“The biotech industry has spent billions on research and public relations hype, but genetically engineered food and feed crops haven’t enabled American farmers to grow significantly more crops per acre of land,” said Doug Gurian-Sherman, a biologist in the UCS Food and Environment Program and author of the report. “In comparison, traditional breeding continues to deliver better results.”

The report, “Failure to Yield: Evaluating the Performance of Genetically Engineered Crops,” is the first to closely evaluate the overall effect genetic engineering has had on crop yields in relation to other agricultural technologies. It reviewed two dozen academic studies of corn and soybeans, the two primary genetically engineered food and feed crops grown in the United States. Based on those studies, the UCS report concludes that genetically engineering herbicide-tolerant soybeans and herbicide-tolerant corn have not increased yields. Insect-resistant corn, meanwhile, has improved yields only marginally. The increase in yields for these crops over the last 13 years, the report found, is largely due to traditional breeding or improvements in agricultural practices.

The UCS report comes at a time when food price spikes and localized shortages worldwide have prompted calls to boost agricultural productivity, or yield””the amount of a crop produced per unit of land over a specified amount of time. Biotechnology companies maintain that genetic engineering is essential to meeting this goal. Monsanto, for example, is currently running an advertising campaign warning of an exploding world population and claiming that its “advanced seeds ”¦ significantly increase crop yields”¦.” The UCS report debunks that claim, concluding that genetic engineering is unlikely to play a significant role in increasing food production in the foreseeable future.

The biotechnology industry has been promising better yields since the mid-1990s, but “Failure to Yield” documents that the industry has been carrying out gene field trials to increase yields for 20 years without significant results.

“After more than 3,000 field trials, only two types of engineered genes are in widespread use, and they haven’t helped raise the ceiling on potential yields,” said Margaret Mellon, a microbiologist and director of UCS’s Food and Environment Program. “This record does not inspire confidence in the future of the technology.”

“Failure to Yield” makes a critical distinction between potential””or intrinsic””yield and operational yield, concepts that are often conflated by the industry and misunderstood by others. Intrinsic yield refers to a crop’s ultimate production potential under the best possible conditions. Operational yield refers to production levels after losses due to pests, drought and other environmental factors. The study reviews the intrinsic and operational yield achievements of the three most common genetically altered food and feed crops in the United States: herbicide-tolerant soybeans, herbicide-tolerant corn and insect-resistant corn (known as Bt corn, after the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, whose genes enable the corn to resist several kinds of insects). Herbicide-tolerant soybeans, herbicide-tolerant corn and Bt corn have failed to increase intrinsic yields, the report found. Herbicide-tolerant soybeans and herbicide-tolerant corn also have failed to increase operational yields, compared with conventional methods.

Meanwhile, the report finds that Bt corn likely provides a marginal operational yield advantage of three to four percent over typical conventional practices. Since Bt corn became commercially available in 1996, its yield advantage averages out to a 0.2 to 0.3 percent yield increase per year. To put that figure in context, overall U.S. corn yields over the last several decades have annually averaged an increase of approximately one percent, which is considerably more than what Bt traits have provided.

In addition, recent studies have shown that organic and similar farming methods that minimize the use of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers can more than double crop yields at little cost to poor farmers in such developing regions as Sub-Saharan Africa.

The report recommends that the U.S. Department of Agriculture, state agricultural agencies, and universities increase research and development for proven approaches to boost crop yields. Those approaches should include modern conventional plant breeding methods, sustainable and organic farming, and other sophisticated farming practices that do not require farmers to pay significant upfront costs. The report also recommends that U.S. food aid organizations make these more promising and affordable alternatives available to farmers in developing countries.

Organic agriculture does not permit GE crops or the use of synthetic herbicides, and focuses on building the soil—minimizing its effect on climate change. For more information, see Beyond Pesticides’ GE program page.

“Endocrine disruptors can cause lifelong health problems, especially for children,” stated EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. “Gathering this information will help us work with communities and industry to protect Americans from harmful exposure.”

EPA’s recent announcement of these chemicals can be found on EPA’s Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program (EDSP) page. According to EPA, “The Agency deleted 6 chemicals from the draft list of 73 based upon recent information showing that the chemicals are no longer expected to be found in 3 exposure pathways.” To be included on the initial list, EPA established that chemicals need to be found in three of EPA’s four exposure pathways: food, drinking water, residential use, and occupational exposure. Azinphos-methyl and fenvalerate were removed from the draft list because all uses will have ended by 2012, when Tier 2 begins. Aldicarb, allethrin, dichlorvos, and methiocarb were removed because by that year, they will be found in fewer than three exposure pathways. Once EPA has tested the first 67, any remaining registered chemicals should be entered in the same review.

According to the EDSP manager, Linda Phillips, it will take about two years for EPA to generate full data for these chemicals, and then take another year to determine the effect each has on the endocrine system.

The pesticide industry, led by CropLife America, submitted a petition to EPA last summer that called EDSP “unnecessary and redundant,” given the current data requirements for pesticide toxicity. Of the result, CropLife’s president and CEO, Jay Vroom, said, “In arriving at this formal response, we worry EPA have not taken into account the unique aspects of pesticide regulatory requirements as they intersect with the overarching, new endocrine screening process.” Since then, however, Mr. Vroom has stated that he is “very confident our products will come through with flying colors,” and “If we do learn something about our products that raises a cause for concern, our industry will be at the table, ready and willing to step forward and take action to mitigate risk.”

A wide variety of pesticides, however, have been found to affect both human and animal hormone systems at low levels. For an overview of endocrine disruptors, view Beyond Pesticides’ article, “Pesticides that Disrupt Endocrine System Still Unregulated by EPA.”

Bed bug outbreaks have tripled since 2005, according to a survey of 800 pest control firms across the country, infesting apartment buildings, college dormitories, hospital wings, homeless shelters and top-rated hotels. Bedbugs outbreaks have been reported in at least 27 states, including Honolulu, San Francisco, Cincinnati, Chicago, Houston and Miami. In 2006, a Chicago woman sued a New York hotel for $20 million after suffering more than 500 bed bug bites.

Persistent outbreaks are normally concentrated in low-income neighborhoods, where people cannot afford to replace or professionally clean bedding and soft furnishing. Both New York and San Francisco have passed city legislation to help control the spread of the bugs. In San Francisco, the legislation centers on landlord and tenant rights while in New York, it involves controlling the sale and transport of used mattresses.

Bed bugs are reddish brown and range in size between 1/8 — ¼ of an inch. They live in the crevices and folds of mattresses, sofas and sheets, cracks in walls, behind picture frames or other wall hangings, or inside the bindings of books or even on stuffed animals. While they do not transmit disease, bites can become infected, which occurs in about 30% of those bitten, leaving behind red raised welts. Signs of a bed bug infestation include a pungent odor, and blood or fecal spots on pillow casings and sheets. A bed bug can live up to one year on a single blood meal.

“The problem seems to be increasing and it could definitely be worse in densely populated areas like cities, although it can be a problem for anyone,” said Lois Rossi, director of the registration division in the EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs. In 2002, EPA classified bedbugs as a public health pest.

The use of broad spectrum insecticides, which kills common household insects, such as cockroaches, ants and other insects including bed bugs, exposed these organisms to a range of chemicals and allowed them to gradually build up resistance to these chemicals. Many of the chemicals used against bed bugs, such as esfenvalerate and various pyrethroids (permethrin, deltamethrin, cyfluthrin, etc) are also associated with adverse human effects including skin irritation (important if applied to mattresses) endocrine disruption, cancer and neurotoxicity.

“Generally I can guarantee that they will be tolerant to at least one or more of the things that are being used against them,” said Harold Harlan, the leading bug expert for the U.S. military. “They’ve been exposed to chemicals so they are more resistant to chemicals.”

Saul Hernandez, an aide to the Rep. G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C who introduced H.R. 6068 -The Don’t Let the Bed Bugs Bite Act of 2008, says he plans to reintroduce the legislation next week, which establishes grant programs to assist States with inspection programs for bed bugs. Federal funding for research into alternative solutions, such as heating, freezing or steaming the bugs out of bedrooms will also be sought by other stakeholders.

There are several habitat modifications and least-toxic alternatives available to prevent, control and treat bed bugs which are all be part of a sound integrated pest management (IPM) strategy. These include sealing cracks and crevices where bed bugs can hide, regular laundering of bed linens and clothing in hot water (120oF), as well as regular vacuuming and steam cleaning of carpets and other soft furnishings which can destroy bed bugs and their eggs. There are also several least-toxic chemical alternatives on the market, including diatomaceous earth. For more information on detecting and preventing a bed bug infestation in your home, read our factsheet “Bed Bugs- Back with a Vengeance” or contact Beyond Pesticides.

Environmentalists, scientists and farmers opposed to GE crops have argued that the corn, which confers resistance to pests, could pollute other crops and pose a threat to the environment and human health. The debate over the use of GE crops in Europe has been ongoing for at least a decade.

MON810 maize, brand name YieldGard, is the only GE crop currently cultivated in the European Union (EU). Under EU laws, countries are allowed to ban individual GE crops for environmental and health reasons. Currently, Hungary, France, Austria, Greece and Luxembourg ban MON810 maize. In March, EU environment ministers overwhelmingly rejected a European Commission proposal to force Austria and Hungary to lift their bans on the controversial cultivation of varieties of genetically modified (GM) corn. Over 20 member states voted against the Commission proposal. Hungary can maintain its ban on Monsanto’s GM maize MON810, and Austria on MON810 and Bayer’s T25.

The effects of Monsanto’s genetically modified maize MON 810, which is engineered to produce a toxin to kill the corn borer, are uncertain and controversial. European Environment Ministers concluded last December that GE risk assessment in the EU is not fulfilling legal requirements, that long term impacts have not been assessed. MON810 is currently being re-assessed at EU level as required under EU law. On November 10, 2008, the Austrian government released a report of long term research showing GE corn fed to mice significantly reduced their fertility over three to four breeding cycles within one generation. Similar effects were found in mice fed GE corn and bred over four generations.

According to a recent report by the by the Center for Food Safety and Friends of the Earth International, GE seeds cost from two to over four times as much as conventional, non-GM seeds, and the price disparity is increasing. From 80% to over 90% of the soybean, corn and cotton seeds planted in the U.S. are GE varieties. Thanks to GE trait fee increases, average U.S. seed prices for these crops have risen by over 50% in just the past two to three years. Exploitation of the food crisis has been extremely profitable for Monsanto, by far the dominant player in GE seeds. Goldman Sachs recently projected that Monsanto’s net income (after taxes) would triple from $984 million to $2.96 billion from 2007 to 2010.

The exorbitant cost of GM seeds is not the only problem. The vast majority of GE crops are not grown by or destined for the world’s poor, but instead are soybeans and corn used to feed animals, generate biofuels, or produce highly processed food products consumed mostly in rich countries. The report documents that nearly 90% of the global area planted GE crops in 2008 was found in just 6 countries with highly industrialized, export-oriented agricultural sectors in North and South America, with the U.S., Argentina and Brazil responsible for 80% of GE crops. The United States alone produced 50% of the world’s GE crops in 2008.

Despite more than a decade of hype, the biotechnology industry has not introduced a single GE crop with increased yield, enhanced nutrition, drought-tolerance or salt-tolerance. In fact, the biotechnology industry’s own figures show that 85% of all GE crop acreage worldwide in 2008 was planted with herbicide-tolerant crops. Roundup Ready crops, which are genetically engineered to be resistant to Monsanto’s best selling herbicide Roundup (active ingredient glyphosate) have been a boon to Monsanto’s profits, but not without environmental costs.

Colombian glyphosate spraying

Colombia is the only country in the world that allows this kind of herbicide spraying””known as fumigation””as an anti-drug practice. Yet the spraying has been a complete failure. According to U.S. government studies, the area subject to coca cultivation has actually increased by 23 percent since the U.S.-backed fumigation began in earnest, and Colombia remains the leading supplier of cocaine for U.S. markets. Coca farmers simply spread out and relocate the crops, moving deeper into the forest and clearing new areas. The environmental impacts have been disastrous.

Further, the chemical mixture of glyphosate and surfactants used in Colombia has not been fully tested for environmental or human health impacts under these conditions. People on the ground in affected regions say that the spraying significantly harms both. The concentrations applied are much greater than those commonly used for aerial spraying, and the spray drift lands on food crops, water sources, and even humans. At least 10,000 farmers have reported food crops killed by fumigations, and the UN Special Rapporteur on Health said there is “credible and trustworthy evidence” that fumigations are harmful to human health.

In 2007, scientists from Pontificia Catholic University in Quito, Ecuador, completed a study of 24 residents living within three kilometers of the Colombian border — an area targeted by the coca spraying – and have found a wide variety of ailments. The study’s subjects suffer from symptoms that include intestinal pain, diarrhea, vomiting, headaches, dizziness, numbness, blurred vision, skin irritation, rashes, and difficulty breathing. In addition, the damage to their chromosomes was 600 to 800 percent greater than that of people living 80 km away, which can signal possible conditions like cancer and reproductive effects like miscarriages.

Now is the time to cut U.S. support and funding for this inhumane, ineffective and environmentally destructive program. Send your letter to President Obama today.

“This decision means that EPA recognizes its responsibility to move forward with implementing the Clean Water Act, instead of trying to circumvent this bedrock public protection statute as was attempted by the Bush EPA,” stated Charlie Tebbutt of the Western Environmental Law Center, who argued the case for the environmental plaintiffs. “We now look forward to working with EPA and the states to bring about meaningful changes in site specific uses of pesticides to protect our nation’s waters,” continued Mr. Tebbutt.

In this same announcement, EPA stated that it will seek to continue the Bush rule for two years, despite the court ruling it illegal. “This part of the EPA’s decision is troubling,” said Mr. Tebbutt, but he added, “I expect that the 6th Circuit will deny the request to keep an illegal rule in place.” The court decision simply reinstates the law as it was before Bush’s intervention in 2006 and numerous states had permits in place prior to the rule change. “It will not be the great hardship that the pesticide industry has concocted. It is time to reinstate the full protections to our nation’s rivers, lakes and streams envisioned by the Clean Water when it was passed in 1972,” Mr. Tebbutt concluded.

In January, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a Bush EPA decision that the spraying of pesticides into the nation’s waters should no longer be regulated by the Clean Water Act. The Court held that pesticide residuals and biological pesticides constitute pollutants under federal law and therefore must be regulated under the Clean Water Act in order to minimize the impact to human health and the environment.

With this decision, virtually all commercial pesticide application to, over and around waterways will now require National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits. The NPDES permits will allow for local citizen input, and provide for accountability and oversight. The permits will also require the regulatory agencies to evaluate effects on fish and wildlife from individual applications, to monitor exactly how much of a pesticide application goes into in our nation’s waters, and to evaluate the cumulative impact this residual effect has on aquatic organisms.

Government delegates will gather in Geneva early next month to decide whether lindane will be added to a list of chemicals targeted for a global phase out under the international Stockholm Convention.

In a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Acting Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration Joshua Sharfstein, a coalition of groups are calling on the agency leaders to support listing of lindane under the international treaty without exemption for lotions and shampoos (“pharmaceutical uses”). The letter also urges FDA to “take definitive action in ending pharmaceutical use of lindane domestically, as has already been accomplished in California.”

“These lindane shampoos and lotions have already been banned in California and in many countries around the world,” says Kristin Schafer, Associate Director for Advocacy with Pesticide Action Network North America. “U.S. agencies must do their job, and take action now to protect children in the US and around the world from this persistent pesticide.” Lindane has also been restricted in Michigan for use on head lice and scabies.

In addition to the letter, the groups submitted a scientific study from the journal Environmental Health Perspectives documenting the success of the 2001 California ban, as well as a compilation of personal stories from parents around the country who have used less hazardous methods to control lice.

“The California experience shows that a ban on lindane products leads to cleaner water and healthier children,” says Dr. Sarah Janssen, co-author of the EHP article. “We have seen no lice or scabies outbreaks after more than seven years. There is simply no reason to keep these products on the market.”

Exposure to lindane, a neurotoxic organochlorine pesticide, has been linked to seizures, developmental disabilities and hormone disruption. It is known to be particularly hazardous to children. Lindane and associated isomers are among the most ubiquitous chemicals in the Arctic environment, contaminating traditional foods of Indigenous communities in the region.

“Our traditional foods are polluted by chemicals that aren’t even used here in the Arctic,” says Shawna Larson, Environmental Justice Program Director for Alaska Community Action on Toxics. “The U.S. has been one of the few countries pressing to allow continued use of these products — it makes no sense, and it has to change.”

The groups also submitted several statements and resolutions from Indigenous organizations in the Arctic region calling for an immediate phaseout of all uses of the pesticide lindane.

According to the coalition, U.S. pesticide and other chemical plants remain one of the sectors of America’s infrastructure most vulnerable to accidents and terrorist attacks. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has identified approximately 7,000 high-risk U.S. chemical facilities. However, unless Congress replaces a flawed temporary law with a comprehensive chemical security program, millions of Americans will remain at risk.

Watch Greenpeace's Chemical Security video

The statute Congress passed in 2006 temporarily authorized “interim” regulations that are wholly inadequate to protect communities. Furthermore these rules expire on October 4, 2009 leaving the 111th Congress only six months to enact truly protective legislation. Congress must pass comprehensive legislation before the temporary law expires.

Among the fatal flaws in the “interim” statute:

— It prohibits the DHS from requiring the most ironclad security measures. DHS cannot require any specific “security measure,” including the use of safer and more secure chemical processes that can eliminate catastrophic hazards posed by poison gas, even when cost-effective alternatives are readily available.

— It explicitly exempts thousands of chemical facilities, including approximately 2,650 water treatment facilities, some of which put major cities at risk.

— It fails to involve plant employees in the development of vulnerability assessments and security plans or protect employees from excessive background checks.

In March 2008 the House Homeland Security Committee adopted the “Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Act of 2008” (H.R. 5577) in a bipartisan vote. H.R. 5577 addresses many of the flaws in the interim law. However, the chemical manufacturers lobby opposed it and favors making the interim law permanent.

Just last summer, a pesticide tank exploded at a Bayer chemical plant in West Virginia, drawing comparisons between the site’s potential risk and the 1984 Bhopal disaster, in which an explosion and leak at the Bayer site’s sister plant killed thousands. Read more. Chemical plant tragedies, as well as the slow poisoning of our environment through everyday pesticide and other toxic chemical use, raises the issue of whether these toxic chemicals should be manufactured at all, when safer practices and products exist.

“Inert” refers to ingredients in a pesticide formulation that have been added to the active ingredient to serve a variety of functions, such as acting as solvents, surfactants, or preservatives. However, the common misconception is that “inert” ingredients are physically, chemically, or biologically inactive substances. EPA allows pesticide manufacturers to put harmful chemicals into pesticide products without telling the public — chemicals linked with cancer, genetic damage, and reduced fertility, despite admitting the policy is misleading. EPA has stated that “many consumers have a misleading impression of the term ”˜inert ingredient,’ believing it to mean water or other harmless ingredients.”

A December 2006 commentary in the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences’ journal Environmental Health Perspectives calls for improvements in pesticide regulation and “inert” ingredient disclosure, citing an extensive body of literature illustrating the concern over related human and environmental health effects. The authors, Caroline Cox, then with NCAP and now research director at the Center for Environmental Health, and Michael Surgan, Ph.D., chief scientist in the Office of the Attorney General of New York State, highlight the regulatory weaknesses that allow the “inert” ingredients in pesticide formulations to go largely untested. The commentary provides evidence that inerts are often far from harmless and need to be examined closely for environmental, wildlife and public health effects. Further, they present an urgent need for “inert” regulation and disclosure due to the ubiquitous nature of pesticides in the environment. Read a summary or the full article.

EPA must be told that these ingredients can no longer be kept secret. That is why in 2006 the Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides, along with Beyond Pesticides and other allies filed a legal petition challenging the EPA’s policy of secrecy on these ingredients. Fifteen Attorneys General submitted a companion petition to EPA. Please e-mail Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Lisa Jackson at [email protected], no later than May 1, urging EPA to respond to NCAP’s petition and mandate that pesticide manufacturers list hazardous “inert” ingredients on pesticide labels.

At the same time, the market for organic potatoes is growing. A bulletin by the University of Maine Cooperative Extension Service states, “Organic potatoes in Maine are an industry that is increasing in scope and in value. Organic potatoes may bring a premium price in the marketplace, because many consumers understand that organic practices not only produce safe, high-quality food; they preserve topsoil and reduce pollution. Organically grown foods are flavorful and nutritious, which is why gourmet restaurants are increasingly seeking organic suppliers. Potatoes and Maine have a long tradition together, perhaps because potatoes can be stored for use during the long Maine winter. Organic potatoes and Maine may have a long tradition together as well.”

This new development is the result of an agreement with a shareholder group concerning the company’s pesticides use. Following the agreement, the Bard College Endowment, Newground Social Investment and the AFL-CIO Reserve Fund, withdrew a shareholder proposal they were going to present at the company’s annual meeting which would have required the company to publish a report on options for cutting pesticide use in its supply. The shareholders said the company’s commitment will support progress on the pesticide issues that affect the environment, public health, and farm employees.

The three investor groups teamed with Investor Environmental Health Network to engage McDonald’s in talks about pesticide reduction. Through the agreement, McDonald’s has committed to:

Ӣ survey its current U.S. potato suppliers;
”¢ compile a list of best practices in pesticide reduction that will be recommended to the company’s global suppliers (through the company’s Global Potato Board); and
”¢ communicate findings related to best practices to shareholders, as well as in the company’s annual corporate social responsibility report.

The details of the agreement were developed by shareholders and McDonald’s, with support Investor Environmental Health Network, which is a collaborative partnership of investment managers advised by nongovernmental organizations concerned about the financial and public health risks associated with corporate toxic chemicals policies.

“Because McDonald’s has such a commanding presence in the marketplace, this commitment offers the promise of significant reductions of pesticide use — which will benefit consumer health, as well as farm workers, local agricultural communities, and the environment,” said Newground Social Investment Chief Executive Bruce Herbert, who is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Children’s Environmental Health.

“Consumers, workers and our environment all suffer from over-use of pesticides,” said John Sweeney, President of the AFL-CIO. “As investors, we knew McDonald’s could take an important first step and we’re ready to work with the company to change and grow.”

Potatoes are a heavy user of pesticides and use more pounds of pesticides per acre than most crops. Farmers often spray on a weekly basis, or even more frequently to try to prevent blight. They also spray herbicides to kill the tops of the plants at the end of the growing season to make the underground tubers easier to harvest. Over 40 toxic pesticides are used on potatoes including ethoprop, mancozeb, chlorothalonil, EPTC and metribuzin. Most of these pesticides are linked to serious chronic effects such as cancer, endocrine disruption and reproductive/developmental effects. Many leach to groundwater and contaminate surface waters. Intensive potato cultivation and pesticides usage have been implicated in the high rates of rare cancers in young children in rural western Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada. The island farming community of about 14,000 has experienced occurrences of osteosarcoma, several lymphomas, Ewing’s sarcoma, and a number of myeloid leukemia cases, all among children.

For more information on potatoes and pesticides read the factsheet entitled “Sustainable Potato Production” by the Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides (NCAP).

The major findings of the data show that:
 The majority of pesticide illnesses are associated with chlorpyrifos, malathion, chlorine, and cypermethrin;
 The largest number of pesticide illnesses were from pesticide drift;
 For occupational cases, the most common activity during pesticide exposure were for applicators and fieldworkers;
 For non-occupational cases, the most common activity during exposure were being in an indoor environment and for applicators;
 For incident setting, the largest number of cases were for single-family homes;
 For agricultural cases, the majority were for individuals between the ages of 20 and 40 years;
 For non-agricultural cases, the majority were for individuals between the ages of 20 to 60 years and 0 to 9 years; and,
 For reported school pesticide cases, 68 percent were related to antimicrobial pesticide exposure.

The data comes from several sources and includes both occupational, such as agricultural and structural use, and home-use incidents of pesticide-related illnesses and injuries. DPR works with other state and local entities in hopes to capture the majority of significant illness and injury incidents associated with pesticide use. For example, in 2007, 538 of the cases were reported through the California Poison Control System (CPCS), which previously offered this service through a federally funded pilot program that expired in 2002. CPCS resumed its reporting of pesticide illnesses in October 2006 under a new contract funded by DPR.

DPR reports that in 2007, the number of illnesses and injuries investigated returned to a level typical of recent years after a dip in 2006. In 2006, only 680 illnesses were identified, the lowest number since pesticide illness records were computerized in 1982. In 2005 and 2004, more than 1,300 and 1,200 cases were identified, respectively. Based on information available at the time of evaluation, DPR concludes that 407, or 41 percent, of the 982 pesticide-associated cases might have been avoided if pesticide users had strictly followed safety procedures on the pesticide labels and California regulations. Interestingly, in a report released three months ago, DPR data shows that pesticide use in the state declined in 2007 to 172 million pounds statewide.

The counties with the greatest number of pesticide exposure cases were Monterey, Los Angeles, Tulare, San Diego, Kern and Frenso, respectively. Nonetheless, the largest quantity of pesticides in the state are applied in Fresno County. Agricultural Commissioners in Tulare and Kern Counties, also in the top five counties that apply the greatest amount of pesticides, have adopted pesticide buffer zone rules that prohibits aerial applications of restricted use pesticides within one-quarter mile of schools in session or due to be in session within 24 hours, occupied farm labor camps and residential areas.

DPR’s Pesticide Illness Surveillance Program, run by the Worker Health and Safety Branch, does not produce a “census” of pesticide injuries, since there is no way to document illnesses that go unreported. Worker Health and Safety Branch studies have shown that pesticide-related injuries at work, or cases related to agricultural activities, are more likely to be reported than pesticide illnesses at home. Pesticide illness studies, supported by hospital records, also show that DPR’s program is effective at detecting any incident involving multiple victims. Although physicians are required by law to report any suspected pesticide illness, compliance is low. DPR has developed other sources of illness data, and County Agricultural Commissioners investigate every report they receive from physicians, DPR or other sources. DPR’s Worker Health and Safety Branch then reviews county investigations and determine whether cases are pesticide-related.

For the first time, the complete California Pesticide Illness Query, or CalPIQ, with data from 1992 to 2007 is available on-line. CalPIQ enables users to analyze the data with individual, user-defined queries based on several variables, including year of incident; agricultural or non-agricultural use; county of occurrence; and pesticide by category, active ingredient or intended use.

Using previous data collected from California and other state surveillance programs, a 2008 study by a National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) researcher finds the pesticide poisoning incidence rate among U.S. agricultural workers is thirty-nine times higher than the incidence rate found in all other industries combined.

Contact Beyond Pesticides to find out what to do in a pesticide emergency and how to file reports to the organization’s Pesticide Incident Reporting system.

(Beyond Pesticides, March 23, 2009) With the beginning of Spring, students from Washington, D.C.’s Bancroft Elementary School have joined First Lady Michelle Obama on the White House’s South Lawn to start an 1,100-square foot kitchen garden that will provide food for family meals, formal dinners and local D.C. soup kitchens. Over the coming months, the students, whose school has had a garden since 2001, along with the Obama family and the White House grounds crew, will help with the organic garden from planting to harvesting. Many hope that this move is more than symbolic, that it will transcend to better agricultural and pesticide-reform policies, invigorate homeowners to convert some of their own lawns to an organic garden, and educate the consumers on the importance of eating healthy locally-grown organic food.

The garden will contain 55 different vegetables, as well as berries, herbs and two beehives. According to the New York Times, the White House has spent $200 for organic seeds, mulch and dirt for the raised garden plot beds that will be “fertilized with White House compost, crab meal from the Chesapeake Bay, lime and green sand. Ladybugs and praying mantises will help control harmful bugs.”

“I’m thrilled for the Obama family and for all who will be inspired by their example to grow gardens of their own this year,” said Roger Doiron, founder of the nonprofit Kitchen Gardeners International who ran the campaign, Eat the View, which coordinated a 100,000 signature-petition asking the Obamas to replant a Victory Garden at the White House.

While the Obamas’ garden might be new, the idea of an edible landscape at the White House is not. Throughout its history, the White House has been home to food gardens of different shapes and sizes and even to a lawn-mowing herd of sheep in 1918. The appeal of the White House garden project, Mr. Doiron asserts, is that it serves as a bridge between the country’s past and its future. “The last time food was grown on the White House lawn was in 1943, when the country was at war, the economy was struggling and people were looking to the First Family for leadership. It made sense before and it makes sense again as we try to live within our own means and those of the planet.”

Over the course of the past month, the Eat the View campaign has touted the economic benefits of home gardens as part of its pitch to White House staff members. As proof, Mr. Doiron and his wife spent nine months weighing and recording each vegetable they pulled from their 1,600-square-foot garden outside Portland, Maine. After counting the final winter leaves of salad, they found that they had saved about $2,150 by growing produce for their family of five instead of buying it.

Mr. Dioron isn’t the only one that has been spearheading the push for a White House organic garden. Alice Waters, chef of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California, has been advocating for such a garden since the 1990’s and continues to campaign for her Edible Schoolyard and School Lunch Initiative. Daniel Bowman Simon and Casey Gustowarow started The White House Organic Farm Project, also a petition-based initiative that uses two school buses fused together with an organic edible garden on the roof to travel around the country in an effort to educate others.

Organic agriculture embodies an ecological approach to farming that does not rely on or permit toxic, synthetic pesticides, chemical fertilizers, genetically modified organisms, antibiotics, sewage sludge, or irradiation. Instead of using these harmful products and practices, organic agriculture utilizes techniques such as cover cropping, crop rotation, and composting to produce healthy soil, prevent pest and disease problems, and grow healthy food and fiber.

Former White House executive chef Walter Scheib told the Washington Post, “This garden is a tremendous idea, one that is both timely and in some ways overdue. There has always been a small garden at the White House, but this commitment by Mrs. Obama to local and freshly grown produce is a progressive move forward that will raise the profile and awareness of local and sustainable food both at the White House and nationally to an unprecedented level.”

Groups around the country are happy to see the new, organic direction the White House is taking, but hopes that President Obama takes it further. Kitchen Gardeners International plans to expand the Eat the View campaign to other high-profile pieces of land, such as sprawling lawns around governors’ residences, schoolyards, and vacant urban lots.

Beyond Pesticides would like to see all federal lands managed organically and federal buildings using defined Integrated Pest Management. Beyond Pesticides supports organic agriculture as effecting good land stewardship and a reduction in hazardous chemical exposures for workers on the farm. The pesticide reform movement, citing pesticide problems associated with chemical agriculture, from groundwater contamination and runoff to drift, views organic as the solution to a serious public health and environmental threat.

Learn more about organics on Beyond Pesticides’ Organic Food program page and at the Bridge to an Organic Future conference, April 3-4 in Carrboro (Chapel Hill area), NC.

EU Health Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou said: “Today represents a milestone in our effort to ensure improved protection of human health and the environment. The review of existing pesticides has lead to the removal from the market of more than two thirds of these substances. I can now say with confidence that our food has become greener.”

Council Directive 91/414/EEC lays down a comprehensive risk assessment and authorization procedure for active substances and products containing these substances. Each active substance was evaluated as to whether it could be used safely with respect to human health (consumers, farmers, local residents and passers-by) and the environment, in particular groundwater and non-target organisms, such as birds, mammals, earthworms, bees, in order to be marketed. If the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) determined that the substance has “no harmful effect on human or animal health and that it has no unacceptable impact on the environment,” the substance was approved.

The European Commission has created an EU list of approved active substances and Member States may only authorize plant protection products, containing such substances, which are included in this list. This review provides assurances that the EU finds the substances currently on the market acceptable to human health and the environment and are in accordance with European-wide criteria. Until this review was finalized, the level of protection could vary widely and national rules on substances could continue to apply.

Of some 1,000 active substances on the market in at least one Member State before 1993, 26 percent, corresponding to about 250 substances, have passed the harmonized EU safety assessment. The majority of substances (67 percent) have been eliminated because dossiers were either not submitted, or were incomplete or were withdrawn by the industry. About 70 substances failed the review and have been removed from the market, because the evaluation carried out did not show safe use with respect to human health and the environment. These pesticides include those which are genotoxic, carcinogenic, immunotoxic, and certain endocrine disruptors. Such chemicals may be used for up to five more years if they are “essential” to crop production, or up to three if less toxic alternatives are available.

Since March 16, a database on active substances has been available on the website of the European Commission. The EU’s aim is to guarantee transparent and up-to-date information on the EU pesticide legislation.

For more background information on the EU’s risk assessment for these products, visit their website.

The study entitled, “The aryl hydrocarbon receptor affects distinct tissue compartments during ontogeny of the immune system,” aimed to identify the critical windows of exposure where fetuses are most sensitive to dioxin’s harmful effects. Pregnant mice were given a dose of 1,000 ppt dioxin either during pregnancy, lactation, or throughout pregnancy and lactation. After dosing, mothers and pups were kept dioxin-free. Researchers then infected mothers and pups with a non-lethal dose of the influenza virus.

Researchers found that the number of specialized white blood cells – referred to as CD8+ T-cells that specifically recognize and kill the flu virus, were significantly reduced in the pups but not their mothers. The most severe reduction in these white blood cells was seen when dioxin was administered only while the pups were nursing. Conversely, a different type of white blood cell, known as neutrophil, significantly increased in the dioxin-exposed pups. Neutrophils, important mediators of inflammation, were most severely increased when dioxin was given late in gestation and during lactation. The mothers of the pups mounted a normal immune response to the influenza infection with no decrease in CD8+ T-cells or increase in neutrophils.

These results illustrate how dioxin exposure in the womb, and/or during nursing, can permanently impact the development of the immune system. They also reaffirm the significance of the impacts of early exposures to harmful chemicals which can result in long-term changes that affect normal biological responses later in life. One notable aspect of this study was that changes in immune response were observed even though the pups were exposed a few times to a low-level dose of dioxin. This means that short-term exposures (as opposed to long-term, continuous exposures) can have significant long-term impact, especially if these exposures occur during important early developmental stages.

Dioxin refers to a family of chemicals linked to cancer, weakened immune systems and reproductive problems. They are persistent organic pollutants that bioaccumulate in humans and other animals, especially in fatty tissue. The main route of human exposure is through diet, especially through foods contaminated with pesticides and other hazardous chemicals that degrade or transform into dioxin. As seen in this study, dioxins are also transmitted from mother to child through breastfeeding. Previous reports have stated that infants exposed to high levels of dioxin in utero suffered poor psychomotor skills, altered thyroid hormone levels, and reduced neurological optimality.

The most infamous dioxin, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-Dioxin (TCDD), is the most dangerous form of dioxin and part ingredient of Agent Orange, once used during the Vietnam War. War veterans exposed to Agent Orange have developed chronic lymphocytic leukemia, Hodgkin’s disease and non-Hodgkins lymphoma and diabetes. Many children of veterans exposed have been affected by their parents’ exposure to the chemical and show a wide range of symptoms.

Dioxin has been found in milk, cheese, beef, pork, fish, chicken, and other animals, as well as soil and sewage sludge. High levels of dioxin still exist in the Tittabawassee and Saginaw rivers and floodplains in Michigan, after being dumped there decades ago by Dow Chemical Co. Clean-up and restoration for these systems are still being debated. Even though dioxin levels in the environment have dropped considerably in recent years from their peak in the late 1970’s, it is important to be vigilant in the foods consumed in order to avoid increasing risk of exposure, since dioxins are persistent and bioaccumulative. A diet rich in organic foods can help minimize risk of dioxin exposure.