrations progressively suppressed growth, with stronger inhibition observed at higher exposure levels,” with changes in energy metabolism. The decreased weight is attributed to impaired feeding activity, metabolic function, and energy storage capacity. Medium and high concentrations also show dose-dependent suppression of offspring production, suggesting that these three fungicides may directly damage reproductive tissues or disrupt associated physiological processes.

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are important for complex biological processes essential for maintaining homeostasis within organisms. A balance of ROS generation and elimination is needed for proper functioning, but exposure to environmental contaminants can disrupt the ROS balance in earthworm metabolic processes. Studies show that elevated ROS levels damage cellular components, including DNA, lipids, and proteins. Within the current study, a concentration-dependent ROS increase from day 7 to 14 is observed, demonstrating that fluxapyroxad, fluopyram, and bixafen exposure induces substantial ROS generation in earthworms that can cause oxidative stress.

When assessing levels of a biomarker used for evaluating contaminant-induced oxidative DNA damage, 8-OHdG, the study finds “levels in all treatment groups consistently exceeded control values throughout the fluxapyroxad exposure period, exhibiting dose-dependent elevation with increasing concentrations,” the authors explain. They continue, “Similar concentration-response patterns were observed for fluopyram and bixafen treatments, collectively indicating the capacity of these fungicides to induce oxidative DNA damage in earthworms.”

As mentioned, these three fluorinated pesticides are known as succinate dehydrogenase inhibitors (SDHIs). To further investigate how specific enzymatic targets operate in earthworms, this study analyzes the activity of succinate dehydrogenase, which the researchers describe as “an important mitochondrial enzyme that releases electrons into the mitochondrial electron transport chain, thereby promoting energy production.” The results show changes in succinate dehydrogenase activity upon exposure throughout the entire experiment, with notably lower levels in the highest concentration treatment group.

“[T]o evaluate the effects of fluxapyroxad, fluopyram and bixafen on digestive function and reproductive functions, we also examined the histopathological changes in intestinal tissue and seminal vesicle tissues,” the authors note. As a result, damage to midgut tissues and seminal vesicle tissues is observed, which may affect the production of germ cells and reproductive behavior and can explain the decreased rate of reproduction.

Biomarker responses following exposure, particularly for antioxidant enzymes such as SOD, CAT, and GST, suggest that fluxapyroxad, fluopyram, and bixafen impact adenosine phosphate production and mitochondrial function, which can lead to cell necrosis or apoptosis (cell death).

Previous Research

Additional scientific literature, cited within the current Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology study, highlights the effects of SDHI fungicides and fluorinated pesticides, as well as impacts specifically in earthworms, which adds to the wide body of science on pesticide-induced harm. Results include:

• Fluopyram impacts aquatic organisms by inducing developmental abnormalities in zebrafish embryos and exhibiting strong toxicity toward Daphnia magna and algae. (See studies here, here, and here.)
• Both fluxapyroxad and sulfoxaflor “induce oxidative stress responses in earthworms, causing tissue and DNA damage, while regulating gene expression and the activity of key enzymes such as succinate dehydrogenase.” (See here and here.)
• In zebrafish, fluxapyroxad interferes with embryogenesis by triggering oxidative stress.
• “Bixafen not only impairs hepatic and pancreatic functions in zebrafish but also shows high toxicity to Daphnia magna—chronic exposure to low concentrations reduces offspring production by 62% and decreases body size by 38% in water fleas.” (See studies here and here.)
• Earthworms chronically exposed to low doses of fluxapyroxad exhibit significant changes in biomarkers of oxidative stress and DNA damage, as well as suppression of biomarkers associated with neurotoxicity and other enzymes, which suggests “that fluxapyroxad exposure has adverse effects on oxidative damage, genotoxicity, and neurotoxicity, and the toxicities intensify with increasing concentration and duration of exposure.” (See study here.)
• Pesticide toxicity in earthworms is evident across multiple physiological and functional dimensions, including growth and reproductive toxicity, neurotoxicity and behavioral deficits, cytotoxicity that triggers immune and metabolic dysfunction (see here and here), and genotoxicity involving DNA strand breaks.
• “[P]esticides (e.g., deltamethrin, imidacloprid, chlorpyrifos) directly impair [earthworm] population sustainability by suppressing weight gain, disrupting germ cell integrity (e.g., sperm nuclear condensation, DNA fragmentation), and reducing cocoon production and hatching rates.” (See studies here, here, and here.)
• Oxidative stress in earthworms occurs as a result of excessive reactive oxygen species (ROS) accumulation driven by pesticide exposure, culminating in apoptosis (cell death) and tissue necrosis. (See here, here, and here.)

As Beyond Pesticides covered in the Daily News post entitled “Adding to Wide Body of Science, Study Finds Pesticide Residues Threaten Health of Soil Microbiome,” research shows a correlation between pesticide residue risks and soil ecological security and human health, revealing response characteristics of soil microbial communities under pesticide stress. (See more Daily News articles on soil health and the soil microbiome here and here.)

Organic Solution

To mitigate these threats to soil health and the soil microbiome, organic agriculture and land management offer a holistic solution. As shared in a Pesticides and You article, Thinking Holistically When Making Land Management Decisions, microbial communities in the soil and on plants contribute to plant growth and health. Soil communities include bacteria, fungi, earthworms, and other invertebrates that break down organic matter and make nutrients available to plants. Soil health is at the foundation of organic practices, which protect these soil organisms and the ecosystem services they provide.   

A decrease in soil microbial diversity reduces ecosystem functioning, with impacts on ecosystem services from decomposition of organic matter to nutrient cycling and carbon fixation. Chemical-intensive agriculture contributes to the loss of ecosystem services, while organic methods promote high soil diversit,y which allows for more efficient ecosystem functioning.

For more information, see Daily News Study Shows Value of Soil Microbiome, Nurtured in Organic Farming, Harmed by Chemical-Intensive Ag; Study Affirms that Organic Farming Improves Soil Health, Microbial Life, and Pathogen Resistance; and Literature Review Compares Increased Soil Benefits of Regenerative Organic to Chemical-Intensive Practices.     

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Shan, D. et al. (2025) Insights into the chronic toxicity and mechanisms of fluorine-containing pesticides on earthworms, Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1382668925001863.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 17, 2025) A study in Environmental Science & Technology finds additive effects of a synthetic pyrethroid insecticide (cypermethrin) and two fungicides (azoxystrobin and prochloraz) on biological control, biomass of major invertebrate trophic groups (position in food web), and soil ecosystem processes in arable systems (land suitable for growing crops). The study authors further highlight the failure of pesticide regulations to consider elaborate trophic interactions and pesticide mixtures, as well as additive and synergistic effects within their assessments, calling attention to the complexity of real-world exposures and the lack of research to fully understand the implications of chemical use for agricultural and land management purposes.

“Arable systems have a high dependence on diverse natural biota to support pest control, soil bioturbation, and nutrient recycling,” the researchers write. These communities rely on a balance of organisms within various trophic levels in order to function and provide vital ecosystem services. Disruptions caused by environmental contaminants, such as pesticides to nontarget organisms, impact entire ecosystems and overall biodiversity. As the authors state, current risk assessments underestimate the real-world risks of petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers that, despite a wide body of science connecting exposure to deleterious health and environmental effects, are still not fully understood.

There are complex interactions of chemical mixtures that occur as a result of the ”chemical soup” present in the environment, with underlying mechanisms that are incompletely comprehended. Rather than relying on a precautionary approach to protect health and the environment, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) utilizes unenforceable mitigation strategies to “reduce risks” and allows registrations based on insufficient scientific research. The risk assessment incorporates the assumption of 100% compliance with mitigation measures. (See more on the precautionary principle here, here, and here, as well as EPA failures here and here.)

Background and Relevance

The use of pesticides has grown exponentially since World War II, with many wartime chemicals transitioning to the consumer market, including the organochlorines (e.g., DDT) and organophosphates (e.g., malathion, chlorpyrifos). “The potential nontarget effects on biodiversity from these pesticides have required the development of regulatory procedures to mitigate risk,” the authors explain. They continue: “However, there is increasing concern that these fail to adequately capture the real-world consequences. Part of this failing relates to a focus during the regulatory process on single active ingredients, an emphasis on a restricted number of established model species (e.g., nontarget arthropods like honeybees, earthworms, springtails, and enchytraeids) from which risk is inferred and the lack of continuous instruction on the timing and dose of pesticide application.”

The use of a limited group of model species, in particular, is concerning as they “fail to capture how differential species sensitivity propagates through trophic interactions to affect wider system-level processes,” the researchers emphasize. (See more information in Daily News coverage on varying sensitivity between species and risk assessment deficiencies here and here.)

The pesticides included in the experiment are cypermethrin, a synthetic pyrethroid insecticide, and two fungicides, azoxystrobin and prochloraz, which documentation shows cause health and environmental effects ranging from toxicity to aquatic organisms and bees to neurotoxicity, endocrine disruption, and oxidative stress.

Study Methodology and Results

The study, performed in an open growing area in Southern England, uses arable communities of pests (aphids and weevils), predators (e.g., beetles, spiders, and mites), and soil biota (including mites and earthworms) to assess interactions between cypermethrin, azoxystrobin, and prochloraz as well as within trophic interactions as a result of exposure to these active ingredients. “This study is intended to provide new insights into the risks posed by pesticide synergisms within the context of trophically complex communities critical to the support of agricultural ecosystem services,” the authors summarize.

They continue: “In this study, we use a model arable mesocosm [controlled, semi-natural experimental ecosystem] approach to test the interacting effects of a widely used pyrethroid cypermethrin in combination with an azole fungicide prochloraz that has an established biochemical mechanism resulting in synergisms. We also tested the effects of the strobilurin fungicide azoxystrobin, for which there is little evidence for synergisms with pyrethroids.”

The results reveal that despite previous research supporting cypermethrin and prochloraz having increased interactions, cypermethrin and azoxystrobin have a greater than additive effect. “The synergism between cypermethrin and prochloraz was relatively small compared to that between cypermethrin and azoxystrobin,” the researchers state. “However, the synergism between cypermethrin and prochloraz was expected due to the inhibition of the cytochrome P450 monooxygenases,” which are proteins essential for metabolism.

The study analyzes the effects of the three pesticides individually and in pairwise combinations to establish how “key aspects of arable farming systems, including aphid pest control by ladybirds, biomass of key trophic levels, overall community food web structure, and soil organic matter recycling” is impacted following exposure. The methodology includes a description of the 35 mesocosms containing blended loam topsoil with organic matter and a seeded soil surface with a mixture of organic powdered oats and dried yeast flakes to provide resources for soil microfauna.

Two months before the application of the pesticides, field beans were transplanted into the soil, and then a sequential addition of arthropod communities began to build up the trophic levels of detritivores (animals that feed on dead organic matter), herbivore pests, and predators. In total, the experiment includes seven treatments ranging from the control (no pesticides) to each active ingredient individually and in pairs.

Assessments following pesticide applications incorporate arthropod sampling and soil sampling, with an assessment of decomposition rates of the breakdown of organic matter by soil macrofauna. Trophic links are also estimated using the WebBuilder function of its statistical package “to predict trophic interactions between the terrestrial and soil arthropod communities for each mesocosm.” These links are based on observed and established species feeding relationships within the mesocosm.

Within the experiment, the arable crop mesocosm system records show 30 taxonomic units (including species, genus, and order classifications), representing a total of 317,064 individuals from the trophic levels of detritivores, herbivores, and predators over the 4-week sampling period. Impacts on the organisms throughout the experiment show:

• Ladybird abundance responds significantly to the interaction between pesticide treatments and sample week, with the lowest numbers recorded with exposure to cypermethrin.
• Predator biomass experiences a significant interaction between pesticide treatment and sample week, suggesting implications for single or acute exposure versus continued exposure.
• “[T]here was in general greater evidence for impacts of all three types of pesticides, with the use of cypermethrin either alone or with the fungicides having negative effects that decreased predator biomass over time. The use of either fungicide alone or in combination also appeared to have net negative effects on predator biomass.” Detritivore biomass declines over time are also noted.
• Within the predator food web architecture, there is a trend for reduced node richness with cypermethrin (alone and in combination with azoxystrobin).
• Additional “changes in the architecture of predatory trophic interactions did show evidence for synergistic effects between cypermethrin and the fungicides.”
• There is a collapse in connectance (measure of network complexity), which represents the proportion of trophic links and is associated with system stability and robustness, which can impact biodiversity and its associated ecosystem processes. (See studies here and here.)
• Nutrient pathways and overall diversity in tropic interactions are affected by all three pesticides, implying “that these critical food webs have reduced functionality, with an equivalent reduction in this metric seen where communities suffer from overexploitation or invasive species.” The results suggest the diversity of nutrient pathways is additive with pesticide exposure.

The authors note that while the data highlights trophic level impacts with all three pesticides, and unexpected additive effects that are highest between cypermethrin and azoxystrobin, “more subtle effects may be occurring, resulting from sublethal behavioral changes (e.g., activity) that may affect their ability to impact soil ecosystem processes.” (See research here and here.) While mesocosms are able to act as an experimental model to study environmental changes under controlled conditions and offer insight, such as for complex interactions between trophic levels, they are inherently artificial and not representative of all factors within natural ecosystems that need to be considered.

Regulatory Deficiencies

As the researchers emphasize throughout the study, agricultural systems apply a wide range of pesticides, which are approved for use through regulatory processes that do not realistically consider all possible combinations and potential interactions between active ingredients. As a result of this, risks to health and the environment are often underestimated, as there is a potential for additive, or even greater than additive (synergistic), effects with pesticide mixtures. (See studies here, here, here, and here.)

The authors describe that, “Such synergistic risks can occur where pesticide active ingredients affect either: 1) the bioavailability of one or more compounds, e.g., by changing its half-life or altering interactions with organic matter to affect sorption; 2) toxicokinetics that change uptake and transport to target sites, e.g., via inhibition of transport proteins, competition for binding sites, metabolism, and/or excretion; or 3) toxicodynamics that change interactions with target sites or affect a species ability to combat the effects of exposure.” (See here, here, and here.)

There is significant potential for synergistic impacts on nontarget organisms, including those providing ecosystem services like pollination, natural pest control, and soil health benefits. However, regulatory assessments do not typically evaluate possible synergistic interactions, as well as the true impacts on community structure, which are highly complex, when exposed to pesticide mixtures.

“We have shown that while insecticide use has arguably predictable consequences for most invertebrates, it is only when consideration is given to complex measures of trophic interactions between species that synergistic risks between pyrethroids and strobilurin fungicides were identified,” the researchers conclude. They continue: “Yet, the current emphasis of pesticide regulatory approaches remains on a limited number of model species while rarely considering how changes in wider community composition can impact complex species interactions. Such interactions have implications for system resilience and ecosystem processes.”

Previous Research on Arthropods

Daily News coverage entitled “Cultivating with Natural Predators Gets Farmers Off the Pesticide Treadmill, According to Study” highlights how many of the pesticides used against insects, including neonicotinoid seed treatments, also kill other beneficial arthropods, as well as other soil invertebrates important to cycling nutrients naturally. The study finds arthropod predators suffer sharp declines in fields applied with pesticides and where seeds have been treated with neonicotinoids, as well as how slug damage can be reduced when natural slug predators are encouraged, allowing farmers to avoid the endless cycle of pesticide dependency, pest resistance, genetically engineered crops, and synthetic fertilizers.

Prior research in Germany, summarized in the Daily News, Study Shows Drastic Loss of Arthropods in German Grasslands and Forests, shows a steep decline of arthropod (insect and spider) populations in grasslands and forests, which adds to the growing body of evidence documenting the ongoing “insect apocalypse.” As noted, it is clear, based on the scientific literature, that the use of pesticides in industrial agriculture is greatly contributing to the rapid decline of insect populations, which then causes cascading impacts throughout the food web, such as with birds and other wildlife.

Support for the Organic Solution

A myriad of studies highlight the importance of insect biodiversity for ecosystem functioning, which is protected through organic land management practices. One study finds uncultivated field margins contain almost twice as many beneficial insects as cropped areas around farm fields, according to research published in the Journal of Insect Science. The study notes that these predators and parasitoids overwinter in diverse vegetation and can provide farmers an important jump start on spring pest problems instead of relying on toxic pesticides.

Another study also promotes the value of natural predators, highlighting how bats are crucial in suppressing pest arthropods in agroecosystems and contribute vitally to sustainable agriculture. (Read more in the Daily News here.) Additional coverage this year of a study in Conservation Genetics, entitled “Organic farming fosters arthropod diversity of specific insect guilds – evidence from metabarcoding,” showcases the negative effect of chemical-intensive, conventional farm management on insect populations when compared to organically managed meadows.

Visit Beyond Pesticides’ What the Science Shows on Biodiversity page for more research on how population declines are linked to pesticide exposure. As an alternative to these harmful chemicals, Beyond Pesticides advocates for the elimination of all petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers that are insufficiently studied and regulated, putting all organisms, including humans, at risk.

The widespread adoption of organic practices can mitigate these risks by protecting and enhancing biodiversity, safeguarding public health, and mitigating climate change. Learn more about the health and environmental benefits of the organic solution here and here and take action to advance organic, sustainable, and regenerative practices and policies.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Woodcock, B. et al. (2025) Synergistic Pesticide Effects on Complex Arthropod Trophic Interactions in Arable Systems, Environmental Science & Technology. Available at: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.5c04611.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 16, 2025) As reported in the Daily News on August 28, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it “will hold a public webinar [today], September 16, 2025, at 2:00 PM ET to provide information on the ecological runoff/erosion and spray drift mitigation measures that can be used to protect endangered species from pesticides.” This follows closely behind an earlier announcement of a newly released Pesticide App for Label Mitigations (PALM) mobile tool to assist in implementing these mitigation measures. Despite boasting that the PALM tool is a “one-stop shop” for farmers to use EPA’s mitigation menu, which the agency claims helps to protect nontarget species, environmental critics say that self-directed mitigation without a rigorous reporting and enforcement apparatus fails to meet the level of protection that is necessary under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

As Beyond Pesticides has often reported, mitigation measures are not enforced through recordkeeping, inspections, and certification, and require no accountability from farmers and pesticide applicators. At the same time, EPA assumes compliance with mitigation measures as the basis for meeting statutory standards of reasonable risk from harmful chemicals, despite documented health and environmental harm. As a Daily News article earlier this year points out, living amid chemical pollution creates the need for immediate mitigation measures in an attempt to manage exposure. Mitigation measures, however, are often found to be lacking because of ongoing risks that may be reduced, but not eliminated, despite the availability of nontoxic practices that current policies do not require.

The root cause of these issues is the failure of EPA to adequately assess the lack of pesticide essentiality and pesticide hazards in the face of unprecedented chronic illness diagnoses, biodiversity collapse (pollinators, birds, and butterflies alone), and the climate crisis. In partnership with farmers, community organizers, public health professionals, and some policymakers, the adoption of land management and food supply chain systems rooted in organic principles and criteria are documented to be more protective by addressing threats to health, biodiversity, and climate by eliminating petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers.

The latest updates to the mitigation menu and PALM tool that EPA has implemented “incorporates information from the Ecological Mitigation Support Document to Support Endangered Species Strategies Version 2.0 (published in April 2025), as well as the Insecticide Strategy and Herbicide Strategy.” Beyond Pesticides’ comments on both strategies can be seen here and here. A previous Daily News post, titled EPA Draft Herbicide Strategy Update Further Weakens Plan to Protect Endangered Species, further describes how EPA strategies are weakening aspects of the agency’s efforts to “protect” endangered species from herbicide use. (See additional coverage on ESA and mitigation measures here, here, here, and here.)

The update to the Herbicide Draft Strategy, specifically, outlines three types of modifications, including “simplifying” its approach, increasing growers’ “flexibility” when applying mitigation measures, and reducing the mitigation measures required in certain situations. By reducing the stringency of the Strategy, advocates are again questioning EPA’s compliance with legal requirements under ESA or protecting endangered species and their habitats in the midst of an unprecedented rate of global extinction. This strategy was finalized in August 2024.

The latest mitigation menu update, as of April 2025, includes additional measures associated with the final Insecticide Strategy. As EPA states: “The mitigation menu does not impose any requirements or restrictions on pesticide use. Rather, pesticide users would access the mitigation menu website only to inform what mitigation measures could be used to achieve the level of mitigation that is required on pesticide labeling.” There is no reporting required to document that these actions were performed. EPA continues to say, “Pesticide users remain responsible for ensuring that all pesticide labeling requirements are met.”

EPA will provide an overview of the changes to the mitigation menu, as well as explain how to navigate the calculation resources, such as the PALM tool, and how these will “improve flexibility for pesticide users by providing options that work best for their situation,” at the webinar today, September 16, 2025. Registration is available here.

In relying on online resources that “assist applicators in determining what mitigation options are available to them, including the spray drift and runoff calculators” and newly released PALM tool, EPA shifts the burden on to farmers and pesticide applicators to properly review product labels and any proposed mitigation measures, identify what is needed for their specific situation, and then implement the measures appropriately, all without the need to report those actions to the agency.

EPA says mitigation tracking is “at the field or farm level” and not required to be submitted to the agency. If working with a technical specialist or conservation program, “Verification can be done through the conservation program and provided to the program enrollee. Verification is not required to be submitted to EPA.” This hands-off approach highlights what environmental advocates identify as a regulatory deficiency within EPA’s program that does not meet the standards of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) and ESA, which require compliance with specific enforceable use restrictions that have been delineated on pesticide product labels.

As stated, the current mitigation process does not properly ensure that choosing from a menu of protective measures will meet a protective standard that is recorded and enforced, thus requiring accountability of applicators. Additionally, the mitigations outlined on EPA’s mitigation menu website are reported by users who participated in a test to be cumbersome to navigate, without assurances that the agency will teach, implement, or enforce the new system. The new point system is intended to establish sufficient mitigation to allow pesticide use. However, the expectation of accurate calculations for mitigation measures is placed on applicators who may not be fully versed in math or English. The users in the test identified technological problems with the website, while also commenting on the complexities involved in the process.

On this topic of mitigation, Beyond Pesticides, in Daily News EPA “Mitigation Menu” Called Complex, Raising Doubts about Required Endangered Species Protection, points to advocates of organic agriculture who argue that instead of spending millions of dollars and many years creating mitigation programs that are unenforceable and ineffective, EPA should spend the same amount of time and money supporting farmers in the transition to organic agriculture and in exiting the toxic pesticide treadmill.

Even if the mitigation menu was easier to navigate, these proposed mitigation measures would only lessen the chance of harmful impacts of pesticide use and, more concerning, are entirely voluntary. Beyond Pesticides maintains that practices to eliminate the need for pesticides must be emphasized because so many pest problems are a function of faulty management practices, which cannot be solved with pesticide use. Instead, EPA assumes the need for pesticide dependency, even though the scientific literature and empirical evidence may say otherwise.

Organic agriculture is a viable, productive alternative to the current regulatory system that assumes the need for pesticides due to chemical dependency. Despite this, the marketplace has responded to consumer demand, which has helped build a market valued at over $70 billion in the U.S. and over $230 billion globally. The global organic market is projected to grow to $564 billion by 2030. (See here and here.) Widely adopted organic agriculture and land management is the holistic solution that is necessary to offer the proper protections EPA is required to provide.

Recent studies, as covered in the Daily News, show how organic practices enhance soil health, increase crop and nutritional quality even with weather uncertainty, and can outcompete chemical-intensive fields, as well as provide health benefits with an organic diet. Learn more about the health and environmental benefits of organic here and here.

Sign up now to get our Action of the Week and Weekly News Updates delivered right to your inbox and have your voice heard on governmental actions that are harmful to the environment and public and worker health, increase overall pesticide use, or undermine the advancement of organic, sustainable, and regenerative practices and policies.

Beyond Pesticides has issued an Action to: Tell Congress To Stand Up for Health and the Environment.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (August 14, 2025). EPA Releases New Mobile Tool to Help Farmers Implement Recommended Ecological Pesticide Mitigation Measures. Available at: https://www.epa.gov/pesticides/epa-releases-new-mobile-tool-help-farmers-implement-recommended-ecological-pesticide.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (August 20, 2025). Register for EPA’s Webinar on Mitigation Measures to Protect Endangered Species from Pesticides. Available at: https://www.epa.gov/pesticides/register-epas-webinar-mitigation-measures-protect-endangered-species-pesticides.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 15, 2025) With residues of the widely used weed killer glyphosate (Roundupᵀᴹ) in the food supply long documented, scientific attention has turned to the synergistic effects of the weedkiller— a magnified effect greater than the individual chemical effects added together. The authors of an article in World’s Poultry Science Journal write, “The synergistic toxic effects of commercial glyphosate formulations and their bioaccumulation in animal tissues are often overlooked in current safety assessments.” Following up on a previous action, Beyond Pesticides is telling Congress and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that the agency must consider the effects of pesticides in the context in which they are used and promote the organic alternative. 

Glyphosate residues in animal feed, as well as in water and through other exposure routes from food generally and residential areas, pose risks to both animal and human health, as these residues can bioaccumulate. As previously examined by Beyond Pesticides, the effects of pesticides are not limited to the crops to which they are applied. Synergistic effects of multiple chemical exposures are the rule, rather than the exception.  

With poultry, the herbicide enters the production system through residues in genetically engineered feed. An earlier article in Scientific Reports concludes that glyphosate’s (GLP) “widespread application on feed crops leaves residues in the feed,” while residues are “found to be common in conventional eggs acquired from grocery stores.” In analyzing the biochemical, toxicological, and ecological impacts of glyphosate on poultry, particularly chickens, the authors find a wide body of evidence linking glyphosate and its metabolite (breakdown product) aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA) to debilitating hazards that extend beyond mortality. These sublethal effects include disruption of the gut microbiome and gastrointestinal disease; decreased productivity and diminished reproductive health; hepatic and kidney toxicity; growth and developmental impacts, including teratogenicity and embryotoxicity; endocrine disruption and oxidative stress; and impaired immune functions. 

Glyphosate residues in animal feed, as well as in water and through other exposure routes from food generally and residential areas, pose risks to both animal and human health, as these residues can bioaccumulate. With a high reliance on corn and soybeans in the diets of poultry, genetically modified (GM) crops are a significant source of exposure for these animals. The ubiquitous nature of glyphosate residues throughout the environment and within organisms is a result of the widespread application of this toxic chemical in forestry, agriculture, landscaping, and gardening. Over 750 herbicides contain glyphosate as the active ingredient, and it also plays a large role in the production of GM crops, “with approximately 80% of GM crops bred specifically for GLP tolerance.”

Although the effects of glyphosate alone, as have long been documented in the scientific literature, range from negative impacts on biodiversity and the environment to food safety risks and human health implications, the true impacts can only be seen when looking at the whole agroecosystem. EPA’s regulatory processes ignore factors that enhance the toxicity of these already harmful chemicals, such as synergy, mixtures, and “inert” ingredients. “Current safety evaluations mostly concentrate on glyphosate in isolation, overlooking the synergistic toxic effects of commercial formulations and their capacity for bioaccumulation in adipose tissues,” the review’s authors point out.

Fortunately, adopting a systems approach to analyzing risks also reveals the systemic solution—regenerative organic production and land management—that is both successful and a suitable standard of comparison. The only way to truly protect humans, as well as pollinators, insects, birds, and other species, and the biosphere as a whole, is to stop the use of pesticides completely. Converting the world’s agricultural systems to organic would have a tremendous positive impact on threatened populations. 

Letter to U.S. Congress
Recent research on glyphosate demonstrates how people are multiply exposed as the pesticide moves through the food chain. A scientific review in World’s Poultry Science Journal highlights the adverse health effects on avian species from exposure to the widely used weed killer glyphosate throughout poultry production. The herbicide enters poultry production through residues in genetically engineered feed. An earlier article in Scientific Reports concludes that glyphosate’s “widespread application on feed crops leaves residues in the feed,” while residues are “found to be common in conventional eggs acquired from grocery stores.” In analyzing the biochemical, toxicological, and ecological impacts of glyphosate on poultry, particularly chickens, the authors find a wide body of evidence linking glyphosate and its metabolite aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA) to debilitating hazards that extend beyond mortality. These sublethal effects include disruption of the gut microbiome and gastrointestinal disease; decreased productivity and diminished reproductive health; hepatic and kidney toxicity; growth and developmental impacts, including teratogenicity and embryotoxicity; endocrine disruption and oxidative stress; and impaired immune functions.

Glyphosate residues in animal feed, as well as in water and through other exposures from food generally and residential areas, pose risks to both animal and human health, as these residues can bioaccumulate. The GM corn and soybeans in the diets of poultry are a significant source of exposure for these animals. The ubiquitous nature of glyphosate residues throughout the environment and within organisms is a result of the widespread application of this toxic chemical in forestry, agriculture, landscaping, and gardening. Over 750 herbicides contain glyphosate as the active ingredient.

Although the effects of glyphosate alone, as have long been documented in the scientific literature, range from negative impacts on biodiversity and the environment to food safety risks and human health implications, the true impacts can only be seen when looking at the whole environment. EPA’s regulatory processes ignore factors that enhance the toxicity of these already harmful chemicals, such as synergy, mixtures, and “inert” ingredients. “Current safety evaluations mostly concentrate on glyphosate in isolation, overlooking the synergistic toxic effects of commercial formulations and their capacity for bioaccumulation in adipose tissues,” the review’s authors point out.

Other studies highlight the need for a broader overhaul of EPA’s current risk assessment process. A November 2023 European study published in Nature challenges “the current assumption of pesticide regulation—that chemicals that individually pass laboratory tests and semifield trials are considered environmentally benign.”

Since interactions and synergism are the rule, pesticides cannot be evaluated based on single-chemical, single-species tests. They must be evaluated in context—that is, the system of chemical-dependent management must itself be questioned. Fortunately, adopting a systems approach to analyzing risks also reveals the systemic solution—regenerative organic production and land management—that is both successful and a suitable standard of comparison. The only way to truly protect humans, as well as pollinators, insects, birds, and other species, and the biosphere as a whole, is to stop the use of pesticides completely. Converting the world’s agricultural systems to organic would have a tremendous positive impact on threatened populations. 

EPA must consider effects of pesticides in the context in which they are used and with reference to the organic alternative.

Thank you.

Letter to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Recent research on glyphosate demonstrates how people are multiply exposed as the pesticide moves through the food chain. A scientific review in World’s Poultry Science Journal highlights the adverse health effects on avian species from exposure to the widely used weed killer glyphosate throughout poultry production. The herbicide enters poultry production through residues in genetically engineered feed. An earlier article in Scientific Reports concludes that glyphosate’s “widespread application on feed crops leaves residues in the feed,” while residues are “found to be common in conventional eggs acquired from grocery stores.” In analyzing the biochemical, toxicological, and ecological impacts of glyphosate on poultry, particularly chickens, the authors find a wide body of evidence linking glyphosate and its metabolite aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA) to debilitating hazards that extend beyond mortality. These sublethal effects include disruption of the gut microbiome and gastrointestinal disease; decreased productivity and diminished reproductive health; hepatic and kidney toxicity; growth and developmental impacts, including teratogenicity and embryotoxicity; endocrine disruption and oxidative stress; and impaired immune functions.

Glyphosate residues in animal feed, as well as in water and through other exposures from food generally and residential areas, pose risks to both animal and human health, as these residues can bioaccumulate. The GM corn and soybeans in the diets of poultry are a significant source of exposure for these animals. The ubiquitous nature of glyphosate residues throughout the environment and within organisms is a result of the widespread application of this toxic chemical in forestry, agriculture, landscaping, and gardening. Over 750 herbicides contain glyphosate as the active ingredient.

Although the effects of glyphosate alone, as have long been documented in the scientific literature, range from negative impacts on biodiversity and the environment to food safety risks and human health implications, the true impacts can only be seen when looking at the whole environment. EPA’s regulatory processes ignore factors that enhance the toxicity of these already harmful chemicals, such as synergy, mixtures, and “inert” ingredients. “Current safety evaluations mostly concentrate on glyphosate in isolation, overlooking the synergistic toxic effects of commercial formulations and their capacity for bioaccumulation in adipose tissues,” the review’s authors point out.

Other studies highlight the need for a broader overhaul of EPA’s current risk assessment process. A November 2023 European study published in Nature challenges “the current assumption of pesticide regulation—that chemicals that individually pass laboratory tests and semifield trials are considered environmentally benign.”

Since interactions and synergism are the rule, pesticides cannot be evaluated based on single-chemical, single-species tests. They must be evaluated in context—that is, the system of chemical-dependent management must itself be questioned. Fortunately, adopting a systems approach to analyzing risks also reveals the systemic solution—regenerative organic production and land management—that is both successful and a suitable standard of comparison. The only way to truly protect humans, as well as pollinators, insects, birds, and other species, and the biosphere as a whole, is to stop the use of pesticides completely. Converting the world’s agricultural systems to organic would have a tremendous positive impact on threatened populations. 

EPA must consider effects of pesticides in the context in which they are used and with reference to the organic alternative.

Thank you.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 12, 2025) A team of Argentinian researchers conducted a study published in Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology of the combined effects of the herbicide glyphosate and the pyrethroid insecticide cypermethrin. The researchers observed significantly higher apoptosis in cells exposed to the mixtures than to the individual pesticides—a synergistic response. Apoptosis, also known as programmed cell death, is a standard way that tissues handle damaged cells to remove threats to their function.

The researchers sought to investigate the cellular toxicity of each chemical, individually and in combination, and assessed whether the effects of the mixture were additive or synergistic. Additive effects occur when two individual chemicals amplify the same sort of response, often because the chemicals have similar structures. Synergism can occur when chemicals have different mechanisms of action but work together to create more powerful effects.

Mixtures of pesticides are the least-studied area of research conducted for regulatory purposes. While regulators provide instructions to applicators regarding which pesticides can be applied together and combined in tank mixtures, there is no control over how pesticides travel through the environment once applied, as they flow through the air as spray drift, lodge in soils and water, and are incorporated into organisms via dermal, respiratory, and ingestion pathways. Herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides may affect different pests and have different mechanisms of action, but in combination, they can do even more profound damage to biological systems. Academic scientists are building up a body of research on pesticide mixtures that should trigger alarm – and action – in the regulatory community. See Beyond Pesticides’ archive on synergistic effects for more details.

Nor are chemicals’ harms necessarily confined to single organs or body systems. For example, Beyond Pesticides analyzed a review of reproductive health in August showing that pesticides and PFAS “disrupt the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis (HPG), impair ovarian function, and contribute to reproductive dysfunction through mechanisms such as oxidative stress, hormonal disruption, and epigenetic [gene expression or behavior] modifications,” according to the review authors. “This leads to menstrual irregularities, infertility, and pregnancy complications, as well as increases in the risk of reproductive system disorders such as endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), and ovarian cancer.”

The effects of exposure to multiple pesticides are of dire significance for people in agricultural areas. The Midwest is a prime example. A recent report from Investigate Midwest details the consequences in southeastern Missouri. With the University of Missouri, the journalists analyze cancer rates and pesticide usage by county. Missouri, in general, has both very high pesticide use per square mile and very high cancer rates per 100,000 people. The investigators found that the state’s “bootheel” has the highest use of pesticides per square mile, and four of the bootheel counties have the highest cancer rates. Major crops are cotton, soybeans, and rice–crops grown in vast amounts with millions of pounds of pesticides. The investigators cited a study by Isain Zapata and colleagues, finding associations between pesticide use and leukemia, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, bladder, colon, lung, and pancreatic cancers; the strength of the associations was rivaled only by smoking. While specific pesticides were associated with specific cancers, neither the journalism investigation nor Zapata’s study attempted to determine the influence of combined exposures, highlighting the urgent need for more research.

The researchers studied the combined effects of cypermethrin and glyphosate because these pesticides are often applied to the same fields and both are found in soils, air, and water. There are some reports that in Argentina, the two pesticides are sometimes combined in tank mixtures or applied at the same time. Cypermethrin kills insects by interfering with neuron function and generating oxidative stress. It has also been found to increase numerous cellular biomarkers of DNA damage in at least three cell types. Glyphosate, the most-used pesticide in the world, is classified as a human carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and is known to degrade kidney function, affect reproductive health, disrupt gut microbes, and more.

The authors wanted to see whether (and how) the cypermethrin-glyphosate mixture promotes cell death, and, if it damages but does not kill cells, how much it damages their genes. They used separate commercially available formulations of glyphosate and cypermethrin and formulated two mixtures with different ratios from scratch. They tested each formulation on a cell line called Hep-2, which is commonly used to study the effects of pesticides on the respiratory tract, and widely used in studies of viruses, cancer, pharmaceuticals, and genetic engineering.

A test of cytotoxicity and genotoxicity produced significant differences between control cells and all the treated groups – that is, treated groups showed a higher incidence of toxicity indicators like the occurrence of two nuclei, multiple micronuclei, and frequency of abnormal cell division. These types of aberrations are associated with apoptosis.

The researchers also point out that apoptosis is dose-dependent. At lower pesticide doses, cells’ genes may be damaged even though the cell does not die. This can result in long-term issues, including mutations and chromosomal breaks, which can in turn result in cancer.

Overall, the authors write, their study demonstrates “that agrochemical mixtures exert toxic effects on this cell line, and that in most cases, these effects are greater than expected for the individual substances alone.” This means that the old toxicological adage that “the dose makes the poison” is an inappropriate measure for assessing the effects of exposure to mixtures of pesticides. For mixtures, those effects are often more than the sum of their parts.

The fact that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) puts its stamp of approval on both glyphosate and cypermethrin and allows the use of these pesticides in combination identifies a serious deficiency. Both are known or suspected human carcinogens. Both harm insects (directly or indirectly), birds, fish, amphibians, aquatic invertebrates, humans, and likely many other organisms. The entire regulatory system is geared toward examining each chemical in isolation. But the real world is awash in uncontrolled combinations of chemicals. As mixtures are the least-studied form of pesticide exposure, those that are additive or synergistic likely represent the most urgent challenge posed by the real-world use of pesticides.

One of the foundational assumptions about synthetic pesticide use is that toxic chemicals can be controlled in the environment. After nearly a century of unbridled release of thousands of chemical compounds into the biosphere, there is abundant evidence that those chemicals move, combine, and degrade in unpredictable ways. They are not controllable in the ways that pesticide companies and regulators claim they are.

EPA continues to foster the massive glyphosate economy and refuses to acknowledge its harms, which are identified by international agencies and the independent peer-reviewed scientific literature. Regarding cypermethrin, egregiously, in its 2021 Interim Registration Review Decision, EPA “decided not to develop unique chemical-specific risk mitigation for the cypermethrins” and “concludes that the cypermethrins provide high benefits for controlling pests in indoor residential areas, outdoor urban areas, and in agricultural crop production…risks may remain to non-target organisms even after mitigation. Any remaining risks are outweighed by the benefits of the cypermethrins’ use” [emphasis added].

On September 8, Beyond Pesticides called on Congress to require EPA to recognize that pesticide exposures occur in the real world in the form of mixtures that often have synergistic effects. The organization’s analysis reviewed multiple lines of evidence, including that the neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid, along with infestation with a parasitic mite, synergistically increases honey bee deaths; plastics combined with petrochemical pesticides exacerbate health effects; the fungicide azoxystrobin, combined with natural fungal toxins, synergistically affects liver cancer cells. It is also noted that profound observers of nature and humanity, such as the poet John Donne and the naturalist John Muir, pointed out long ago that all life is interconnected; therefore, synergy is to be expected, not ignored. Here is a letter the public can send to Congress stressing the importance of acknowledging and studying the combined effects of pesticides, plastics, climate change, and other human-induced changes to the biosphere.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources:
Assessment of cell death and genotoxic potential of glyphosate and cypermethrin formulations, individually and in combination, in HEp-2 cells
Coalova et al.
Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology 2025
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1382668925001905

The unseen harvest: Pesticides, cancer and rural Missouri’s health crisis
Alex Cox, Adeleine Halsey, Kyla Pehr and Savvy Sleevar
Investigate Midwest August 18, 2025
https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/08/18/the-unseen-harvest-pesticides-cancer-and-rural-missouris-health-crisis/

Scientific Studies Identify EPA Deficiency in Evaluating Safety of Toxic Chemical Interactions
Beyond Pesticides, September 8, 2025
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2025/09/scientific-studies-identify-epa-deficiency-in-evaluating-safety-of-toxic-chemical-interactions-calls-for-action/

Study Shows Importance of Testing Pesticide Mixtures to Determine Adverse Ecosystem Effects
Beyond Pesticides, June 6, 2024
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2024/06/study-shows-importance-of-testing-pesticide-mixtures-to-determine-adverse-ecosystem-effects/

Children’s Health Threatened as Rates of Pediatric Cancers are Linked to Agricultural Pesticide Mixtures
Beyond Pesticides, March 4, 2025
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/category/statelocal/nebraska/

(Beyond Pesticides, September 11, 2025) A study published in Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment finds organic rice paddies in the Mediterranean region have greater ecosystem biodiversity, including increased presence of aquatic microorganisms and insects, than their chemical-intensive counterparts. While not a “cradle-to-grave” or holistic analysis of organic vs. chemical-intensive agriculture (see a similar example in previous Daily News here), the authors note that there is an increase in greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe) associated with compost use, which replaces synthetic fertilizers. Typically, compost builds biological life in the soil and contributes to a drawing down (or sequestering) of atmospheric carbon. As EPA notes, “[C]omposting lowers greenhouse gases by improving carbon sequestration in the soil and by preventing methane emissions through aerobic decomposition, as methane-producing microbes are not active in the presence of oxygen.”

The transition to organically produced rice in the U.S. has come with challenges. One includes thorny debates over the inclusion of copper sulfate on the National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances, which establishes materials permitted for use in certified organic production under the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA). Under the law, USDA restricts copper sulfate in organic farming as follows: “For use as tadpole shrimp control in aquatic rice production, use is limited to one application per field during any 24-month period. Application rates are limited to levels which do not increase baseline soil test values for copper over a timeframe agreed upon by the producer and accredited certifying agent. For use as an algicide in aquatic rice systems and for tadpole shrimp control in aquatic rice systems; use is not to exceed one application per field during any 24-month period. Application rates are limited to those which do not increase baseline soil test values for copper over a time frame agreed upon by the producer and accredited certifying agent.” (Reference: 7 CFR 205.601(a)(3), 205.601(e)(4), & 205.601(i))

Certifiers of organic are charged with evaluating the need for copper sulfate use and determining that other preventive means, including cultural practices, have been tried.

It should be noted that copper sulfate, like all allowed substances in organic, is subject to public review and comment on a five-year cycle and must be reviewed by the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) and voted on to remain on the National List. In chemical-intensive agriculture, by contrast, copper sulfate is registered for use as a fungicide, algicide, a source of copper in animal nutrition, as fertilizer and herbicide, and for seed treatment. It is also used to kill slugs and snails in irrigation and municipal water treatment systems.

As biodiversity, public health, and other planetary boundaries strain under the weight of a fossil fuel and chemical-intensive global economy and society, organic advocates continue to call for the incorporation of climate resilience into organic agriculture with improved soil biology and water retention.

Background and Methodology

The study was conducted in Albufeira Natural Park (ANP), a wetland listed under the intergovernmental treaty Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance since it is considered “a key ecological and economic resource in the region.” There are four sampling sites—a water spring (on the edge of ANP and consisting of aquatic plants [macrophytes]), an organic rice field (manually seeded and fertilized with horse manure), and two chemical-intensive rice fields. The first chemical-intensive rice field, located in the northern area of ANP, was irrigated with reclaimed wastewater and used more pesticides due to issues with weeds, pest pressures, and a seed variety prone to fungal disease. The second chemical-intensive rice field is in the southern area, and it was irrigated with water from Albufera Lake. Researchers gathered three samples from each site throughout the 2021 cultivation cycle, with more specific information on the seeding dates, irrigation regimes, pesticide and fertilizer applications, and drying periods available to review in Section 2.1 of the Materials and Methods section.

The researchers emphasize the significance of this study, given that there has generally been minimal research “explor[ing] the long-term effects of pesticides and conventional rice farming practices—such as intermittent drainage or fertilization—on biodiversity in rice paddies.” In this vein, the researchers reference previous studies suggesting the benefits of organic rice farming (see here, here, and here), however these were all conducted in subtropical regions in Asia; Mediterranean rice paddies, meanwhile, have specific management practices that significantly affects the GHGe [greenhouse gas emissions] of rice production,  “such as post-harvest flooding patterns, straw management, and the type of wetlands previously present on reclaimed land.”

In terms of gathering data on aquatic organisms, researchers engaged in biological sampling and analysis for microbial communities (bacteria and archaea), zooplankton, macroinvertebrates, and emerging insects. Gathered through water and sediment using an EZNA soil DNA kit, researchers tested for phylogenetic diversity (which is considered a measure of biodiversity between species rather than just relying on a given species’ abundance or quantity). Only individuals from the microzooplankton group were gathered after the researchers identified them through a stereomicroscope, filtering samples through 5 liters of water through a zooplankton net. Macroinvertebrates were gathered through a net, preserved in 96 percent ethanol, and biomass measured after drying the samples and removing shells from the assessment. Emerging insects went through a similar sampling process, except that pyramid-shaped nets were used. To test GHG emissions (specifically carbon dioxide and methane), researchers used a tactic employed in previous wetland studies to gather sediment cores to assess the exchange of CO2 and CH4 gases between May and October 2021. More information on the statistical data analyses employed in this study is available for review in Section 2.5.

The authors are based at universities in the European Union, including the University of Alcala, IMDEA Water Institute, and University of Valencia. They declared that “they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.” The study received funding from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities, Agency of Research, and Recovery and Resilience Facility (which “finances reforms and investments in EU Member States made from the start of the pandemic in February 2020 until 31 December 2026).

Results

“The study….reveals that the structure of aquatic communities is heavily influenced by rice farming practices, with organic rice farming supporting a larger abundance of pollution-resistant zooplankton and a higher diversity and biomass of emerging insects,” says the authors. They continue: “However, organic rice farming was associated with the highest prevalence of fecal microorganisms and contributed more to greenhouse gas emissions during the rice cultivation period due to its manure fertilization regime.”

Key patterns that the authors note for the organic rice field are that it is characterized by higher biodiversity (particularly for insects), higher presence of fecal-associated microbial life (which the authors warn may be “indicating a potential risk of pathogen introduction through manure-based fertilization”), and higher GHGe overall from manure. “Higher insect emergence in the Organic Rice field provide[s] food to riparian arthropod predators, amphibians, and water birds, contributing to energy transfer between aquatic and terrestrial environments,” say the authors. When calculating GHGe, the authors do not consider the emissions associated with synthetic fertilizer production – they only measured the flux of methane and carbon dioxide from the sampling sites and assessed the difference in emissions and potential for carbon sequestration.

Meanwhile, the two chemical-intensive fields generally have low biodiversity, higher presence of aquatic life that are “pollution-tolerant,” and contain moderate-to-high GHGe depending on the water source for irrigation. It is important to note that daily methane emissions were highest in the first conventional rice field relative to all other sites. They also emphasize that “GHG emissions observed in this study are relatively low compared to those reported in other regions.” There are practices identified “to mitigate methane emissions, such as delaying winter flooding or removing straw after harvest to reduce methanogenesis and microbial decomposition, which are key contributors to elevated CH₄ and CO₂ fluxes, respectively.”

Previous Research

As this study lays out in its introduction, there is significant research on the impacts of rice production on ecosystem health and broader biodiversity.

A study published in 2022 in Communications Biology finds that ‘Weedy rice,’ a close relative of cultivated rice that invades rice fields and reduces yields, is rapidly developing herbicide resistance in critical rice growing areas throughout the United States. Researchers note that the root of the issue farmers face is a result of an agricultural approach that relies on a single, streamlined method of weed control. “Just like in the case of antibiotic resistance, the rise of resistance to this particular herbicide will be met with a new technology that relies on a new herbicide,” says study co-author Marshall Wedger, PhD. He continues: “New herbicide-resistant cultivars are already in development, so I expect this process to repeat.”(See Daily News here.) Similar issues have emerged with herbicide- and pesticide-resistance, including waterhemp (Amaranthus tuberculatus), commodity crops like corn, and other “crops” like farm-raised fish and the sea lice pesticide emamectin. More specifically to rice production, a 2016 study published in Scientific Reports and produced by Japan’s National Institute for Environmental Studies found that the insecticide fipronil significantly reduces the population of adult dragonflies, more so than any other pesticide treatment. (See Daily News here.) This is also a potential public health crisis, as a Consumer Reports-published study in 2012 found “worrisome” levels of inorganic arsenic in rice products across organic and conventional products, challenging advocates to meet this moment of crisis and call for alternatives while also continuing to be critical. (See Daily News here.)

One of the more controversial inclusions to the National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances is that of copper sulfate. As an antimicrobial and fungicide, its use is permitted in organic certified operations for food/feed crops, including orchard, row, field, and aquatic crops, flowering/non-flowering plants, and trees. Beyond Pesticides has continued to call for the sunset of this material, given the known associated adverse health and ecological effects. (See here for Beyond Pesticides’ comments to the National Organic Standards Board).

The authors of a 2024 case study in Canale D’Aiedda (Italy) published in Scientific Reports, conclude that, “[T]he results of monitoring and modeling activities revealed a chronic risk associated with the presence of Cu [copper] from November to April in several river reaches and acute risk associated to the presence of glyphosate in several reaches mainly in the wet season.”  According to the authors, “The most important factor influencing the chronic risk for Cu were the combination of two factors: the high surface runoff and the Cu applications. The most important factor influencing the glyphosate peaks of concentration is the streamflow.” The NOSB has previously discussed alternative growing systems that would eliminate the need for copper sulfate and made such alternatives a research priority. Copper sulfate is widely used in organic rice production to control algae and an invertebrate known as tadpole shrimp. Most of the world transplants rice seedlings into flooded paddies. Dryland rice production eliminates the need for control of tadpoles, which eat the rice seedlings in flooded fields. Ironically, tadpole shrimp are regarded as a biological control for algae. (See Daily News here.)

Call to Action

There is a concerted effort in Europe to advance what is being coined as Organic Climate Farming. As organic is increasingly understood to be a climate solution,  OrganicClimateNet last year launched an aggressive effort to build the base of organic farmers in the European Union (EU). (See Daily News here.) OrganicClimateNet defines organic climate farming as “an agricultural approach that integrates organic farming’s nature-based and circular principles with climate-conscious practices. This combination provides innovative and impactful solutions to the challenges posed by climate change.

You can take action today by leveraging and sharing Eating with a Conscience, which is a repository including dozens of non-organic fruits, vegetables, and food items to see which pesticides can be used in their production. There are specific sections on rice and wild rice that may be relevant; however, this tool was developed to help you evaluate the impacts on the environment and farmworkers of the toxic chemicals allowed for use on major food crops, grown domestically and internationally. 

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source: Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 

(Beyond Pesticides, September 10, 2025) After being criticized by the chemical industry and allied agribusiness and service industry groups on the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) report in May, the strategy document, released yesterday, has tamped down efforts to reform government programs that regulate pesticides. There are no specific recommendations on improving the regulation of pesticides. Rather, the strategy appears to embrace business-as-usual and could even ramp up government efforts to tout the need for pesticides and claims that current regulatory reviews are effective and comprehensive.

In a section of the strategy entitled “Increasing Public Awareness and Knowledge,” the document says: “EPA, partnering with food and agricultural stakeholders, will work to ensure that the public has awareness and confidence in EPA’s pesticide robust review procedures and how that relates to the limiting of risk for users and the general public and informs continual improvement.” This is at odds with the earlier MAHA assessment report which identified pesticides as substances of concern that, citing deficiencies in chemical reviews, “may be neglecting potential synergistic effects and cumulative burdens, thereby missing opportunities to translate cumulative risk assessment into the clinical environment in meaningful ways.”

While the earlier report, Make Our Children Healthy Again: Assessment, cited glyphosate, chlorpyrifos, and atrazine as examples of chemicals of concern, the strategy drops a clear effort to address the systemic regulatory problems pointed out in many parts of the report, given the toxic soup of chemicals permitted for use or regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). 

A section in the strategy, entitled “Cumulative Exposure,” basically identifies a current statutory mandate for EPA under the Food Quality Protection Act (amending the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act and the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act) to “focus on pesticides acting through a common mode of action.” It remains to be seen what will happen and how long it will take to implement the recommendation in this section: “The EPA, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and NIH will develop a research and evaluation framework for cumulative exposure across chemical classes.“ However, there is nothing new here unless this strategy addresses chemical mixtures and potential synergistic effects, in addition to additive or cumulative effects.

The strategy embraces chemical dependency in agriculture in a section entitled “Precision Agriculture,” which states, “USDA and EPA will launch a partnership with private-sector innovators to ensure continued investment in new approaches and technologies to allow even more targeted and precise pesticide applications.” The section implicitly extols the productivity benefits of the toxic pesticides identified as problematic in the first MAHA report, pointing to technology as a potential tool to “reduce the total amount of pesticides needed.” The strategy, which suggests government funding through the proposed public-private partnership, “should focus on precision application methods, including targeted drone applications, computer-assisted targeted spray technology, robotic monitoring, and related innovations.”

With the embrace of pesticide dependency as stated in the “Precision Agriculture” section, it remains to be seen whether the section on “Water Quality” could provide an opportunity to assess the hazards of pesticides in the nation’s waterways and drinking water. This section states, “The EPA and USDA, along with other relevant Federal partners and in collaboration with NIH, will assess ongoing evaluations of water contaminants and update guidance and prioritizations of certain contaminants appropriately.” The only example given in this context is “fluoride in drinking water to inform Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendations.” While the strategy notes that CDC will “update recommendations” on PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) in water, no mention is made of a specific assessment of fluorinated pesticides that invade waterways.

In context of the overall strategy, the one mention of organic raises organic integrity concerns that are troubling to organic advocates. In a section entitled “Process Efficiencies and Deregulation” and a subsection “Agriculture Deregulation,” the strategy notes that USDA will, “Streamline organic certification processes and reduce costs for small farms transitioning to organic practices.” One of the key elements that sets organic apart from chemical-intensive agriculture is the inspection and certification requirement that ensures organic consumers that the USDA organic seal is based on a rigorous organic systems plan and compliance with the strict standards that give farmers a price premium. Organic advocates are against deregulation, which is often code for a weakening of standards that would undermine consumer trust in the organic label. The deregulation fever that has taken hold in the current Congress and administration was recently seen with the passage of the Promoting Efficient Review for Modern Infrastructure Today (PERMIT) Act, H.R. 3898, sponsored by Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA) and supported by Republicans only, in the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure in the U.S. House of Representatives. The committee says in its press release on the legislation that it will “Cut Red Tape and Increase Clean Water Act Permitting Efficiency,” but environmental groups explain that it is an attack on the safety of the nation’s waterways, undermining water quality, pesticide oversight, and community right-to-know. A part of this legislation is attached to the House Interior-EPA Appropriations Bill (SEC. 460), passed out of the full Appropriations Committee, and is moving to a floor vote. 

The President’s  Make America Healthy Again Commission Executive Order 14212, issued on February 13, 2025, and the follow-up assessment report in May, included language that promised a broad strategy to protect the health of children with recommendations that addressed “the scope of the childhood chronic disease crisis and any potential contributing causes, including the American diet, absorption of toxic material, medical treatments, lifestyle, environmental factors, Government policies, food production techniques, electromagnetic radiation, and corporate influence or cronyism.” The first line of the report in May characterized it as “a call to action” on a broad range of issues, including toxic chemical and pesticide exposure. A reading of the strategy suggests that pesticides are no longer a concern for children’s health or the current administration. The science would suggest otherwise.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source: Make Our Children Healthy Again: Strategy Report

(Beyond Pesticides, September 10, 2025) Published earlier this year, a review of over 1,700 studies in Nature Communications finds pesticides affect a diverse range of nontarget organisms and contribute to global biodiversity loss. The authors* reveal “negative responses of the growth, reproduction, behaviour and other physiological biomarkers within terrestrial and aquatic systems” for nontarget plants, animals, and microorganisms.

“To our knowledge, there has been no systematic and overarching synthesis of how different types of pesticides affect the diversity of multiple non-target eukaryotic and prokaryotic organisms across all trophic levels,” the researchers write. They continue, “Furthermore, current syntheses have not considered how the impacts of pesticides differ globally across climatic zones or for major mechanisms of exposure, such as those acting in aquatic or terrestrial environments.”

In particular, pesticide regulatory risk assessments analyze a limited range of model species, including rats, zebrafish, clawed frogs, honeybees, and earthworms, among others. As such, they are unlikely to capture the variety of responses to pesticide exposure seen across the diversity of species and communities found in both managed and natural systems,” the authors state.

*Authors include Beyond Pesticides 2023 National Forum speaker Dave Goulson—see the Daily News on his keynote address here.

Research Results

To address these limitations, the authors integrated 20,212 estimates of pesticide effects reported in 1,705 experimental studies from around the world. The research measures the effects of insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides on animals (invertebrates and vertebrates), plants (dicotyledonous, monocotyledonous, and spore-producing), and microorganisms (bacteria and fungi) through laboratory and field experiments.

The studies incorporate pesticide exposure responses from 471 active ingredients (243 insecticides, 104 fungicides, and 124 herbicides) in 830 different species (560 animals, 192 plants, 78 microorganisms) and 129 non-species-level groups. Throughout the research, the results consistently demonstrate that pesticides threaten wildlife and ecosystems beyond the hazards accounted for in risk analyses, highlighting “the limitations of regulatory assessments in predicting real-world hazards like long-term low-level exposure, cumulative effects at the landscape level, and synergistic interactions between active ingredients,” the researchers explain.

For the various nontarget species analyzed, the results all indicate health impacts that affect species survival and progeny. In animals, the studies show overall decreased growth and reproduction, as well as modified behavior, with pesticide exposure. In particular, insecticides negatively impact animals through nervous system functioning, affecting longevity, fecundity, and survival across a range of animal taxa, among other factors.

Fungicide exposure in animals is linked to changes in metabolism and physiological functioning, including intracellular glutathione depletion and decreased cellular respiration. Herbicides also impact animal reproduction and behavior through neurotoxic effects and impacts on metabolism. “Pesticides overall, as well as separately for insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides, perturbed animal biomarkers, including indicators of neurophysiological response and cellular processing,” the authors note. (See studies here and here.)

In plants, pesticide exposure decreases growth, also disturbing plant biomarkers and affecting metabolism, photosynthesis, and transpiration necessary for plants to function. “The decreased growth and reproduction of plants may be linked to reductions in photosynthesis through known modes of action of herbicides, as well as by off-target effects for selected insecticides and fungicides,” the researchers state. “These include impacts on the cell cycle (e.g. abnormal cytoskeletal distribution, tube morphology and microtubule organization), direct or indirect interactions leading DNA genotoxicity and via non-specific cellular reactivity.” (See research here, here, here, here, here, and here.)

Microorganism growth and reproduction also decrease with pesticide exposure, as microorganism biomarkers that indicate enzymatic reactions are affected. “The negative responses of microorganism growth and reproduction to fungicides can be linked to impacts on spore germination, germ tube elongation, sporulation, and root colonization, as well as through effects on electron transport and energy metabolism,” the authors explain.

The impacts from insecticides and herbicides are linked to “cellular chemical reactivity leading to intracellular damage of microorganisms, as well as denaturing [disruption or death] of key macromolecules and/or changing cell membrane permeability” based on the scientific literature. (See here and here.)

The authors of the review also “tested whether the predominantly negative effects of pesticides on major taxonomic groups differed among pesticide types, experiment types, exposure media (aquatic or terrestrial), climatic zones, conflict-of-interest status and publication year.” As a result, the same negative trends seen above continued for all pesticide classes.

These analyses, utilizing field-realistic application rates, confirm the strong evidence of deleterious effects to nontarget species following pesticide exposure, regardless of the type of pesticide. Additionally, the authors also find that the negative implications increase as application rates are increased.

“Overall, our synthesis comprehensively shows that insecticides, fungicides and herbicides have broad-scale detrimental effects on all groups of non-target organisms tested,” the researchers summarize. They continue, “Pesticides consistently decreased growth and reproduction across all taxonomic groups, while also eliciting behavioural responses in animals and perturbing multiple endpoints linked to metabolic or physiological status.”

These results within nontarget organisms highlight the broader implications to ecological communities and functions, as well as additional factors that can impact biodiversity such as pesticide mixtures and synergistic effects, that fail to be considered in regulatory assessments. (See more in Daily News Fungicide’s Nontarget Harm to Insect Confirms Deficiency in EPA’s Ecological Risk Assessment, Study Finds, and Research Highlights Regulatory Failures in Addressing Risks to Nontarget Organisms from Rodenticides.)

The authors conclude that the “universal cross-taxa impact” of pesticides is “unsustainable for modern agriculture” and that “[u]nless changes occur, the hazard of severe, unexpected and long-term impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning will remain unacceptably high.”

Additional Scientific Findings

Previous research finds that, at sufficient environmental concentrations, pesticides in all classes affect nontarget organisms “by disrupting their survival, growth, reproduction and behaviour (e.g. detection of stimuli), as well as effects on other metabolic and physiological processes (e.g. biomarkers of neural function or immunity, cellular respiration, photosynthesis).”

Studies report that fungicides “may decrease the biomass of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, affecting their symbioses with higher plants,” while herbicides “may reduce plant pollen viability and carbohydrate metabolism; insecticides (targeting pest herbivores) may cause long-term declines in non-target insect pollinators associated with mass-flowering crops.” (See research here, here, here, and here.)

These impacts are widespread across taxa, with not only studies reporting effects on individual species but “across trophic levels, impacting ecosystem-scale species interactions that may lead to secondary effects,” the researchers note.

Beyond Pesticides’ coverage of deleterious effects on nontarget organisms is extensive. In particular, there is a wide body of science on pollinators and other beneficial insects that are vulnerable to pesticides. Recent Daily News titled Mass Kill of Monarch Butterflies in California Linked to Pesticide Residues in Their Bodies highlights the role of pesticides, synthetic pyrethroids in particular, in causing lethal and sublethal effects to nontarget organisms. (See What the Science Shows on Biodiversity for more information.)

Research earlier this year shows adverse effects of pesticides on nontarget soil organisms, like nematodes, that are essential for soil health and ecosystem functioning. (See Daily News Soil Nematodes Vital to Plant Health Threatened by Nontarget Pesticide Exposure, Study Finds.) Another study on Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) exposed to florpyrauxifen-benzyl suggests that the new herbicide causes oxidative stress (imbalances affecting the body’s detoxification abilities that lead to cell and tissue damage), with specific genotoxic (damage to genetic material) and hepatotoxic (damage to the liver) effects that threaten nontarget aquatic species and biodiversity. (See full coverage here and additional Beyond Pesticides’ resources on pesticide impacts on nontarget organisms here and here.)

Organic Solution

As recently shared in an Action of the Week, transitioning to organic land management and away from petrochemical materials not only protects workers but also aligns with broader goals to protect public health and biodiversity and mitigates the climate crisis. In adopting organic methods that prohibit pesticide use in both food production and land management, we are eliminating the use of petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers associated with endocrine disruption and rising rates of a vast number of related illnesses. (See a talk by Dr. Tracey Woodruff as part of the 2024 National Forum Series here, as well as the Pesticide-Induced Diseases Database.)

The public can play a role in the organic solution by reaching out to local decision makers and elected officials, as well as advocating for the transition of community parks, playing fields, and open spaces to organic land management with the assistance of Beyond Pesticides’ Parks for a Sustainable Future program.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Wan, N.-F. et al. (2025) Pesticides have negative effects on non-target organisms, Nature Communications. Available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-56732-x.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 9, 2025) SprayDays California, the pesticide notification and mapping tool run by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR), was updated in late August after public backlash (including from farmworkers), which identified inadequate notice of pesticide use to those who work in or live in proximity to agricultural fields. According to a DPR press release from August 28, these changes include attempts to bring down barriers for users so that, in the words of DPR Director Karen Morrison, the department can “provide Californians with access to information and services.”

While public health advocates view notification as a step that may allow people to leave a treatment area or take shelter to reduce exposure, groups continue to express concerns about a focus on notification to the exclusion of addressing the root causes of exposure—chemical-intensive agriculture, despite the viability of organic compatible practices and products. The groups criticize the continuous registration of pesticide active ingredients and product formulations without considering widely available practices and nonchemical and nature-based alternatives to pest management. These include regenerative organic principles and practices that draw inspiration from Indigenous land management and agroecological systems that have thrived in coexistence with nature.

Recent Updates

There are two main changes to California SprayDays from the original proposal, according to the DPR press release. They include:

• “Map-Based Sign-Up: In addition to entering an address, users can now subscribe to notifications by selecting a one-square-mile section on a map, making it easier for those in unincorporated areas to sign up and receive the same information they would if using a recognized address within that section.
• Recent Application Visibility: The pesticide map now highlights one-square-mile sections where applications were scheduled within the past four days. While this information was already available in the system, it is now easier for users to see where recent activity may have occurred.”

DPR announced that over 3,700 users have signed up for notification alerts in heavily agricultural counties, including Kern, Monterey, Santa Cruz, Ventura, and Fresno, with more than 30,000 notifications sent to subscribed users in California. The Center for Farmworker Families estimates that roughly 500,000 to 800,000 farmworkers reside in California as of late 2024, which is roughly corroborated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Economic Research Service’s data finding that California farmers hired 808,000 workers during the week of July 7-13, 2024, “up 3 percent from the July 2023 reference week.”

In addition to DPR not embracing an alternatives assessment in its pesticide registration program, not all people have readily available access to a telephone or computer to subscribe or receive the notification messages from the SprayDays program. 

Farmworkers are continuing to speak up on pesticide use in their communities, even when government leaders fail to take a comprehensive approach to pesticide registration and restrictions. In late August, two farmworker activists in Watsonville, California, Omar Dieguez and Providence Martinez Alaniz, began a 30-day food fast with the goal “to pressure local berry growers to transition to organic farming practices and put an end to the harms caused by pesticide use.” These “local berry growers” include Driscoll’s, a titan of the blueberry industry operating both organic and chemical-intensive fields. According to reporting by Santa Cruz Local, “The hunger strike is an escalation of a local movement against the use of pesticides near schools, headed by the Campaign for Organic and Regenerative Agriculture. State law prohibits the use of pesticides within a quarter mile of a school-on-school days, but gaseous fumigants can drift in the wind for miles.”

One highly toxic fumigant, 1,3-D (Telone), is going through the rulemaking process currently “for regulations to restrict 1,3-dichloropropene (1,3-D) use to address cancer risks for occupational bystanders,” according to an August 21 DPR press release. This move comes after years of advocacy, public comments (including from Beyond Pesticides), investigations led by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Inspector General (OIG), and legislative efforts to address runaway pesticide use impacting farmworkers and their children. One of the issues identified is EPA’s failure to conduct an adequate and independent assessment of the cancer effects of 1,3-D.

OIG’s original report, The EPA Needs to Improve the Transparency of Its Cancer-Assessment Process for Pesticides, was issued in 2022 and concluded that EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) engages in secret meetings with industry, elevates unqualified individuals to decision-making roles, uses an untested scientific approach, fails to conduct a simple literature review, and neglects public transparency. (See Daily News here.)

Background

Growing out of the passage of AB 617 Community Emissions Reduction Act in California, passed in 2017, farmworker safety advocates have long been advocating for a pesticide spray notification system. In late 2017, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) began implementation of AB 617, a bill enacted with the stated intent of addressing the air quality crisis in many communities of predominantly people of color, who are disproportionately harmed by toxic chemicals. While the overall goal of the law is to reduce air pollution in these communities, farmworker advocates have sought to operationalize a pesticide spraying notification system to warn communities when nearby spraying is scheduled to take place.

Based on DPR’s website, the agency began developing SprayDays California in 2021 after receiving funding in the state budget. That same year, pilot projects were voluntarily launched in four counties (Stanislaus, Riverside, Santa Cruz, and Ventura), and a two-year public outreach effort culminated in four focus groups and eight public meetings. The UC Davis Center for Regional Change conducted an independent evaluation of the notification system from the four notification pilot projects, echoing some concerns raised by local groups and Beyond Pesticides on guidance for precautionary action and communication on the level of health hazard associated with exposure to the spray. (See here.) In 2023, DPR moved to propose regulations to implement this system across the state, with final regulations approved in December 2024. 

SprayDays California requires that “restricted material pesticides” must be added to the notification system, with a 48-hour minimum notice expected for soil fumigants and a 24-hour notice for all other pesticides in this category. The notifications are sent via email and text messages, with opt-out options available depending on the user’s needs. The pesticide map component of this system organizes pesticide applications into one-square-mile sections, including relevant information, such as pesticide product name, active ingredient(s) name(s), application method (ground, aerial, fumigation, other), number of treated acres, and EPA registration number.

For more information on the history of SprayDays, see the Daily News here when the program was initially launched earlier this year.

Previous Research on Pesticide Drift

There is increasing evidence that pesticides have significant potential for drift and subsequent contamination of nearby environments and people.

Fifteen currently used pesticides (CUPs) and four metabolites (breakdown or transformation products—TP) were found in the marine atmosphere over the Atlantic Ocean in a research study published in Environmental Pollution. Three legacy (banned) pesticides were also discovered. The researchers found empirical evidence for pesticide drift over remarkably long distances to remote environments. The CUPs include the insecticides bifenthrin,  carbofuran, flonicamid, and flupyradifurone; the fungicides cyflufenamid, dicloran,  dimethomorph, fenpropidin, fluopyram, and tebuconazole; the herbicides clopyralid, fenuron, flumioxazin, isoxaflutole, and metamitron; the transformation products metalaxyl metabolite CGA 62826, metolachlor ethane sulfonic acid, metolachlor oxanilic acid, and prothioconazole desthio; and the legacy pesticides 2,4’-DDE, 4,4’-DDD, and hexachloro-benzene. (See Daily News here.)

In a study that may hit closer to home, researchers have detected eighty pesticides (35 insecticides, 29 fungicides, and 11 herbicides, and metabolites) in the ambient air of a rural region of Spain (Valencia) between 2007 and 2024. Despite these dramatic findings, the authors conclude that there is “no [observable] cancer risk,” “no inhalation risk for adults,” and only one pesticide concentration (the insecticide chlorpyrifos) showing “a potential risk to toddlers.” However, the authors did not conduct an aggregate risk assessment that would typically consider all routes of exposure to the individual pesticides detected, including through water, food, and landscapes. (See Daily News here.)

For further coverage of policy developments and scientific research on pesticide drift, see its dedicated Daily News section here.

Call to Action

As highlighted on the Campaign for Organic and Regenerative Agriculture (CORA) website, concerned citizens “want the fields near our homes and schools to be converted to organic in order to protect the health of our children and community.” You can take action here by asking your mayor to lead a transition to practices and product procurement that protect workers with criteria that meet organic standards in landscaping and food purchasing. By transitioning to organic product procurement and land management away from petrochemical materials, this effort to protect workers aligns with broader goals to protect public health and biodiversity, and mitigate the climate crisis.

Workers, as well as farmers and consumers, are also facing the existential threat as chemical companies and their allies in Congress continue to attack the viability of “failure-to-warn” liability claims that hold pesticide manufacturers accountable for their harmful products. Beyond Pesticides joined 50 other organizations and businesses across the country to call on Congress to oppose legislation that shields pesticide companies from lawsuits and limits states’ authority to regulate pesticides. (See Daily News here.) Eliminating failure-to-warn claims takes away one of the three legs of accountability in terms of federal pesticide law (registration, labeling, and litigation), allowing manufacturers to hide behind existing weak labels and registration reviews for active ingredients currently on the market, as well as potential future ones that may be submitted for EPA approval.

See here for the joint statement, Protect the Right of Farmers, Consumers, and Workers to Hold Pesticide Companies Accountable for Their Harmful Product. You can also see here for the associated press release, and here to learn more about the dangers of pesticide preemption and failure to warn. You can also take action here by telling your U.S. Senator to co-sponsor S. 2324, the Pesticide Injury Accountability Act, to create a federal right of action for anyone who is harmed by a toxic pesticide, serving as a potential checkmate to the state-by-state effort led by Modern Ag Alliance to strip away failure-to-warn claims, which are under state-level legal jurisdiction.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources: California Department of Pesticide Regulation, Santa Cruz Local, CORA, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Economic Research Service

(Beyond Pesticides, September 8, 2025) Beyond Pesticides today called on Congress to require the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to incorporate real world science into its evaluation of pesticide safety calculations by recognizing that daily exposure involves multiple chemicals and synergistic interactions— a magnified effect greater than the individual chemical effects added together. The organization cites numerous scientific studies that call public attention to this issue; that a realistic assessment of the human and environmental harm potentially caused by pesticides cannot be evaluated based on single-chemical, single-species tests. Given the numerous complexities associated with this type of assessment, the group points to organic land management in agriculture and residential areas as a more cost-effective approach, sending this message to Congress: EPA must consider the effects of pesticides in the context in which they are used and with reference to the organic alternative.

A recent study, covered by Beyond Pesticides in its Daily News, found that the presence of Varroa mites in combination with the neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid increases the risk of bee mortality and disrupts the larval gut microbiome. The study found synergy (a greater combined effect) between Varroa destructor, a parasitic mite that attacks and feeds on honey bees, and imidacloprid. The findings were published last month in Pesticide Biochemistry and Physiology, and reinforces the important findings of a study published earlier this year. While there has been debate on whether neonicotinoid (neonic) insecticides or Varroa mites (Varroa destructor) are more detrimental to the survival of bees, evidence suggests that neonicotinoids are not only harmful individually but can increase vulnerability to parasitism from mites in western honey bees (Apis mellifera) and bumblebees. 

Other examples of synergistic effects of pesticides abound. A review in Clinical and Experimental Obstetrics & Gynecology analyzes studies linking exposure to environmental contaminants with adverse effects on women’s reproductive health. The chemical classes within the review include plasticizers, PFAS, heavy metals, pesticides, organophosphate flame retardants (OPFRs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), microplastics, quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs), and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), many of which are related to chemical-intensive land management and can exacerbate health effects through additive or synergistic effects, like microplastics when in contact with petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. 

The scientific literature shows that microplastics (MPs) and pesticides, both ubiquitous throughout the environment, have synergistic effects that threaten aquatic organisms. The most recent study to demonstrate this, published in Ecotoxicology, focuses on the impacts of MPs and chlorpyrifos (CPF), a widely used organophosphate insecticide, on cladocerans, a group of microcrustaceans. A literature review of over 90 scientific articles in Agriculture documents MPs’ increase in the bioavailability, persistence, and toxicity of pesticides used in agriculture. In analyzing the interactions between neonicotinoid pesticides (NNPs) and MPs, a recent study in The Science of The Total Environment finds that neonicotinoids such as thiacloprid (THI) become more bioavailable in soils containing traditional and biodegradable plastics. Increased bioavailability, which quantifies the extent to which organisms are exposed to chemicals in soil or sediment, puts soil microbiota at risk and leaves all consumers susceptible to adverse effects in contaminated food crops. 

A study in Royal Society Open Science shows intraspecific differences (genetic differences of individuals of a species) in wild bumblebees (Bombus vosnesenskii) exposed to an herbicide (glyphosate), a fungicide (tebuconazole), and an insecticide (imidacloprid), with gut microbiome health as a factor. The authors conclude, “These findings suggest that site-specific factors influence pesticide sensitivity and should be considered in ecotoxicological studies of wild bees.” 

Researchers studying a mass mortality event of approximately 200 monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus plexippus) in Pacific Grove, California, point out, there are additional issues in assessing risks to species since “available toxicity values are based on exposure to a single active ingredient, whereas all the sampled monarchs contained residues of multiple pesticides.” Exposure to multiple pesticides can result in additive or synergistic effects, which then enhance toxicity, as has been demonstrated in many studies of pollinator species. 

A common soil arthropod has clearly illustrated how this convergence creates synergistic effects: warming increases pesticide toxicity; pesticide toxicity triggers antibiotic resistance; antibiotic resistance spreads through horizontal gene transfer (movement through the environment to people) and predation.

Published in Environmental Pollution, a study of commercial dry pet products finds dietary pesticide residues in dog and cat food, “highlighting the urgent need for improved regulatory frameworks to address the presence of non-approved pesticides in pet food.” Additionally, the researchers point out: “Current regulatory frameworks primarily assess the toxicity of individual pesticide compounds, yet real-world exposure involves complex mixtures that may lead to additive or synergistic effects. The presence of multiple residues in a single sample suggests that companion animals may be subjected to combined toxicological burdens that are not yet fully understood.” 

A recent study published in Foods assesses the ability of the fungicide azoxystrobin (AZX) and naturally occurring toxins produced by certain fungi, known as mycotoxins, to display effects of cytotoxicity (cell damage). These effects were evaluated using three common mycotoxins found in food, including ochratoxin A, deoxynivalenol, and T-2 toxin, as mixtures with AZX within human hepatocarcinoma cell cultures. In analyzing combinations of these compounds at sublethal concentrations, the authors find modified toxicological behavior and synergistic effects that highlight the complexities of chemical mixtures and potential threats to liver health through dietary exposure to both toxicants and toxins, which are not adequately regulated for their interactions. 

Study results published in Pesticide Biochemistry and Physiology “suggest that combined [pesticide] exposure may further amplify the toxicity and compromise the intestinal barrier.” 

A study in GeoHealth of pediatric cancers in Nebraska links exposure to agricultural mixtures with the occurrence of these diseases. The authors find statistically significant positive associations between pesticide usage rates and children with cancer, specifically brain and central nervous system (CNS) cancers and leukemia. 

A study in Chemosphere, conducted by researchers from the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in Germany, reveals the varied lethal and sublethal effects of different mixtures of the weed killer glyphosate through tests on the South African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis). After exposing embryos to four glyphosate formulations, mortality, morphological defects, altered heartbeat rate, and impaired heart-specific gene expression are observed. 

In their recent publication in Environmental Pollution, researchers from the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research in Leipzig, Germany, find the greatest synergistic effects when Daphnia magna are subjected to the insecticide esfenvalerate under conditions experienced with climate change. 

In a study published in Biomedicines, the authors conducted a multi-behavioral evaluation of the effects of three pesticides, both individually and as mixtures, on larvae. The authors state, “Even at low concentrations, pesticides can negatively affect organisms, altering important behaviors that can have repercussions at the population level.” By analyzing effects on individual zebrafish with single compounds and mixtures, this study shows the dangers of pesticides in aquatic systems regarding synergy and the ripples created throughout entire ecosystems. 

Other studies highlight the need for a broader overhaul of the current regulatory review to address critical flaws in EPA’s current ecological risk assessment process. A November 2023 European study published in Nature demonstrates that relying on testing one active ingredient in a laboratory setting misses real-world impacts of pesticides on bees, nontarget pollinators, and a “landscape-level” study finds that typical risk assessment reviews used by EPA and European regulators fail to “safeguard bees and other pollinators that support agricultural production and wild plant pollination.” The authors’ conclusions challenge “the current assumption of pesticide regulation—that chemicals that individually pass laboratory tests and semifield trials are considered environmentally benign” and call into question EPA’s current regulatory assessments based on the western honey bee and its failure to adequately regulate mixtures of chemicals to which organisms are exposed in the real world as well as the actual devastating impacts to pollinators from the ubiquitous neonicotinoids. 

A study published in Conservation Letters, a journal of the Society for Conservation Biology, exposes critical shortcomings in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) ecological risk assessment (ERA) process for modeling the risks that pesticides pose to bees and other pollinators. For the study, “Risk assessments underestimate threat of pesticides to wild bees,” researchers conducted a meta-analysis of toxicity data in EPA’s ECOTOX knowledgebase (ECOTOX), an EPA-hosted, publicly available resource with information on adverse effects of single chemical stressors to certain aquatic and terrestrial species. The meta-analysis found that the agency’s approach, which relies heavily on honey bee data from controlled laboratory studies, drastically underestimates the real-world threats from neonicotinoid insecticides (and likely other pesticides) to native bees and other pollinators. The study “challenges the reliability of surrogate species as predictors when extrapolating pesticide toxicity data to wild pollinators and recommends solutions to address the (a)biotic interactions occurring in nature that make such extrapolations unreliable in the ERA process.”

The organic alternative. Since, as noted by John Muir—and others as long ago as John Donne’s “No Man is an Island”—all life is interconnected, it is no surprise that synergism is the rule, rather than the exception. As noted by Maricel Maffini, PhD, and Laura Vandenberg, PhD, in a commentary in Frontiers in Toxicology, “Current approaches also rely on the assumption that testing chemicals one at a time is appropriate to understand how chemicals act under real-world conditions. Numerous mixture studies, including ones that demonstrated cumulative effects, have disproven this assumption.”

Beyond Pesticides has maintained that the only way to truly protect pollinators, insects, birds, and other species, as well as the biosphere as a whole, is to stop the use of pesticides completely. This questions the system of chemical-dependent management of crops, landscapes, and structures. In this context, it advocates the conversion of the world’s agricultural systems to organic would have a tremendous positive impact on threatened populations. 

Beyond Pesticides invites the public to send the following letter to Members of Congress. (The letter can be sent by clicking HERE.)
Studies demonstrating synergistic interactions between pesticides and other stressors bring to mind John Muir’s wisdom: “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.”

Recent studies show:

The presence of Varroa mites in combination with a neonicotinoid insecticide increases the risk of bee mortality and disrupts the larval gut microbiome; suggesting that neonicotinoids are not only harmful individually but can increase vulnerability to parasitism from mites in western honey bees.

Women’s reproductive health is adversely affected by exposure to environmental contaminants, many of which are related to chemical-intensive land management and can exacerbate health effects through additive or synergistic effects.

Microplastics (MPs) and pesticides have synergistic effects that threaten aquatic organisms. MPs increase the bioavailability, persistence, and toxicity of pesticides used in agriculture, putting soil microbiota at risk and leaving all consumers susceptible to adverse effects in contaminated food crops.

Individual wild bumblebees differ in their response when exposed to an herbicide (glyphosate), a fungicide (tebuconazole), and an insecticide (imidacloprid), with gut microbiome health as a factor.

Researchers studying a mass mortality event of about 200 monarch butterflies in Pacific Grove point to additional issues in assessing risks to species since “available toxicity values are based on exposure to a single active ingredient, whereas all the sampled monarchs contained residues of multiple pesticides.”

A common soil arthropod demonstrates synergistic effects: warming increases pesticide toxicity; pesticide toxicity triggers antibiotic resistance; antibiotic resistance spreads through horizontal gene transfer and predation.

The presence of multiple residues in a single sample of dog or cat food suggests that companion animals may be subjected to combined toxicological burdens that are not yet fully understood.

The interaction of a fungicide and naturally occurring mycotoxins shows synergistic effects, highlighting the complexities of chemical mixtures and potential threats to liver health through dietary exposure to both toxicants and toxins that are not regulated for their interactions.

Combined pesticide exposure may further amplify the toxicity and compromise the intestinal barrier.

Agricultural mixtures are linked to the occurrence of pediatric cancers, specifically brain and central nervous system cancers and leukemia.

Different glyphosate mixtures produce varied lethal and sublethal effects–mortality, morphological defects, altered heartbeat rate, and impaired heart-specific gene expression—on the South African clawed frog.

Daphnia magna experienced synergistic effects when subjected to esfenvalerate under conditions of climate change.

A multi-behavioral evaluation of the effects of three pesticides, both individually and as mixtures, on zebrafish larvae found, “Even at low concentrations, pesticides can negatively affect organisms, altering important behaviors that can have repercussions at the population level.”

Other studies highlight the need for a broader overhaul of the EPA’s current risk assessment process. A November 2023 European study published in Nature challenges “the current assumption of pesticide regulation—that chemicals that individually pass laboratory tests and semifield trials are considered environmentally benign.”

Since interactions and synergism are the rule, pesticides cannot be evaluated based on single-chemical, single-species tests. They must be evaluated in context—that is, the system of chemical-dependent management must itself be questioned. Fortunately, there is an alternative system—regenerative organic production and land management—suitable as a successful, comparable standard.

EPA must consider effects of pesticides in the context in which they are used and with reference to the organic alternative.

Thank you.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 5, 2025) A study in Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry finds permethrin, a commonly used synthetic pyrethroid insecticide, to be disruptive to the gut microbiome, altering microbiota and leading to increased formation of fat cells (adipogenesis) and metabolic disorders. With an aim to “comprehensively elucidate the effects of permethrin on gut microbiota, lipogenesis, and the associated molecular mechanisms,” the study explores the adverse effects of permethrin exposure in adult mice through multiple experiments.

“Our study provides the first in vivo [in a living organism] evidence suggesting a potentially causal relationship between permethrin exposure and the development of obesity, potentially mediated by specific gut microbiota-derived metabolites,” the researchers explain. They continue, “Notably, this work is the first to define a distinct microbiota−metabolite−host axis as a critical mediator of environmental toxicant-induced metabolic dysfunction.”

Permethrin is widely used as an insecticide on crops, such as cotton, corn, and wheat, as well as on livestock, in indoor and outdoor areas, and for treating lice and scabies. Mosquito abatement programs often utilize permethrin, further adding to the various exposure routes of this neurotoxic chemical. (See additional uses and health effects of permethrin in Beyond Pesticides’ Gateway on Pesticide Hazards and Safe Pest Management here.)

Since pyrethroids are lipophilic compounds (“fat loving” or having an affinity for fats, oils, and other non-polar substances), they are able to extensively distribute throughout the body and can encompass many vital organs including the liver, adipose tissue, intestines, nervous system, stomach, and kidneys.

Previous research by the study authors demonstrates that permethrin promotes weight gain and exacerbates comorbidities associated with obesity. (See here and here.) Obesity is a chronic metabolic disorder linked to type 2 diabetes, fatty liver, and cardiovascular diseases, and is influenced by the gut microbiome. Any imbalance of gut microbiota can lead to a multitude of adverse health impacts including obesity.

Study Methodology and Results

To determine the effects of permethrin exposure in adult mice, the current study performed multiple experiments that included an insulin and glucose tolerance test, plasma and liver lipid measurements, evaluation of the gut barrier integrity, and intestinal microbial sequencing and analysis.

“To study the effects of permethrin on the development of obesity in the mice model, the permethrin-treated group (Per) was administered permethrin orally to C57BL/6J mice for 12 weeks, while the control group (Con) was maintained on a high-fat diet,” the authors share. As a result, permethrin “significantly raised body weight, epididymal white adipose tissue (eWAT), and liver index without impacting food consumption.” The exposed group also shows a pronounced rise in blood glucose and altered serum levels.

Permethrin exposure induces substantial alterations in the composition of gut microbiota. Not only did exposed mice have greater permeability of the gut epithelial barrier, but “analysis of gut microbiota revealed that following permethrin treatment, there was a notable decrease in the ACE index [a statistical measurement of diversity in the gut microbiome].” Changes in microbiota at the phylum level reveal a marked increase in the proportion of Firmicutes and a significant decrease in the proportion of Bacteroidetes. These changes caused a 151% elevation in the Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes (F/B) ratio.

“At the genus level, we observed a notable decrease in the proportion of Intestinimonas, Anaerovorax, Faecalibacterium, Ruminiclostridium, Peptococcus, Bacteroides and UBA1819 within the Per group,” the researchers report. They continue, “Conversely, a notable increase was observed in the proportion of Prevotella_1, Eubacterium_brachy_group, Eubacterium_nodatum_group, Prevotella_7, Ruminococcaceae_UCG-013, Family_XIII_AD3011_group, Family_XIII_UCG-001, and Marvin- bryantia within the Per group.”

These results highlight how permethrin significantly influenced the delicate balance of gut microbiota and can lead to additional health implications and diseases. A follow-up experiment involving fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) further shows the causal role of microbiota in fat accumulation and impacts from permethrin exposure.

The “FMT from permethrin-treated donors induced an imbalance of gut microbiota in mice,” the authors write. In particular, the treatment group shows a 27% increase in Firmicutes abundance, as well as increased lipid accumulation. “[T]ransplanting the intestinal microbiota in sterile mice revealed that microbiota derived from the Per group substantially aggravated the development of obesity and insulin resistance in the subjects via FMT experiments,” the researchers note.

Additional analysis shows permethrin alters the fecal composition of bile acid derivatives, diacylglycerophosphoglycerols, fatty acids, and indoles and their derivatives. The observed lower indole levels could foster obesity and fatty liver progression by regulating lipid oxidation genes. The gut microbial dysbiosis can lead to enhanced intestinal permeability, allowing microbial metabolites to enter the liver and further influence hepatic lipids and promote obesity. (See studies here and here.)

“Hence, permethrin potentially modulated the composition of gut microbiota, thereby affecting the production of SCFAs [short-chain fatty acids] and indole and subsequently initiating lipogenesis, ultimately resulting in obesity, which might provide new insight into the mechanism of permethrin,” the authors conclude.

This study highlights the significant impact of permethrin on the liver and adipose tissue, while mirroring natural exposure patterns and concentrations. “Our study emphasizes the significant impact of permethrin, a common pesticide, on obesity, insulin resistance, and gut microbiota composition in mice,” the researchers summarize. They continue: “We found that permethrin dramatically alters gut microbiota, particularly Firmicute and Bacteroidetes, reducing the production of microbial metabolites (butyrate and indole), which is crucial for preventing obesity… In summary, our current results revealed a causal relationship between the development of obesity and gut microbiota.”

Previous Research

Additional research cited in the current study highlights the molecular mechanisms underlying lipid accumulation that can be affected following pesticide exposure. Particularly, studies show the effects in adipocytes induced by deltamethrin, another pyrethroid insecticide, focusing on cellular-level processes. (See here and here.) Another study of Xenopus laevis exposed to cis-bifenthrin shows “a disturbance within the delicate balance of the gut microbiota and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.” 

Research involving permethrin shows “shifts in gene expression and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) methylation, with the potential to disrupt glutamatergic signaling across generations, thus influencing behavioral patterns,” as well as increases to fatty acid synthesis and adipogenesis. Prolonged exposure to permethrin also provokes liver and kidney damage. (See studies here, here, here, here, and here.)

Previous Daily News coverage connects permethrin with rheumatoid arthritis, adverse effects on women’s reproductive health, impaired memory and learning, thyroid dysfunction, and mortality in birds and butterflies, among others. (See the Daily News archive for permethrin here for additional articles.)

In particular, two studies within the past year also link permethrin, and other pesticides, to impacts on the gut microbiome and higher risks for obesity. See Study Maps the Gut Microbiome and Adverse Impacts of Pesticide Residues and Study Links Numerous Chemical Families of Pesticides to Endocrine Disrupting Effects, Including Obesity for more information.

Organic Solution

To mitigate these health risks, the adoption of organic land management as a holistic solution is imperative. The only way to truly protect health and the environment is to remove the use of petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, especially in agriculture that contaminates food, water, and air.

Organic land management is proven to be a sustainable and profitable alternative to toxic chemical use with higher crop yield, with additional benefits of protecting and enhancing biodiversity, increasing soil health, providing health benefits to those who adopt an organic diet, and mitigating climate change, among others.

To add your voice to the organic movement, take action to tell Congress to stand up for health and the environment. Make The Safer Choice to avoid hazardous home, garden, community, and food use pesticides and join the Parks for a Sustainable Future program. You can also sign up to get Action of the Week and Weekly News Update emails sent directly to your inbox and learn more about the health and environmental benefits of organic here and here.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Lin, J. et al. (2025) Permethrin Stimulates Fat Accumulation via Regulating Gut Microbiota and Its Metabolites in Mice, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. Available at: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jafc.5c05013.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 4, 2025) A review of agricultural neonicotinoid insecticide regulations, published in Pest Management Science, evaluates the varied approaches being taken for bans and exemption-based restrictions in the European Union (EU), Canada, and the United States (U.S.). Despite an ever-growing and overwhelming body of science linking neonicotinoids (neonics) to adverse effects on pollinators and other nontarget species, the regulations fall short in protecting the environment and wildlife. The review, with the history and current status of neonics, lends further support for a full transition to organic agriculture and land management that removes neonicotinoid exposure routes and subsequent health threats.

With the application of this widely used class of neurotoxic system insecticides increasing, so too has the concern over the long-term chronic effects on pollinators and other species from exposure. This concern, backed by scientific literature, has “led to increased governmental regulations since the mid-2010s, particularly in agricultural settings,” state the authors from Iowa State University and Washington State University. They continue, “These regulations have varied in terms of approach, geography, and timeline, starting with a ban implemented by the European Union (EU) and evolving into exemption-based regulations across two Canadian provinces and five U.S. states as of this writing.”

While designed to control piercing and sucking pests like aphids and whiteflies, neonicotinoid impacts on nontarget species range from sublethal effects on pollinators to aquatic insects and crustaceans as well as birds and mammals, including humans. Scientific literature also shows “evidence that different common neonicotinoid derivative groups pose differing levels of threats, with nitroguanidine neonicotinoids (including clothianidin, dinotefuran, imidacloprid, and thiamethoxam, often applied as seed treatments) presenting greater risks to pollinators than the cyanoamidine group (including acetamiprid and thiacloprid, mainly used as foliar applications),” the authors note. The cyanoamidine group, however, are less studied than the nitroguanidine neonicotinoids but have been found to be highly toxic to aquatic insects.

EU Regulatory Cases

Use of imidacloprid in some EU countries was authorized as early 1991, while others, such as thiamethoxam, were introduced throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s. Research began in 2009 and was published four years later documenting impacts on bee health with neonic exposure, leading to EU Regulation 485/2013, which “placed a moratorium on the use of three specific neonicotinoids (imidacloprid and clothianidin, manufactured by Bayer, and thiamethoxam, manufactured by Syngenta) in bee-attractive open-crop fields,” the authors write.

They continue: “Specifically, the use of nitroguanidine neonicotinoids was prohibited in corn/maize, canola, and sunflower crops. Controversy arose, particularly because the decision was contested by agrichemical industries.” This backlash led to subsequent field studies in which the agrichemical industries “contend[ed] that the results demonstrated the in-field safety of neonicotinoids.”

Non-industry scientists and citizens fought back against these claims, leading to a reassessment of evidence on neonicotinoids and bee health that prompted EU Member States to approve a full ban of imidacloprid, clothianidin, and thiamethoxam in outdoor applications. Ban exemptions create loopholes. Between 2019 and 2023, 236 emergency pesticide exemptions were granted, 47.5% of which related to neonicotinoids.

“Following appeals from farmers, beekeepers, and environmental organizations, the decision for pesticide exemptions was reversed in 2023, and it was also determined that individual European countries could not legally grant exceptions for the use of pesticides that the EU has banned, aligning with recommendations by Epstein et al. to stringently limit emergency exemptions,” the authors explain.

Limiting exemptions was in part due to the detection of neonics in aquatic wildlife above environmental quality standards that were deemed safe, as well as the persistence of this class of chemicals in soil and water. As the study notes, “Additionally, research has found high levels of soil and canola nectar contamination, particularly with imidacloprid, even after the 2013 and 2018 bans took place, suggesting that partial bans (i.e. those not extending to non-pollinated crops and indoor use, or granting too many emergency exemptions) may be insufficient to adequately control risks.”

As it currently stands, two neonicotinoids in use are up for renewal evaluation in 2025. It has also been announced that the EU intends to ban the import of products containing any traces of thiamethoxam and clothianidin by 2026.

Regulatory Action in Canada

In the 1990s, neonicotinoids were first used in Canada for the Colorado potato beetle and flea beetle in potatoes and canola. Immediate research began to show negative impacts to bees and pollinators, with agrichemical companies arguing the science was too uncertain to be conclusive. “Nonetheless, the province of Ontario followed the example of the EU in that Ontario attempted to impose a blanket ban on nitroguanidine neonicotinoids, but some restrictions were later rescinded,” the authors recount.

They continue, “Ultimately, Ontario instituted a partial ban based on the precautionary principle, i.e., that a given course of action or technology must be proven safe before it can be used, to reduce agricultural use of neonicotinoids by 80%.” This ban, thanks to involvement from the Ontario Bee Working Group, went into effect on July 1, 2015. Despite pushback from the Grain Farmers of Ontario, the ban stayed in place.

It was decided that farmers wishing to buy and use neonicotinoid-treated seeds must complete a one-time free Integrated Pest Management (IPM) training, complete a pest risk assessment report, and sign an IPM Written Declaration Form stating that they have considered IPM principles to decrease the risk of early season insect damage.

“After reviewing the science, including studies specific to Canada, Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA), in 2018, proposed a phaseout of all agricultural, ornamental, and greenhouse use of neonicotinoids over the next 3–5 years, the authors state. “However, this proposal was heavily altered by the PMRA in 2021. The PMRA concluded that the neonicotinoids in question were largely acceptable, and only minor mitigations were required, such as restricting their application to seed treatments.” As shared in reporting by Canada’s National Observer, it is alleged that the reversal is a result of “agrichemical company interference and collusion.” Revaluation of neonicotinoid restrictions is ongoing, with a plan to publish any decisions in the 2025–2026 fiscal year.

Québec independently regulates nitroguanidine neonicotinoid use, prohibiting since 2019 the use of neonicotinoid-treated seeds for corn and soybean unless growers have a verification of need from an independent agronomist. This ban, as shown in a report by the Québec government, led to a drop in detected neonicotinoids in surface waters from 2018 to 2020. However, most farmers turned primarily to diamides (about 60% of corn fields in 2021) as a replacement, perpetuating the pesticide treadmill. Completely untreated seed were only reported in about 20–30% of fields in 2023. Québec’s current plan is to “subject all insecticide seed coatings—not just neonicotinoids—in corn, soybean, canola, wheat, and barley to regulations, including agronomic justification and prescription by a trained agronomist, to go into effect in 2025.”

U.S. Regulations

In the U.S., as pointed out in many previous Daily News articles by Beyond Pesticides, regulatory actions through the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) fail to properly address the associated risks from petrochemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. Presently, a registration review and amended proposed interim decision through EPA is scheduled on the use of imidacloprid, clothianidin, thiamethoxam, dinotefuran, and acetamiprid is expected in 2025.

As the current review notes, the U.S. has been slower to implement restrictions on neonicotinoids than the EU or Canada but specific states have taken additional action. As of 2023, at least 20 states had developed plans or passed legislation to protect pollinator habitats. In the review, efforts from California, Minnesota, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Illinois showcase state-based actions particularly for agricultural uses, while additional states including Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Nevada, New Jersey, and Washington have enacted actions pertaining to nonagricultural uses.

California

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR), in 2008, began receiving adverse effects disclosures of neonicotinoids on pollinators. Four nitroguanidine neonicotinoids were reevaluated in 2009 but proposed regulations did not go into effect until January 1, 2024, which limited soil and foliar—but not seed-treated—nitroguanidine neonicotinoids in the production of agricultural commodities in 16 fruit, vegetable, and cereal crops.

Minnesota

In 2023, four bills concerning neonicotinoids were signed into law, one of which is directly related to agriculture and involves the use and disposal of pesticide-treated seeds. “As of October 2024, the NRDC [Natural Resources Defense Council] led the filing of a legal petition against the MDA, arguing that the MDA has failed to protect Minnesotan citizens’ rights by failing to enact farther-reaching neonicotinoid-treated seed restrictions,” the authors share. “However, the NRDC’s petition was rejected in December 2024.”

New York

The Birds and the Bees Protection Act was signed by the Governor of New York in 2022, which prohibits the use of both nitroguanidine and cyanoamidine neonicotinoids in corn, soybeans, and wheat production. This was anticipated to decrease the use of neonicotinoids in the state by 80–90%. Provisions in this bill, however, do not take effect until 2029.

As covered in Daily News titled Bill to Protect Birds and Bees in New York Raises Political Challenges to Addressing Ecosystem Collapse, legislative efforts to curtail some life-threatening pesticides associated with birds and bees (and other pollinators) decline were weakened in New York State at the end of December 2023 as the governor negotiated and stripped elements of a bill relating to agriculture that had passed the legislature—again illustrating the grip of the agrichemical industry on public policy intended to begin to address the crisis in ecosystem collapse. (See “Study Cites Insect Extinction and Ecological Collapse.”) In passing the Birds and Bees Protection Act, New York joined New Jersey, Nevada, and Maine in banning most nonagricultural uses of neonicotinoid insecticides, but, in last-minute changes to avoid the governor’s veto, failed to phase out corn, soybean, and wheat seeds coated with these chemicals.

Rhode Island

Legislation in 2022, and effective as of January 1, 2024, was signed by the Governor of Rhode Island to restrict the use of both nitroguanidine and cyanoamidine neonicotinoids outdoors but contains a provision allowing certified applicators to purchase and use neonicotinoids as long as the plant is not blossoming. “While the National Pest Management Association opposed the bill and appeared to influence a vote delay in the House and Senate, activist groups pushed the legislature to approve it,” the authors note.

Vermont

The Governor of Vermont vetoed a bill that limits nitroguanidine and cyanoamidine neonicotinoids in the state, but the legislature overrode it and the bill was enacted. This requires farmers to get a prescription from their agronomist demonstrating that neonicotinoid-coated seeds are necessary. “The bill explicitly prohibits the use of neonicotinoid-treated seeds in soybeans and cereal grains, outdoor application during bloom, and outdoor application to leafy and petiole vegetable crops harvested after bloom,” the authors explain. These provisions will go into effect in 2029, on the condition that the legislation in New York successfully goes into effect as well.

Illinois

In 2024, the Illinois General Assembly passed legislation restricting corn, soybean, and wheat seed treatments with neonicotinoids in both the nitroguanidine and cyanomidine groups (clothianidin, imidacloprid, thiamethoxam, dinotefuran, and acetamiprid). These restrictions are also modeled after those outlined by the state of New York.

Overview of Regulations to Date

Despite the growing body of research connecting neonicotinoid exposure to detrimental environmental and health effects, “regulations have spread from the EU to Canadian provinces and, subsequently, to specific US states, becoming increasingly voluntary and less restrictive over time.,” the authors highlight. The industry pressure from agrichemical companies has reduced the effectiveness of regulatory action, with the adoption of voluntary efforts and a myriad of exceptions and exemptions. (See Daily News articles on industry influence here and here.)

Additionally, the replacement of neonics with other toxic chemicals such as pyrethroids or diamides, sometimes at higher usage levels than neonicotinoids, perpetuates the risks to pollinators and other wildlife. “What can we infer from these trends?,” the authors ask. They continue: “For one, the nature of regulation will largely depend on each government’s adherence to the precautionary principle. The EU has taken a highly precautionary approach by instituting a complete ban, while Canadian and US federal agencies have been slow or reluctant to act, leaving regulation mostly to lower-level regional governments.” These regulations have been criticized as insufficient in protecting the environment and all organisms within it, which provides further support for the urgent need to transition all agriculture and land management to organic.

Previous Coverage

As shared in a 2019 Daily News article, Settlement Bans Some Bee-Toxic Pesticides, Requires Public Comment Period on Testing All Pesticide Product Ingredients and Regulating Pesticide-Treated Seeds, plaintiffs in a 2013 lawsuit against EPA made a number of claims related to EPA’s failure to protect pollinators from dangerous pesticides, its poor oversight of the bee-killing pesticides clothianidin and thiamethoxam, and its practice of “conditional registration,” as well as labeling deficiencies. The parties in the suit negotiated a settlement, as directed by a federal judge, that was signed in October 2018 and portends some positive movement in curtailing the use of some toxic pesticides [12 products, each of which contains clothianidin or thiamethoxam as an active ingredient] that harm pollinators in particular, as well as other organisms and the environment. Learn more with related coverage from 2023, Groups Challenge EPA on Allowing Toxic Pesticides that Do Not Even Work and Without Its Review.

State-based coverage includes: Nevada Assembly Votes Unanimously To Protect Pollinators, Recognizes Deficiencies of EPA Regulations, Colorado Limits Bee-Toxic Pesticide Use, as EPA Details Harm to Endangered Species, States Step In to Restrict Bee-Toxic Pesticides, California the Latest in Absence of EPA Action, and Vermont Leverages New York Limits on Neonic Insecticides with Deference to Chemical-Intensive Agriculture.

What Can You Do?

• Plant pollinator habitats! Explore Beyond Pesticides’ resources to find ideas for native plants and untreated flowers and dig your pollinator-friendly garden today. Use the Bee Protective Habitat Guide and the Pollinator-Friendly Seed Directory to help!
• Pledge to protect pollinators and produce in your garden by never using chemicals that harm beneficial insects and ladybugs and go organic! Display a Pesticide-Free Zone sign for your yard and show your neighbors that pesticide-free spaces are important for health and the environment.
• Become an Organic Parks Advocate! Engage with your municipal parks department by sharing Beyond Pesticides’ factsheets on Establishing New Lawns and Landscapes and Maintaining Sustainable Lawns and Landscapes. For more support from Beyond Pesticides, sign up to become a parks advocate!

Learn more on the Lawns and Landscapes page on Beyond Pesticides’ website and about the benefits of organic here and here. For more information about becoming an advocate for organic land, see Parks for a Sustainable Future and Tools for Change.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Source:

Dentzman, K. et al. (2025) An overview of agricultural neonicotinoid regulation in the EU, Canada, and the United States, Pest Management Science. Available at: https://scijournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ps.70126.

(Beyond Pesticides, September 3, 2025) A study in Environmental Entomology shows that habitat and open space near agricultural fields become a killing field of pesticides, threatening biodiversity due to contamination from toxic drift. The study detected 42 pesticides, including several neonicotinoids, which are among the most lethal threats to pollinators. The research reveals the complexity of pesticide flow through the environment and the inadequacy of current methods of protecting nontarget organisms, including honey bees, bumblebees, and hundreds of other species of native bees worldwide. Their catastrophic declines is tied to pesticides in large part and highlights the inadequacy of current pesticide reduction strategies, such as integrated pest management (IPM) and now other loosely defined concepts like “regenerative,” in an attempt to protect the environment and nontarget organisms in chemical-dependent land management and agriculture. (See What the Science Shows on Biodiversity.)

The researchers on the study, from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Cornell University and Michigan State University, put silicone bands on fence posts in open areas adjacent to highbush blueberry fields on 15 farms in western Michigan. Silicone takes up chemicals in the atmosphere which can then be extracted and analyzed. The fence posts were placed at seven intervals ranging from zero to 32 meters from the blueberry field edges. They were left in place for three weeks in July 2020.

A total of 104 samples from the 15 sites, one for each distance interval, were analyzed. Forty-two pesticides were detected altogether, including several neonicotinoids, which are among the most lethal threats to pollinators. Among the 42 pesticides detected, the herbicide metolachlor is found in all samples, followed by the fungicides azoxystrobin and trifloxystrobin and the herbicide atrazine. Active ingredients detected at the highest concentrations are the insecticides acetamiprid (a neonicotinoid), bendiocarb (a carbamate), malaoxon (a degradate of the organophosphate malathion) and phosmet (an organophosphate). These are found at levels above the upper limit of quantification, that is, higher than the maximum the detection method can confidently identify. The neonicotinoid imidacloprid is also found at very high concentrations. Several fungicides are also detected near or above the upper limit of quantification. Quantification of levels is not always an effective method for determining harm because of the failure of ecosystem studies to fully evaluate mixtures, synergistic effects, nondisclosed “inert,” but chemically and biologically active, ingredients, contaminants in pesticide formulations (including per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), among other hazardous complexities.

One very significant result of the study is the finding that distance has no effect on the number of active ingredients detected—in other words, just as many active ingredients are found at 32 meters from the field as at two meters. There are significant differences in the average concentrations of all pesticides at different distances, with longer distance corresponding to lower concentrations, but this is mostly due to the influence of fungicides in the dataset. For the seven insecticides with high concentrations or frequent detections, there is no difference between distances. The organophosphate phosmet, used primarily on orchard fruits and considered the greatest risk to honeybees during fruit ripening, is also found at similar concentrations at every distance measured.

Efforts to reduce pesticide drift are cited as a mitigation measure. The authors write: using different spray nozzles and spray pressure, reducing the volume of the active ingredient, and slowing tractor speed, for example. However, the researchers write, “[A]doption of drift-reducing practices remains limited across most cropping systems.” (The adverse effect of pesticide drift on biodiversity has been widely studied.) Another way pesticides often migrate in air is through volatilization—that is, after application as a liquid they vaporize and travel in the atmosphere. In this study, the highest concentrations of pesticides found away from the target crop were of low volatility, suggesting that any drift that occurred probably did so during initial application and be captured in sizable buffer zones that would still attract and potentially harm biodiversity. (In a related story, see EPA To Allow Dicamba Herbicide Used in Genetically Engineered Crops, Prone to Drift and Weed Resistance.)

Pesticides are also not the only things that drift. Pollen itself, principally from wind-pollinated plants like corn, drifts for long distances. While pollen drift is not so much an issue for insect and bird-pollinated plants, the advent of genetically modified corn (GMO) varieties has nonetheless created problems for pollinating insects: the genetic modifications enable explosive use of pesticides, as the GMO varieties are tolerant of certain herbicides and insecticides and may be resistant to insects and viruses. These pesticides in turn decimate pollinators.

Pollinators collect both nectar and pollen from flowering plants and transport them back to their nests. These are distributed to all members of a social insect colony, and in both social and solitary pollinators the larvae are exposed. The widespread assumption has been that it is mostly pollen, and secondarily nectar, from treated crops that are the source of the pesticide exposures. There has also been an assumption that pollinators’ pesticide exposure from agricultural applications is diluted by the pollen collected from untreated wildflowers. But strikingly, in a 2015 British study of canola fields treated with neonicotinoids, the total concentration of these insecticides in wildflower pollen from field margins was higher than in the pollen from the crop plants. This was not the case for the nectar samples, and the British researchers suggested that the neonicotinoids in the nectar arrived there via soil contamination. Neonicotinoids are highly water soluble and easily make their way into an entire plant through roots, leaves and the plants’ circulatory mechanisms.

From a larger perspective, it is clear that pesticides, including those that directly affect vital pollinators, do not stay put. A study analyzed by Beyond Pesticides last March found that pesticides drifted all the way from the Rhine Valley floor to the tops of surrounding mountains—distances of up to “multiple hundred meters,” according to the authors. Unfortunately, spray drift is only one of the ways that pesticides migrate around landscapes. According to a recent scientific review, neonicotinoids are applied by soil drenching, root irrigation, foliage spray, injection and seed treatment. The British study also found that crops that had been treated with fungicides but not neonicotinoids contained residues of neonicotinoid mixtures, possibly from contaminated machinery used to process treated seeds or their parent crops.

The Michigan blueberry study adds to the growing evidence that the current norms for protective buffers are wholly inadequate. In western Michigan blueberry fields, a typical width is 16 to 20 meters. “Given this, for the majority of wildflower plantings in this region, the entire planting is likely to be within the area where we found no significant reduction in pesticide concentration with distance from the crop field edge,” the authors write. A frequently suggested optimal buffer size to minimize drift is approximately 10-20 meters and based on wind speed at the time of application. The Michigan authors suggest that the few existing wildflower plantings ranging from two to 10 acres near blueberry fields may provide far better protection than small 32-meter strips along field margins.

Beyond Pesticides has a deep archive of information on pollinators, neonicotinoids, spray drift, and hundreds of pesticides. See the report, “No Longer a BIG Mystery: Recent scientific research confirms the role of pesticides in pollinator decline” and our BEE Protective resource for information on stopping the pollinator carnage.

In 2014 a panel of scientists from Britain and The Netherlands published a paper in the Royal Society Proceedings B entitled “A restatement of the natural science evidence base concerning neonicotinoid insecticides and insect pollinators.” In it, the authors wrote:

There is clear evidence of the great value of neonicotinoids in agriculture as well as the importance of the ecosystem services provided to agriculture by managed and wild pollinators. Pollinators also have intrinsic importance as components of natural biodiversity that cannot, or can only inexactly, be accorded economic value. In some cases, intelligent regulation of insecticide use can provide ‘win-wins’ that improve both agricultural and biodiversity outcomes but in other cases there will be trade-offs, both within and between different agricultural and environmental objectives.

What is clear a decade later is that there are no “win-wins” and the “trade-offs” are so unbalanced as to threaten the entire world’s food supply and the stability of its large-scale ecological balance.

All unattributed positions and opinions in this piece are those of Beyond Pesticides.

Sources:
Pesticide drift into field margins threatens bee pollinators and other beneficial insects Free
Graham et al.
Environmental Entomology 2025
https://academic.oup.com/ee/article/54/4/835/8161150?login=false

Study Finds High Pesticide Drift Into Wildflower Buffer Zones Near Crop Fields
Andrew Porterfield
Entomology Today 2025
https://entomologytoday.org/2025/08/19/study-high-pesticide-drift-wildflower-buffer-zones-near-crop-fields/

Sampling Finds Pesticides Throughout Environment with Toxic Mixtures from Agricultural Use
Beyond Pesticides, March 28, 2025
https://beyondpesticides.org/dailynewsblog/2025/03/sampling-finds-pesticides-throughout-environment-with-toxic-mixtures-from-agricultural-use/
Neonicotinoid Residues in Wildflowers, a Potential Route of Chronic Exposure for Bees
Botías et al.
Environmental Science & Technology 2015
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/acs.est.5b03459?ref=article_openPDF

A restatement of the natural science evidence base concerning neonicotinoid insecticides and insect pollinators
Godfray et al.
The Royal Society Publishing Proceedings B 2014
Proceedings Biological Science
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4046413/#s4

Pollinators and Pesticides: Protecting honeybees and wild pollinators
Beyond Pesticides
https://www.beyondpesticides.org/assets/media/documents/pollinators/pollinators.pdf