(Beyond Pesticides, November 30, 2018) A study published this month in Science of the Total Environment reveals numerous pesticide residues persisting in soil, harming the viability of agricultural lands and increasing risk of off-site contamination. Funded by the Horizon 2020 programme of the European Commission, researchers from the European Diverfarming project at the University of Wageningen in the Netherlands suggest nations urgently reevaluate conventional land use and inputs including water, energy, fertilizers, machinery and pesticides. Researchers decrying the lack of soil protection policies endeavored to determine which pesticides had the highest soil persistence and toxicity to non-target species.

Three hundred seventeen surface soil samples were analyzed from 11 European countries. Selected countries were those with the largest amounts of active agricultural land, characterizing six distinct cropping systems. Sampled soils purposefully represented different soil properties and were taken from crops with the highest pesticide use per hectare. Samples were then analyzed for the concentration of 76 pesticide residues. These 76 pesticides were selected as being most often applied on conventional crops.

Eighty-three percent of samples contained varying degrees of pesticide residues, with 25 percent showing one pesticide residue and 58 percent showing mixtures of two or more. Only 17 percent of the tested soils had no pesticide residues detected.

Southern countries of the European Union (EU) show significantly fewer residues than the northern, eastern and western EU regions. Soils in the eastern EU were those most frequently containing mixtures of residues of more than six pesticides.  All sampled soils from root crops showed pesticide residues, with 85 percent of samples showing multiple residues.

Overall, 43 different residues were detected, with a total of 166 pesticide combinations observed. Glyphosate, DDT (which was banned in 1972) and broad-spectrum fungicides, including boscalid, epoxiconazole and tebuconazole, were the compounds detected most frequently and at the highest concentrations. Glyphosate was the most widely detected.

With pesticides detected across the EU, researchers are concerned persistent residues can become airborne by strong winds, later inhaled by humans and animals, or contaminate aquatic ecosystems through reoccurring erosion. Advocates say similar data revealing pesticide persistence demands national leaders improve environmental risk assessment procedures by evaluating both short-term and long-term environmental risks. Researchers indicate risk assessments must be adapted to assess toxicity of mixtures of pesticide residues to a wider range of soil microorganisms, and, doing so, offer accurate assessments to farmers and elected officials alike.

However, pesticides residues are not a problem solely for the EU. With toxic pesticides used across the globe, advocates explain chemical-intensive agricultural and mismanagement of pesticide waste has become a global problem.

The chemical industry claims pesticide use has increased crop yields. However, pesticides have not been shown to increase profits for farmers. In addition, the onset of herbicide tolerant crops has resulted in an increase of pesticide use, making chemical companies rich while farmers and consumers suffer.

Soil contamination alters soil functions, soil biodiversity and food safety, with pesticides linked a wide range of diseases. All the while, organic agriculture, incorporating cover crops and crop rotations, improves soil health and enhances natural ecosystem processes. With the planet’s soils and waterways increasingly compromised by chemical-intensive practices, there is an urgent need to swiftly move towards regenerative organic agriculture.

To grow nutrient-dense produce, farmers need living soil in which countless living organisms, bacteria and fungi are allowed to coexist.

Worried about contamination of food crops and ecosystems? Talk to local farmers. Begin growing your own food organically with a supply of organic seeds and plant starts. Begin composting food scraps, leaves, and brush.  Add water and turn the organic matter regularly with a pitchfork or shovel.  This process results in compost, a soil conditioner, which can be added to gardens, potted plants and around fruit trees.

As was said in Seeds that Poison, “Our future depends of our respect for nature and the complex biological systems that sustain life.” Help Beyond Pesticides eliminate toxic pesticides and grow organic solutions. Learn more about how organic agriculture offers numerous benefits to human health and the surrounding environment.

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

Source: Science Daily

(Beyond Pesticides, November 29, 2018) The British Cayman Islands will no longer fund the release of genetically engineered (GE) mosquitoes, as reports indicate that the program failed to achieve its intended goals.  The government is formally terminating its contract with the UK-based company Oxitec, which marketed GE mosquitoes as a sort of silver bullet for the management of diseases such as Zika, yellow fever, malaria, and dengue. Advocates opposed to the GE mosquito program are continuing to encourage a focus on education and source reduction as the best method to address mosquito-borne diseases.

Oxitec first began introducing its line of GE mosquitoes earlier in the decade, at a variety of locations including India, Brazil, Malaysia, and the Florida Keys. Public opposition to the release has been consistently strong. In the Florida Keys, over 230,000 people signed a change.org petition opposing the release. In the Cayman Islands, residents launched a number of lawsuits. In each instance the company was granted free reign to initiate its program.

GE mosquitoes aim to ‘gene drive’ mosquito populations out of existence, a process intended to propagate a particular set of genes in a species. The company developed GE mosquitoes in a laboratory, injecting a gene that produces sterile male mosquitoes. Male GE mosquitoes are then released into the environment en masse, in the expectation that they will outcompete other male mosquitoes and breed with available females. Females that mate with the male GE mosquitoes are expected to produce offspring that die before they hatch.

British-based environmental group Genewatch UK has consistently opposed the release of GE mosquitoes, arguing that there were a number of risks associated with this work. One concern is that the mosquitoes rely on the antibiotic tetracycline to act as a chemical switch, allowing the GE larvae to develop under lab conditions. Thus, low levels of tetracycline in the environment could undermine effectiveness, and result in only short-term mosquito population reductions.  In addition to efficacy, many note public health concerns relating to the introductions of novel genes into the environment.

This is how the mechanism of the GE mosquito is supposed to work, according to the article Genetically engineered mosquitoes, Zika and other arboviruses, community engagement, costs, and patents: Ethical issues, published in PLOS:
“The GE mosquito: How does it work?
The GE OX513A Aedes aegypti has been subject to a germline modification that includes a lethality gene. Specifically, a synthetic genetic sequence encoding a tetracycline-repressible transcriptional activator (tTAV) is introduced into the mosquito with the intent of creating tetracycline dependency in the insect. In the absence of tetracycline, tTAV is expressed, and this leads to the death of most of the mosquitoes carrying the trait [4]. If tetracycline is present (as it is during the mosquito rearing in the laboratory, for example), then tTAV is repressed and the larvae can develop and reach adulthood. Female mosquitoes are the biters that spread the disease, so only the male GE mosquitoes are intended for release in the target area.”

The Cayman Islands government had contracted with Oxitec for the last two years. In May, a $720,000 deal was renewed, but Oxitec said at the time that it would be integrating other management techniques alongside the release of GE mosquitoes. However, ultimately, as the territory’s environmental health minister told the press, “The scheme wasn’t getting the results we were looking for.” Cayman Island’s Mosquito Research and Control Unit (MRCU) appeared to reflect the same concerns as advocates in explaining its reasoning, citing concerns over the spread of antibiotic resistant bacteria, and risk of lowered immunity to mosquito-borne diseases.

Based on the results seen on the ground, GE mosquitoes are likely not worth trading one public health risk for another. Scientists continue to look into more natural alternatives to genetic modification, focusing on the use of a bacterium called Wolbachia, which would function in a similar manner to Oxitec’s mosquitoes. Wolbachia-infected male mosquitoes mate with females who would then be unable to produce offspring. However, like GE mosquitoes, the efficacy and safety profile of this approach is also lacking.

An arsenal of highly toxic adulticides that include organophosphates like naled, chlorpyrifos, malathion, and pyrethroids like permethrin and sumithrin are often the first line of treatment for mosquitoes in many communities. These pesticides have been linked to a host of adverse effects, including neurotoxicity, cancer, and reproductive dysfunction. Further, adulticiding has been shown to be the least effective method for reducing mosquito populations, as these chemcials are indiscriminate and just as likely to harm non-target insects as they are mosquitoes.

Management of disease-carrying mosquitoes can be successful when emphasis is placed on public education and preventive strategies. Individuals can take action by eliminating standing water, introducing mosquito-eating fish, encouraging predators, such as bats, birds, dragonflies and frogs, and using least-toxic larvacides like bacillus thuringiensis israelensis (Bti). Community-based programs should encourage residents to employ these effective techniques, focus on eliminating breeding sites on public lands, and promote monitoring and action levels in order to determine what, where, and when control measures might be needed. Through education of proper cultural controls, and least-toxic and cost effective biological alternatives, the use of risky technologies such as toxic pesticides and GE mosquitoes can be avoided.

For more information, see Beyond Pesticides’ mosquito management program page and comprehensive Public Health Mosquito Management Strategy.

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

Source: Edmonton Journal

(Beyond Pesticides, November 28, 2018) Recent research out of Harvard University and published in the journal Science has demonstrated some of the mechanisms through which exposures to neonicotinoid pesticides harm bumblebee populations. The study found that exposure to imidacloprid, a neonicotinoid — the most widely used category of pesticides worldwide — directly impacts social behaviors in bumblebees. These behaviors have serious effects on the functioning and viability of bee colonies.

In the research experiment, worker bees exposed to imidacloprid exhibited reduced general and nurturant activity, and a tendency to locate themselves at the periphery of the nest. The study noted decreased caretaking and nursing behaviors, which in turn harms productivity and thermal regulation in the colony. These tasks are important to colony development; impaired thermoregulation negatively affected the bees’ typical construction of an insulating wax canopy for the nest, and poor caretaking can affect brood growth.

Investigators noted that, “Neonicotinoids induce widespread disruption of within-nest worker behavior that may conribute to impaired growth. . . . These changes in behavior acted together to decrease colony viability, even when exposure was nonlethal.” The authors also observed that many of these dysregulated behaviors were more pronounced at night than during sunlight hours, and were exhibited by queens as well as workers. Prior to the subject study, neonicotinoids were already understood to reduce growth in developing bee broods by impairing adults’ foraging abilities — related to both spatial navigation and so-called “floral learning” (acquiring and remembering how best to secure nectar from a variety of flowers of varying structural complexity).

Neonicotinoids are used frequently as seed coatings, as well as on a great number of agricultural crops. They are systemic pesticides that are taken up by plants and transported to leaves, flowers, roots, and stems, as well as to pollen and nectar; pollinators are at great risk of exposure to these compounds through their foraging activities. (These pesticides also contaminate waterways and are highly toxic to aquatic organisms.) Neonicotinoids affect the central nervous system of exposed target and non-target insects, leading to eventual paralysis and death.

Bees are responsible for nearly one-third of all the pollination that takes place on the planet. For more than a decade, the decline and loss of critical insect pollinators has been of enormous environmental, economic, and scientific concern. For nearly that long, neonicotinoid pesticides have been identified as primary contributors to this decline, which often manifests in reduced colony size through mortality. These compounds have been repeatedly pointed to as a cause of Colony Collapse Disorder. Other contributing factors include habitat fragmentation and destruction, the introduction of non-native species and pathogens, and some land management practices.

In 2013, the European Union voted to ban neonicotinoid pesticides for a two-year period. In May 2018, the General Court of the European Union (EU) banned three chief neonics — clothianidin, imidacloprid, and thiamethoxam — for any outdoor uses across the EU. Here in the U.S., the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did adopt, in early January of 2017, a policy to mitigate acute risks to bees from pesticides, and does offer some guidance on assessing risks to pollinators from pesticides. But as Beyond Pesticides noted earlier this year, EPA has been slow to act on neonicotinoids, despite the plethora of independent peer-reviewed, scientific papers demonstrating their hazards to pollinators and other non-target organisms.

In setting allowable uses of pesticides in agriculture, EPA utilizes risk assessment reviews with extreme limitations when it evaluates a food-use pesticide in combination with its non-food uses. The agency has been criticized by Beyond Pesticides because when it evaluates ecological impacts, EPA weighs the “economic, social, and environmental costs and benefits” associated with a given pesticide to determine whether an “unreasonable risk to human health and the environment” will occur. The problem with this approach is that it fails to allow for the prioritization of ecological protection, including protection of non-target pollinators.

Early in 2018, U.S. Representatives Earl Blumenauer (OR) and Jim McGovern (MA) reintroduced HR 5015, Saving America’s Pollinators Act of 2018, which, if enacted, would suspend the registration of certain neonicotinoid insecticides until the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) conducts a full scientific review that ensures these chemicals do not harm pollinators. Whether the bill’s chances of passage will improve — with the reconfigured post-midterm election Congressional landscape — remains to be seen.

Protection of pollinators is an important focus of Beyond Pesticides; its work can be followed via its BEE Protective website page. Beyond Pesticides advocates to protect critical pollinators from the ravages that neonicotinoids can cause. It does so through its BEE Protective activities; its work to expose the health and environmental risks of chemical-intensive agricultural practices (including the use of pesticides); and its advocacy for organic agriculture because of its health and environmental benefits. Beyond Pesticides also offers guidance on less harmful, more-holistic approaches to land management. See its information on how to help protect pollinators.

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

Source: https://e360.yale.edu/digest/neonicotinoids-impact-bees-nursing-and-social-behaviors-study-finds

(Beyond Pesticides, November 27, 2018) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ignored the input of an expert weed scientist on the controversial herbicide dicamba, bending to Bayer’s Monsanto and the pesticide industry, according to emails obtained by the Arkansas Democrat and Chronicle (ADC) through a Freedom of Information Act request. The scandal centers on the recent re-approval of the pesticide, a highly volatile and drift-prone herbicide that has become a serious problem for many farmers and state regulators. As top-level EPA officials continue to work with industry to subvert their own agency’s scientific findings, more and more consumers are moving to organic products in order avoid the pesticide risks government regulators ask consumers to accept.

Emails ADC received indicate that Jason Norsworthy, PhD, a weed scientist with the University of Arkansas, worked closely with Bayer’s Monsanto in conducting field trials this past summer, but found high volatility and drift of the company’s new dicamba-based herbicide XtendiMax. The product was developed in the face of widespread resistance to glyphosate-based herbicides in genetically engineered (GE) farm fields. However, recent accounts from farmers in the south and midwest indicate that, not only is the switch to dicamba unhelpful  in eliminating drift and reversing escalating weed resistance, its use threatens valuable nontarget crops, particularly sensitive fruit trees and wine grapes.

Working closely with Bayer’s Monsanto, Dr. Norsworthy investigated dicamba drift on a 240 acre crops field. While 38 acres were planted with dicamba-tolerant soybeans, the rest of the crops were susceptible to the chemical. Dr. Norsworthy observed damage to sensitive crops after an XtendiMax application, with industry representatives involved in the study process. Collecting this data was intended to influence the size of a buffer zone needed to protect plants and animals surrounding use sites. The results indicate that a 135 meter (443 feet) buffer would be necessary to avert adverse impacts to listed species.

However, despite close involvement in the study from Bayer’s Monsanto, the company immediately challenged the results. ADC indicates that, over a conference call, Dr. Norsworthy refuted each concern raised by industry. Scientists within EPA’s Environmental Fate and Effects Division (EFED) reviewed relevant data and ultimately agreed with Dr. Norsworthy’s conclusions.

“Based on this discussion, EFED cannot preclude the use of the Norsworthy data in the expansion of the dicamba action area,” scientists wrote in a draft approval document obtained by ADC. “Acceptance of the Norsworthy data as valid results in the recommendation of a 135-m ‘buffer’ … for the purposes of establishing a protective and technically defensible limit.”

On October 31, EPA announced changes to dicamba’s registration. Rather than respond to the results of a study performed in coordination with Bayer’s Monsanto, and agreed upon by officials within the agency, Acting EPA Administrator Wheeler decided to ignore adverse impacts to farmers and nontarget species, in favor of the chemical industry. Dicamba buffer zones will be set by EPA at 57 feet.

This decision raises a litany of structural problems within the pesticide registration process. Mixtures and synergy are not adequately tested. Inert ingredients are not disclosed. As exemplified in this instance, pesticide producers submit their own studies to EPA in order to support the registration of a product for which they have a vested economic interest. Many pesticides, including GE dicamba products like XtendiMax, are registered conditionally without required health and environmental safety information.

Advocates see this action by top-level officials in the Trump Administration as political meddling with a scientific process already structurally deficient, seriously jeopardizing the health and well-being of U.S. residents and the environment. This action is part of a pattern of the Trump administration’s EPA head ignoring the agency’s science. In reversing an EPA decision to stop the use of the insecticide chlorpyrifos in food production in March 2017, the EPA Administrator ignored the agency’s finding that the highly neurotoxic pesticide adversely affects brain development in children.

Just this August, it was revealed that former EPA head Pruitt allowed Monsanto (not yet purchased by Bayer) to effectively write the initial rules for the use of XtendiMax. According to the released emails, Monsanto actually line-edited regulations initially proposed by EPA (begin on p147). In another level of irony, this information only came to light because of a lawsuit launched as a result of EPA not consulting with wildlife agencies over risks to endangered species.

If you’re upset about the way the pesticide industry and EPA are colluding to manipulate or ignore science in the pesticide review process, get active. Beyond Pesticides has tools and resources to help you start at the local level to eliminate toxic pesticides from your community.

As scandals continue to pile up around the safety of our food for our health and the environment, choose organic, which never allows toxic synthetic pesticides or GE crops to be certified.

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

Source: Arkansas Democrat and Chronicle

(Beyond Pesticides, November 26, 2018) Organic consumers expect that the organic products they buy are grown without toxic chemical inputs. However, oil and gas wastewater (including fracking wastewater) is currently used to irrigate crops. Among the chemicals known to be present in oil and gas wastewater are heavy metals and other chemicals with carcinogenic, reproductive, developmental, endocrine-disrupting, and other toxic effects. When the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) was passed, and regulations adopted, there was no agricultural use of oil and gas wastewater, so the regulations did not address these hazards.

 Tell USDA to Outlaw Fracking Wastewater in Organic Production! 

The Cornucopia Institute has filed a petition for rulemaking, asking that oil and gas wastewater be ruled a prohibited substance in organic production. This issue should be put on the work agenda of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB), which advises the Secretary about issues concerning NOP. The petition from the Cornucopia Institute contains information that will serve as support for the work agenda item. Over the past several years, the NOSB has received many comments requesting them to address this issue

Among the comments have been suggestions for guidance to farmers faced with contamination from oil and gas activities. The NOSB must play an important role in ensuring that farmers are not unnecessarily harmed by the proposed rulemaking.

Although the exact blend of chemicals in oil and gas wastewater is considered “proprietary,” making it difficult to test food for residues, much is known about individual chemicals that may be present, including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes; polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs); volatile organic compounds (VOCs); radionuclides; heavy metals; and elevated levels of chloride and bromide. Although toxic effects of many of these chemicals are known, their combined and cumulative effects have not been determined.

Water treatment does not always remove all of the toxic chemicals, and the safety of treated water cannot be determined because it is not possible to determine all chemicals that might be present. OFPA and its regulations give USDA, with advice from the NOSB, the responsibility to ensure the integrity of the organic label. Many of the substances known to be in oil and gas wastewater are prohibited for use in organic production. OFPA prohibits “natural poisons such as arsenic or lead salts that have long-term effects and persist in the environment.” Regulations require that producers “maintain or improve the natural resources of the operation, including soil and water quality.” USDA must ensure that this relatively new source of contamination does not endanger organic integrity.

Tell USDA to Outlaw Fracking Wastewater in Organic Production!

Letter to USDA

I am writing in support of the petition from the Cornucopia Institute, asking that the Secretary of Agriculture, with advice of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB), initiate rulemaking and/or guidance that ensures that contaminated wastewater from oil and gas production is not used in organic production. The petition from the Cornucopia Institute contains information that will serve as support for the work agenda item. The Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) and its regulations give USDA, with advice from the NOSB, the responsibility to ensure the integrity of the organic label.  The NOSB has received many comments on this issue over recent years, including suggestions for guidance to farmers faced with contamination from oil and gas activities. The NOSB must play an important role in ensuring that farmers are not unnecessarily harmed by the proposed rulemaking.

Oil and gas wastewater is currently used to irrigate crops. Many of the substances known to be in oil and gas wastewater are prohibited for use in organic production. OFPA prohibits “natural poisons such as arsenic or lead salts that have long-term effects and persist in the environment.” Regulations require that producers “maintain or improve the natural resources of the operation, including soil and water quality.” When the Organic Foods Production Act was passed, and regulations adopted, there was no agricultural use of oil and gas wastewater, so the regulations did not address these hazards. USDA must ensure that this relatively new source of contamination does not endanger organic integrity.

The exact blend of chemicals in oil and gas wastewater is considered “proprietary,” making it difficult to test food for residues. However, much is known about individual chemicals that may be present, including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes; polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs); volatile organic compounds (VOCs); radionuclides; heavy metals; and elevated levels of chloride and bromide. Although toxic effects of many of these chemicals are known, their combined and cumulative effects have not been determined. The chemicals known to be present in oil and gas wastewater are heavy metals and other chemicals with carcinogenic, reproductive, developmental, endocrine-disrupting, and other toxic effects.

Water treatment does not always remove all of the toxic chemicals, and the safety of treated water cannot be determined because it is not possible to determine all chemicals that might be present.

Please initiate action to prohibit the use of oil and gas wastewater in organic production, including adding the petition to the work agenda of the National Organic Standards Board.

Thank you.

(Beyond Pesticides, November 22, 2018) As we sit down for our Thanksgiving meal with friends and family, let us all take a moment to give thanks to the hardworking individuals that made our meal possible. Farmworkers and farmers toil day in and day out in the field, growing the staples that make the holiday special. This year, farmworkers need our support more than ever, as powerful forces within the agrichemical industry continue to influence decisions that deny them the protections and compensation they deserve for their hard work.

After a proposal under the Obama administration to update farmworker protections following decades of inaction, former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt reversed course and decided to delay implementation. The new policy, representing the bare minimum required to improve the deplorable conditions many farmworkers confront, would have raised the age to apply highly toxic pesticides to 18, and improved training materials, among other basic changes. The agency then determined in December 2017 that it would not only refuse to implement changes as planned, but potentially do away with them all together. Allowing minors to spray toxic pesticides was put back on the table, as were 25 to 100 ft exclusion zones after toxic chemical use, and the ability for farmworkers to designate a representative to obtain information about pesticide spraying.

But advocates are fighting back in the courts, and in March 2018 a District Court judge ruled that EPA’s decision to delay was illegal. And numerous lawsuits, including those from state attorneys general and civil society organizations, have been filed in defense of farmworker protections.

The scientific literature confirms that farmworkers, their families, and their communities face elevated hazards from pesticide exposures, and existing farmworker data finds that the incidence rate of pesticide poisoning is extremely high. An average of 57.6 out of every 100,000 agricultural workers experiences acute pesticide poisoning, illness or injury each year. And when these incidents occur, there is no guarantee that justice will prevail, even in the form of financial settlement. Pesticides like the herbicide 2,4-D, the organophosphate chlorpyrifos, and synthetic pyrethroid insecticides are routinely detected in the bodies and homes of farmworkers. The risks of exposure from these chemicals have long-lasting impacts on farmworker communities.

The average life expectancy for a farmworker is 49 years, compared to 78 for the general population. This is similar to the life expectancy of individuals living in the 1850s.

Giving this information, it is not bombastic to say that farmworkers are giving years of their lives to put food on the tables of countless Americans. As we enjoy our Thanksgivings fixings over the holiday, the turkey, potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, and apple crumble, remember all the hardworking farmworkers who have helped to bring our meal to the Thanksgiving table.

There are ways we all can help farmworkers gain the protections they deserve. First, spread awareness of their plight. Speak with your friends about farmworker issues, and share videos like the one from Beyond Pesticides’ National Pesticide Forum workshop on Farmworkers, Families and Health. Second, take action by contacting your members of Congress. Go to Beyond Pesticides’ website to send a letter, or better yet, contact your representatives directly through a phone call. Lastly, purchase organic whenever possible. Although organic does use some pesticides, they are of significantly lower toxicity and used sparingly only according to need, not as a regular course of business. By promoting a safer food production system, we can help improve farmworkers’ conditions.

The food we choose to eat has a significant effect on those who grow the food we eat. Rather than purchasing conventional products grown in contaminated fields, strive to go organic this Thanksgiving, and influence friends and family to do the same.

To help better explain the benefits of organic food consumption, Beyond Pesticides invites readers to use the Eating with a Conscience database, which evaluates how toxic chemicals used used food items effect the environment and farmworkers. The more we can grow organic, the more we can establish production systems that do not subject farmers and farmworkers to toxic chemicals as they continue to do the important work of growing our nation’s food.

Have a Healthy and Happy Thanksgiving, from Beyond Pesticides!

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

(Beyond Pesticides, November 21, 2018) A study published last month in the Journal of Apicultural Research finds significant numbers of U.S. honey bees at risk after exposure to hazardous synthetic pesticides intended to control mosquitoes. With many beekeepers rarely given warning of insecticide spraying, researchers say the risk of losing colonies could increase. Advocates say fear of Zika and other mosquito-borne illnesses could result in counterproductive and reactionary insecticide spraying that will add further stress to managed and native pollinators already undergoing significant declines.

Researchers aimed to determine whether neighboring honey bee colonies could be similarly affected by aerial insecticide spraying. To calculate the percentage of colonies that could be affected, density of honey bee colonies by county was compared with projections of conditions thought to be prone to regional Zika virus outbreaks.

Researchers found 13 percent of U.S. beekeepers at risk of losing colonies from Zika spraying. In addition, it was determined that many regions of the U.S. best suited for beekeeping are also those with favorable conditions for Zika-prone mosquitoes to proliferate. These regions include the southeast, the Gulf Coast, and California’s Central Valley.

“[Considering] all the threats facing bees,” says study lead author Lewis Bartlett of the University of Exeter’s Center for Ecology and Conservation in a university press release, “even a small additional problem could become the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

In its 2016 report, Mosquito Control and Pollinator Health: Protecting Pollinators in the Age of Zika and Other Emerging Mosquito Diseases, Beyond Pesticides found, “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has identified 76 pesticide chemicals that are highly acutely toxic to honey bees. These were singled out because they have an acute contact toxicity value of less than 11 micrograms per bee (LD50<11 micrograms/bee) and can be applied in ways that can expose bees. Of these, several are used to control mosquitoes, including malathion, naled, permethrin and phenothrin, which are the most commonly used for ultra-low volume aerial and ground spraying.” In the report, see Table, Pesticides Used for Mosquito Control, which identifies those mosquito control pesticides that are especially toxic to bees.

Given the scale and uniformity of modern agricultural systems, managed honey bees are increasingly used as supplementary pollinators to service large agricultural areas. Since these pollination services are temporary, farmers must be able to afford an apiarist’s service every year and numerous colony visits per season. With worker-bees already exposed to a range of insecticides while pollinating conventional crops, additional exposure through chemical-intensive mosquito management could cause many farmers to fall into unprecedented financial hardship, as the rental costs of managed-bee colonies increases.

Researchers worry that higher colony density in large agricultural regions demands policies to protect apiaries and the farmers who rely on them. Likewise, advocates say the risk of honey bee colony contamination demands policy makers conduct research to determine effective alternatives to toxic mosquito management methods.

“Many beekeepers live on the breadline,” says Mr. Bartlett, “and if [organophosphate spraying causes] beekeeping [to be] no longer profitable, there will be huge knock-on effects on farming and food prices.”

Entomologists from around the world already classify aerial and ground spraying of insecticides as the least efficient mosquito control technique. Entomologist Dino Martins, PhD, in a 2016 interview with The Guardian, said “We are basically fighting an arms race with mosquitoes rather than cleverly understanding its life cycle and solving the problem there…[R]esistance will always evolve to the use of pesticides….“[Spraying insecticides] is a quick fix but you pay for it. You kill other species that would have predated on the mosquitoes.”

Spraying Naled, the first pesticide recommended by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to combat Zika, has been shown to be ineffective and known to carry consequences. In 2016, over two million bees were killed after aerial mosquito spraying in South Carolina. Beekeepers received insufficient warning for when aerial spraying would occur. One couple reported seeing thousands of dead bees scattered across their pool deck and driveway.

More research is needed to assess the broad ecological harms of mosquito spraying by including poisoning of native pollinators, whose pollination habits sustain a panoply of native plants.

Advocates feel that elected officials’ failure to account for pollinator activity in the decision to spray adds insult to injury. Many advocates wonder how many families could afford the increase in food prices as agricultural pollination costs increase.

With climate change increasing the range for many mosquito-borne diseases, take action locally.  Educate your neighbors and community leaders by providing examples of proper mosquito management, such as: eliminating standing water, introducing mosquito-eating fish, encouraging predators like bats, birds, dragonflies and frogs, and using least-toxic larvacides like bacillus thuringiensis israelensis (Bti). Visit Beyond Pesticides’ Mosquito Management page for more information.

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

Source: Journal of Apicultural Research

(Beyond Pesticides, November 20, 2018) Scientific conclusions used to support the registration of the insecticide chlorpyrifos were flawed and omitted key health impacts, according to a fresh analysis of the original data by a team of independent scientists from northern Europe and the U.S. This re-review not only casts further doubt on the safety of the neurotoxic chlorpyrifos, it highlights a major flaw within federal pesticide regulation that allows pesticide producers to submit their own safety evaluations to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency without public oversight. “One conclusion we draw is that there is a risk that the results of industry-funded toxicity tests are not reported correctly,” says co-author Axel Mie, PhD. “This makes it difficult for the authorities to evaluate the pesticides in a safe and valid way.”

In both the U.S. and European Union, pesticide producers contract with laboratories to perform required safety tests of active ingredients they hope to register for use. While these studies are generally considered ‘confidential business information’ and not available to the public, using Swedish freedom of information laws, researchers were able to obtain two key studies relating to the developmental neurotoxicity of chlorpyrifos. Although not disclosed within the study, it is well known that multinational chemical company Dow Agroscience is the primary registrant for chlorpyrifos.

Scientists first analyzed a study performed in 1997-8, which used laboratory rats exposed to the chemical as a reference for health impacts to prenatal human exposure. Summary reports indicated possible effects to a specific area of the brain known as the cerebellum, which regulates motor control. This led researchers to further investigate the underlying data. The industry-contracted laboratory concluded that at low to medium doses, there were no observed impacts, and, at high doses, impacts were seen but were a result of undernutrition caused by toxicity in the mother rat.

These findings led to an overall determination–accepted by regulators–that the chemical does not affect developmental neurotoxicity. However, the independent scientists indicate that this conclusion was backed up by averaging impacts to the brain, rather than looking at the cerebellum, the specific brain region impacted. Although seemingly subtle to readers without considerable scientific background, the study notes that such an approach is considered by EPA to be an “inappropriate and inconclusive manipulation of data.” Despite this clear-cut abuse of data, regulators never requested that the laboratory correct this approach.

A re-analysis by scientists finds that in low and medium doses, cerebellum height decreased up to 11%, and up to 14% at the highest dose compared to control rats. This indicates “statistically highly significant” effects the authors note were observed in the absence of toxicity in the mother rat. Although a review of this type was not included in the report submitted to regulators, it strongly supports the conclusion that chlorpyrifos is a developmental neurotoxin.

Independent scientists also identified other shortcomings from the same industry-contracted laboratory. Notably, the study length did not adequately match up with the length of time necessary to make a comparison between human and rat development. Further, the lab failed to show developmental impacts from lead nitrate used as a positive control (positive control is a control where you know the response).

Unfortunately, studies conducted by a separate lab in 2015 for a structurally similar compound, chlorpyrifos-methyl, also revealed errors. Like the previous study, rats were dosed with chlorpyrifos (this time only at a high level) to observe developmental neurotoxicity. It was revealed that the second lab had missing data for half of its data points related to cerebellum height. And less than half of these missing points were given explanations. The lab concluded that the missing data did not impact the overall interpretation of the study, however scientists re-reviewing this data found this to be a red flag. The independent scientists indicate that the industry-contracted lab may have inadequately modeled exposure relative to human impacts. This suspicion is further backed up by the fact that the lab could not produce data on the actual amount of chlorpyrifos nursing rats were exposed to.

This is far from the first time industry-contracted labs have undermined public trust and public health. In the early 1980s, a major scandal unraveled in the 1970s when it was uncovered that a prominent industry-contracted lab called Industrial Biotest was falsifying and covering up inaccurate research data used by EPA to register pesticides. Outrage led to criminal convictions and new regulations, however it is evident many problems still remain.

The Monsanto Papers, published in 2017, reveal a long history of industry meddling and collusion with EPA, stretching back to Agent Orange and dioxin contamination. And recently, as part of the discovery process associated with the glyphosate trial, it was revealed that Monsanto worked closely with top-level EPA officials to stop government reviews of its flagship weedkiller Roundup. Chlorpyrifos itself has also been the subject of industry meddling, as reports indicate former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt met privately with the CEO of Dow several weeks before reversing EPA’s tentative decision to ban on the chemical.

Based on these findings, the independent scientists made four suggestions for strengthening accountability:

• Require toxicity studies be commissioned by regulatory authorities, not the chemical industry.
• Select contracted labs based on a history of proficiencies in performing safety tests.
• Eliminate ‘confidential business information’ and allow independent scientists access to raw data.
• Eschew the propensity for ‘regrettable substitutions’ that undermine the review system by substituting chemicals like chlorpyrifos for less studied chemical cousins like chlorpyrifos-methyl.

Establishing these practices would go a long way towards regaining public trust in the pesticide review process. As it stands, more and more states and communities are rejecting EPA reviews as politically tainted and unable to adequately protect human and environmental health. Help your community obviate EPA’s failed pesticide regulatory scheme by working to pass laws at the local level that focus on safely managing pests. Sign here to tell us you’re ready to fight, and receive a helpful guide on how to create community change. Whether its adopting alternatives for lawns and landscapes, around the home, or in food production, the tools exist to eliminate toxic pesticides.

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

Source: EurekAlert, Environmental Health (peer reviewed journal)

(Beyond Pesticides, November 19, 2018) The Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) requires organic milk and dairy products labeled as organic to come from dairy cows continuously managed as organic from the last third of gestation. Because of the short supply of organic dairy breeder stock when the law was passed in 1990, a one-time conversion of conventional dairy cows to organic was allowed, as long as they are managed organically.

Please urge the Secretary of Agriculture to issue a final rule for Origin of Organic Livestock, as urged by the NOSB.

Unfortunately, the National Organic Program (NOP) allowed two interpretations of this provision, turning the provision into a loophole that has allowed some large dairy operations to circumvent the last third of gestation requirement altogether, and bringing conventionally managed animals into their operations on a continuous basis.

In 2015, USDA proposed an Origin of Livestock rule to clarify that section of the law and ensure consistent enforcement of the standards, but appears to have no plans to finalize the rule. In its October 2018 meeting, the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) recognized the unfairness that allows large organic dairies to profit at the expense of smaller dairies who follow the spirit of the law. In a rare demonstration of unity, the NOSB unanimously passed this resolution:

It has come to the attention of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) that the continued state of varying interpretations and practices around the Origin of Livestock standards is creating market instability for organic producers. The 2015 USDA Origin of Livestock Proposed Rule was based on six recommendations from the NOSB between 1994 and 2006. The proposed rule responds to findings from the July 2013 USDA Office of Inspector General (OIG) audit report on organic milk operations stating that certifying agents were interpreting the origin of livestock requirements differently. Rulemaking is necessary to ensure consistent interpretation and enforcement of the standards for origin of livestock and provide industry with additional clarity of application of the organic dairy standards. In early 2017 the Origin of Livestock Proposed Rule was removed from the Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. Support for this rule has been expressed through public comment by the majority of organic stakeholders. Strong federal oversight is essential for creating a fair and level playing field for all certified organic operations. 

Therefore, be it resolved by unanimous vote, the National Organic Standards Board—as USDA’s Federal Advisory Board on organic issues and representing organic farmers, ranchers, processors, retailers and consumers—urges the Secretary to directly issue a final rule for Origin of Livestock that incorporates public comments submitted in response to the Proposed Rule (Docket Number AMS-NOP-11-0009).

Please urge the Secretary of Agriculture to issue a final rule for Origin of Organic Livestock, as urged by the NOSB.

Letter to Secretary Perdue [address in Salsa], AMS Administrator Bruce Summers [email protected], and NOP Deputy Administrator Jenny Tucker [email protected]

The Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) requires organic milk and dairy products labeled as organic to come from dairy cows continuously managed as organic from the last third of gestation. Because of the short supply of organic dairy breeder stock when the law was passed in 1990, a one-time conversion of conventional dairy cows to organic was allowed, as long as they are managed organically.

Unfortunately, certifiers allowed two interpretations of this provision, turning the provision into a loophole that has allowed some large dairy operations to circumvent the last third of gestation requirement altogether, and bringing conventionally managed animals into their operations on a continuous basis.

In 2015, USDA proposed an Origin of Livestock rule to clarify that section of the law and ensure consistent enforcement of the standards, but appears to have no plans to finalize the rule. In its October 2018 meeting, the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) recognized the unfairness that allows large organic dairies to profit at the expense of smaller dairies who follow the spirit of the law. In a rare demonstration of unity, the NOSB unanimously passed this resolution:

It has come to the attention of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) that the continued state of varying interpretations and practices around the Origin of Livestock standards is creating market instability for organic producers. The 2015 USDA Origin of Livestock Proposed Rule was based on six recommendations from the NOSB between 1994 and 2006. The proposed rule responds to findings from the July 2013 USDA Office of Inspector General (OIG) audit report on organic milk operations stating that certifying agents were interpreting the origin of livestock requirements differently. Rulemaking is necessary to ensure consistent interpretation and enforcement of the standards for origin of livestock and provide industry with additional clarity of application of the organic dairy standards. In early 2017 the Origin of Livestock Proposed Rule was removed from the Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. Support for this rule has been expressed through public comment by the majority of organic stakeholders.  Strong federal oversight is essential for creating a fair and level playing field for all certified organic operations.

Therefore, be it resolved by unanimous vote, the National Organic Standards Board—as USDA’s Federal Advisory Board on organic issues and representing organic farmers, ranchers, processors, retailers and consumers—urges the Secretary to directly issue a final rule for Origin of Livestock that incorporates public comments submitted in response to the Proposed Rule (Docket Number AMS-NOP-11-0009).

Please adopt a final rule for Origin of Organic Livestock that creates consistency across production and incorporates the public comments that the agency received.

Thank you.
Sincerely,

(Beyond Pesticides, November 16, 2018) Pesticides and biocides used to control bacterial infections in humans and weeds and pests in agriculture are surpassing ‘planetary boundaries’ within which human civilization can continue to rely on these biocides, according to a review by an international team of scientists working on the Living with Resistance project. While the study reinforces the role of susceptible populations in managing resistance, it fails to distinguish essential differences between antibiotic resistance and resistance to pesticides that is identified by Beyond Pesticides.

The study focuses on six different forms of resistance. Researchers looked at antibiotic resistance in gram negative bacteria (such as E. coli, P. aeruginosa, Salmonella) and gram positive bacteria (such as S. aureus, Clostridium) separately, due to their divergent resistance mechanisms. Pesticide resistance was divided among herbicides in general, herbicide resistant crops, insecticides in general, and genetically engineered (GE) crops that produce their own insecticide. Resistance to antibiotics and pesticides are similar in that they are both evolved responses to substances toxic to the organism. However, lumping them together in evaluating their importance to human health and survival does not recognize important differences in context.

“Without new approaches, going to hospital in the future will increasingly become a gamble. More patients will get unlucky, and become infected with untreatable or hard to treat bacteria. This is an urgent risk to human society,” says study coauthor Søgaard Jørgensen, PhD in a press release. The risk of antibiotic resistance is, indeed, a crisis of major proportions. The authors of this study found antibiotic resistance in gram negative bacteria to fall into the category of highest risk –where resistance was found to all relevant antibiotics— while resistance to gram positive bacteria fell in a category in which some antibiotics are generally useful.

For crops genetically engineered (GE) to be herbicide-tolerant or contain plant-incorporated insecticides, the authors found that there is general resistance among pests–though local populations may still be susceptible to the pesticides— while resistance to pesticides not used with such GE crops is not as pervasive.

The authors regard susceptibility to pesticides to be a characteristic that should be conserved, in order to maximize the usefulness of the chemicals. Maintaining susceptibility to antibiotics is a generally-recognized strategy in medicine, where it is addressed (not always successfully) by restricting antibiotic use to situations in which they are required to fight specific infections and by eliminating the use of antibiotics for non-medical uses, such as pest control in plant agriculture or growth promotion in animal agriculture.

With regard to human health and survival, however, there are important differences between antibiotics and pesticides. Antibiotics in medicine are administered to individuals with illness caused by susceptible bacteria. Pesticides are broadcast onto the landscape, also affecting organisms of the target species who are not attacking crops (and therefore provide support for predators and parasites of pests), which increases selection for resistance. Secondly, antibiotics in medicine are reserved for uses in which they are believed necessary, and the risk to the individual receiving the antibiotic can be assessed against the benefits. On the other hand, pesticides are toxic chemicals that negatively affect the health of not only humans, but also other organisms exposed to them.

It is important to recognize the spread of pesticide resistance. It is a symptom of the ineffectiveness of chemical-intensive agriculture, and it leads to increased use of more and more toxic pesticides. For example, widespread and ever-increasing glyphosate resistance led these researchers to classify herbicide-resistant GE crops as regionally ineffective. As a study published this year by UK scientists indicates, the only solution to managing resistance in agriculture is to reduce the need to use these chemicals in the first place.

Organic agriculture seeks to prevent pest problems by creating healthy agroecosystems. The organic approach preserves antibiotics for use in human medicine and eliminates the use of toxic pesticides that endanger human and ecological health and survival.

For more information on resistance, see Beyond Pesticides’ 2011 article on the phenomenon, as well as the program pages for antibacterials, and herbicide tolerant and insecticide incorporated GE crops.

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

Source: Phys.Org, Nature Sustainability

(Beyond Pesticides, November 15, 2018) Neonicotinoids are widely known for their link to declining pollinator populations, but new research finds that the ill effects of these chemicals also extends to amphibian populations. In a study published late last month, scientists from the National Wildlife Research Center in Ottawa, Canada found that chronic exposure to real-world levels of the neonicotinoid imidacloprid limits the ability of juvenile wood frogs to escape a predator attack. This research adds additional evidence that neonicotinoids are harming aquatic food chains, and reinforces calls for U.S. regulators to follow the science and adequately restrict these toxic pesticides.

Researchers investigated the impact of neonicotinoids on the post-tadpole life stage of wood frogs, which has been identified as critical to sustaining viable populations of the species. Rather than determine acute impacts that assess how lethal a pesticide is, scientists opted to observe how wood frog behavior changes as a result of chronic, real-world exposure scenarios. In particular, scientists sought to figure out whether exposure resulted in an altered behavioral response to the presence of a predator.

As tadpoles, wood frogs were chronically exposed to real world levels of imidacloprid (1, 10, and 100 micrograms/liter), while others were left unexposed as a control. Three weeks after metamorphosis, these frogs were placed into 10 gallon tanks for observation. The tank was split into three sections, including a small pool, a gravel area, and an area with moss intended to act as shelter. A fabricated heron head and neck was used to mimic a predator attack, and researchers were able to observe the response from a viewer outside of the tank, without disturbing the frogs. Researchers observed whether the frog responded to the presence of the predator, how it responded, how quickly it moved, and whether it used shelter or refuge.

Wood frogs exposed to imidacloprid at 10 and 100 micrograms/liter are significantly less likely to actively respond to the attack by moving in any way (such as jumping or crouching) compared to unexposed control frogs. Frogs contaminated with imidacloprid are also more likely to remain in the area of the attack. While both control and exposed frogs use refuge in a similar way, researchers concluded that these results indicate neonicotinoids may make young wood frogs more vulnerable to predators. By impacting the ability for the frogs to assess and respond to the presence of a predator, neonicotinoids may be having subtle, but important, effects on frog survival.

Significantly, the impact of pesticides on animal behavior is not adequately studied, and often not considered by regulatory authorities. However, similar behavioral impacts are likely playing into neonicotinoid-associated declines with pollinator populations as well. In bees, these chemicals have been shown to interfere with foraging, memory, and learning.

Neonicotinoids are particularly problematic for aquatic ecosystems, due to their ability to quickly dissolve in water. And evidence from the U.S. Geological Survey finds that these chemicals are widespread throughout the Great Lakes, boding poorly for the rest of America’s waterways. Canadian pesticide regulatory authorities have proposed a phase-out of neonicotinoids, due to risks both to pollinator populations and aquatic species. While regulators there based their reasoning primarily on acute toxicity to aquatic invertebrates, it is evident that more attention should be paid to amphibians and other aquatic vertebrates that may feed on contaminated insects or swim in neonic-contaminted water.

For more information the effect of neonicotinoids on aquatic environments, see Beyond Pesticides report Poisoned Waterways. You can also take action and encourage Congress to support measures to suspend neonicotinoids by sending a letter in support of the Saving America’s Pollinators Act.

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

Source: EurekAlert, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry

(Beyond Pesticides, November 14, 2018) Monarch butterflies are in the midst of a staggering decades-long population decline that has rapidly accelerated since 2005, research published by an international team of scientists and the University of Florida last month indicates. According to data meticulously collected by researchers, monarchs making their way to central Florida after emerging from their breeding grounds in Mexico have declined by 80% over the last decade and a half. This is roughly the same time frame at which beekeepers began to see precipitous declines in managed honey bee colonies. Researchers point to industrial development and increasing pesticide use as factors that have accelerated the decline of this iconic species.

“A broad pattern is that 95 percent of corn and soybean products grown in the U.S. are Roundup Ready crops that resist glyphosate,” said study coauthor Earnest Williams, PhD, of New York’s Hamilton College in a press release. “That has a national impact. What’s really needed are patches of native vegetation and nectar sources without pesticides. It’s not just for monarchs but all pollinators.”

Beginning in 1985, renowned monarch expert Lincoln Brower, PhD and his team monitored monarch populations at a pesticide-free cattle pasture south of Gainesville, FL. Caterpillars were observed on milkweed, the main source of food for monarchs before metamorphosis, and the numbers of adult monarchs were also recorded for 37 years, spanning what researchers indicate are over 140 monarch generations.

Based on these data, scientists found that monarchs leave Mexico just in time to reach milkweed at its optimal growth stage in central Florida. The timing is critical for monarchs, a deviation of just a couple weeks could result in monarchs missing the opportunity to provide the right conditions for their offspring to survive.

And as researchers indicate, it is critical for them to do so. “Florida is kind of a staging ground for the recolonization of much of the East Coast,” said co-author Jaret Daniels, PhD of the Florida Museum of Natural History. “If these populations are low, then the northern populations are going to be at a similar abundance level.”

Recent reports directly from the monarch overwintering grounds in Mexico paint a very grim picture for the species. Last year monarch populations were 15% lower than the year before. Western monarchs, which overwinter in coastal California forests, are subject to the same declines, with scientists indicating that there is an 86% chance of extinction within 50 years, and nearly 75% chance within 20.

The current research aligns closely with data presented by the World Wildlife Fund, which tracked the Mexican overwintering grounds and recorded a similar 80% decline since the 1990s. While in the past fluctuations in Monarch populations could be explained by factors such as a cold winter, the evidence is now clear that there are human factors putting downward pressure on monarch populations.

Researchers are pointing at a number of factors, with habitat elimination being the primary driving force behind the decline. Industrial development, whether in the form of strip malls and planned communities or intensive monoculture farm fields, contributes to a loss of milkweed that the species requires. Not only are farm fields often displacing monarch habitat, a majority of fields already in use are planting genetically engineered crops designed to tolerate repeated herbicide spraying. While crops are left untouched from the use of chemicals like glyphosate (Roundup), 2,4-D, and dicamba, milkweed is often eliminated from field margins and other near-farm areas due to drift and run-off after herbicide applications.

The class of systemic chemicals linked to the decline of bees has also been shown to harm monarchs. Two studies, one in 2015 and another in 2016, have linked neonicotinoid exposure to the death of monarch larvae. It’s not difficult for these chemicals to make their way into monarch habitat either. Once applied, either through spray, or more commonly, through coated seeds, these chemicals either drift or run off into areas where milkweed is growing. While the insecticides don’t kill milkweed, they can make their way into the milkweed plant, contaminating it. By poisoning the plant, it becomes deadly for monarch caterpillars to feed on its primary food source.

Scientists point last to the unfortunate proliferation of a non-native milkweed species, tropical milkweed (Asclepias curassavica), which can spread parasites to unsuspecting monarchs. The variety is sold in stores and often planted for its color and long growing season, but researchers indicate these properties could lead to monarchs breeding at the wrong time, on the wrong species of milkweed.

While the authors suggest Florida residents plant swamp milkweed (Asclepias incarnata), or butterflyweed (Asclepias tuberosa), they note limitations in that approach. “It’s not as simple as saying, ‘we plant milkweed and the monarch will be saved,'” said Dr. Daniels. “We should think of this as an ecological issue. There are a lot of complexities to any organism and any system.”

Lead author Dr. Brower, a world renown researcher who led the decades long-study Monarchs for decades, died shortly after the release of this research, his final published work. “The best thing we can do is to continue his mission and continue to study and work to conserve the monarch,” Dr. Daniels said of Dr. Brower’s legacy. “I think he would be proud of that mission.”

The monarch is up against complex modern forces – development, chemical pesticides, climate change, logging, and other sources of habitat destruction, disease, and contamination. In order to solve the crisis, advocates need to work on multiple fronts. Help limit the growth of genetic modification in agriculture by purchasing only organic. Also take action in your home and community. See Managing Landscapes with Pollinators in Mind and Hedgerows for Biodiversity. For additional steps you can take to protect monarchs and other pollinators, see Beyond Pesticides’ Bee Protective webpage.

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

Source: Eurekalert

(Beyond Pesticides, November 13, 2018) We are living in extraordinary times that call for bold action. We face serious public health and environmental challenges and know that we must work to advance local, state, and federal action. Our program relies on your support, which elevates independent science to call for action. While the November 6 election results offer some important opportunities in our communities, state, and nation, we continue to face the power of the pro-pesticide lobby and those seeking to weaken the integrity of organic standards in the Farm Bill.

Please consider a donation to Beyond Pesticides because your support is critical to the ongoing challenges, as we leverage the opportunities. Check out our 2017 annual report, which captures the importance of our program in supporting the adoption of policies and practices at a time when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is curtailing its program, reversing previous decisions to restrict pesticide use, and ignoring scientific findings.

Your support enables us to continue our critical work at a critical time. In our annual report, we share our strategy for effecting the changes necessary to protect health and the environment in 2018 and moving ahead. Your support enables us to:

* Protect the local right to restrict pesticides and advance organic land management policies.
We are fighting to preserve the right of local governments to restrict pesticides against a chemical industry lobby attack in the 2018 Farm Bill. This is an attack on the democratic process and the authority of states. At the same time, we are fighting to stop state governments from preempting local authority to restrict pesticides on all land in the community, stopping chemical drift and run-off, and the contamination of waterways and the local ecosystem. Collaborating closely with local groups in almost every state, we are challenging the use of pesticides like glyphosate (Roundup) –a probable carcinogen, killer of bees, and destroyer of soil organisms and our gut microbiome.

*  Protect the integrity of organic standards and the USDA organic label.
We are fighting to protect the integrity of the organic standard setting process against another attack in the Farm Bill. By changing the review process, a provision will open the floodgates to allowed synthetic chemicals in organic production, handling, and processing. We have built an important law in the Organic Foods Production Act, which incorporates values and principles that build and regenerate soil, protect pollinators and biodiversity, eliminate toxic pesticide use, and contains a default provision that strictly limits synthetic chemicals in certified organic products. This will all change with the Farm bill amendment.

Beyond Pesticides advances change.

We speak up.

Our work is based on the belief that an active and informed citizenry and community-based organizations sharing information and strategies will drive decisions that protect health and the environment. Your support enables us to inspire action and provide people with the tools to carry out effective advocacy.

We advance public consideration of independent science.
We bring independent science to advocacy. Your support enables us to track the latest independent science, making sure it is accessible and understandable in the decision making context, maintained in databases that ensure that it is widely available and can be easily used in campaigns.

We seek the adoption of policy.
We believe that we must institutionalize changes in practices through precautionary policies that are responsive to new information and scientific understanding. Your support enables us to advance policies that ensure the adoption of management practices in sync with nature will enable human survival as a part of healthy ecosystems.

We put in place practices that eliminate toxic pesticide use.
The adoption of practices that implement the solution to or prevent a problem is critical to our strategic vision. Your support enables us to bring the resources to communities that put organic programs in place.

Our focus is on solving problems.

Our focus is federal. When standards of health and environmental protection are under attack by the very institutions established to prevent harm, the public’s voice must be heard.

Our focus is state. When the federal government is out-of-step with actions necessary to protect health and the environment, state and local action is more critical than ever.

Our focus is community. When state governments ignore the local health threats to children, pets, pollinators, wildlife, and local waterways, local action is even more important.

Our focus is school. When schools use hazardous pesticides on their playing fields and in their buildings, action by administrators, teachers, and parents is the key to change.

Our focus is home. When the marketplace sells toxic products, services, and food that are harmful to families and the environment, individual action to source and demand safer products is required.

Our focus is organic and regenerative. The solution requires the use of production and management practices and products that are healthful and compatible with the ecosystem, where exposure to toxic chemicals does not poison workers and consumers and destroy life.

Our work identifies environmental and public health problems that threaten life. We see the solutions within our grasp, from the protection of land, air, and water, to a slowing of global climate change. With your support, we provide the hands-on support to make change happen.

Please consider supporting Beyond Pesticides today, by clicking on this link. We will get pesticides out of our communities and food production with your support!

Thank you!

(Beyond Pesticides, November 9, 2018) A Tunisian study (published in January 2018) on the effects in pre-pubertal mice of exposure to malathion — an organophosphate pesticide first registered for use in the U.S. in 1956 — demonstrates significant distortion of liver and kidney biochemistry and function in the animals. Deleterious effects include compromise of feeding ability, metabolism performance, neurologic deficits, reduction of overall body weight, and simultaneous increases in the weights of livers and kidneys, with structural anomalies and lesions in those organs.

Organophosphates (OPs) have raised alarm bells for years. Some, such as chlorpyrifos and diazinon, have had their registrations cancelled for household uses because of the extreme health risks to children, but agricultural, golf course, and “public health” (mosquito control) uses remain commercially available and in use. Recently, Beyond Pesticides reported on research whose investigators support — and called publicly for — a worldwide ban on the compounds because of the serious health and environmental risks they pose, particularly for children.

Beyond Pesticides has written extensively on OP pesticides, including malathion and chlorpyrifos. Both are used widely in agriculture. Chlorpyrifos has been the subject of quite a ping-pong match in recent years: a scheduled ban by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a rescinding of that directive, a court order to execute it, and now, a promise by the Trump administration to appeal that order. Malathion is used to control pests on a huge variety of food and commodity crops, by home gardeners, and in mosquito control efforts to limit mosquito-borne diseases. (Those programs typically involve aerial “adulticide” spraying to knock down adult mosquitoes in flight; it’s a strikingly ineffective approach to the problem.) Organophosphates are strongly linked to a number of human health risks, including neurological, reproductive, developmental, endocrine, and respiratory impacts, as well as liver and kidney damage.

Organophosphate pesticides were initially considered an improvement over organochlorine pesticides, such as DDT and dieldrin. Organochlorines (OCs) persist in the environment and can bioaccumulate, causing ongoing exposures and ecotoxicological impacts, whereas OPs degrade relatively quickly in the environment, thus reducing some of those organochlorine-associated risks. However, “though OPs are not as persistent as OCs, they are more acutely toxic and act to irreversibly inhibit . . . an enzyme critical to nerve function in both insects and humans.” That inhibitory impact inactivates acetylcholinesterase, an enzyme responsible for metabolism of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. This is the “common mechanism of effect” for all OPs.

This inhibition causes the accumulation of acetylcholine, which can result in symptoms such as diarrhea, dizziness, headache, and muscle twitches, as well as potentially more-serious ones, including respiratory muscle paralysis, respiratory failure, coma, and death. The Turkish study cited below notes that, “Subjects exposed to organophosphates for [a] prolonged period might experience neuropsychiatric and mood changes, cognitive and memory deficits, polyneuropathy extrapyramidal symptoms,” or development of neurogenerative disorders (e.g., Parkinson’s disease, dementias). The liver and kidneys are considered among the main targets of malathion toxicity, which is mediated through oxidative stress — an imbalance, in cells, between the production of free radicals and reactive metabolites (so-called reactive oxygen species, or ROS), and their elimination by antioxidants. The Tunisian study identified those impacts as primary (see below).

Other studies have pointed to similar impacts and the oxidative stress mechanism. One such investigation, published in Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety in October 2018, found hepatotoxic impacts of exposure to malathion in a fish species called rohu, a member of the carp family. Those included hepatic necrosis, fatty infiltration, congestion, and cellular swelling. The authors of that study concluded that their research “clearly revealed malathion as a potent hepatotoxic pesticide; therefore the injudicious, indiscriminate and extensive use of Malathion should be prohibited or at least reduced and strictly monitored.” An investigation by Turkish researchers, published in Toxicology Research in March 2018, also concludes that malathion increases oxidative stress, causes tissue damage, and decreases antioxidant status in rats. A third study, out of Egypt and published in April 2018 in the Asian Pacific Journal of Tropical Medicine, concluded that “compared to controls, malathion resulted in increased oxidative stress in [the] brain and liver.”

EPA’s determination of acetylcholinesterase inhibition as the “common mechanism of effect” is important. The Food Quality Protection Act requires that EPA calculate the multiple effects of pesticides with similar toxic properties; thus, cumulative risk assessment must consider, for example, malathion exposure plus any chlorpyrifos exposure, etc. EPA, not known for quick action on pesticide registration reviews, in 2016 issued, on the basis of a draft risk assessment, risk management recommendations for mosquito control professionals on the use of aerial malathion spraying. EPA was driven, no doubt, by concern related to increased spraying activity because of the then-rapid spread of the Zika virus, as well as other mosquito-borne illnesses. Information from the risk assessment was disturbing enough that the EPA took the uncharacteristic step; that information included evidence of histopathological lesions of the nasal cavity and larynx from exposures below the “dose” that typically causes the inactivation of acetylcholinesterase, as well as clinical signs of neurotoxicity (such as, tremors, salivation, urogenital staining, and decreased motor activity) in those exposed at levels 10 times those that cause such inactivation.

Beyond Pesticides advocates for transitioning away from toxic organophosphates for pest control. There are less- and non-toxic approaches to most pest problems that can drastically reduce the health and environmental risks associated with pesticide use. Learn more about organophosphates, pesticides generally, and shifting to organic agriculture through Beyond Pesticides’ Daily News Blog, journal Pesticides and You, Safer Choice pages, and its website pages on the transition to organic agriculture. 

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

Primary source: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.toxrep.2017.12.021 

(Beyond Pesticides, November 8, 2018) Two months after publishing its first series of tests, part two of an Environmental Working Group (EWG) study finds residues of Roundup’s active ingredient, glyphosate, in all General Mills’ Cheerios and PepsiCo’s Quaker Oats products sampled. Health advocates are expressing concern about the consequences of chronic glyphosate exposure, and say U.S. federal agencies must limit the herbicide’s use on oat-based breakfast foods regularly marketed to children. In addition, organic itself is under threat, as chemical-intensive management practices undermine the future of the growing organic movement.

In this second round of testing, EWG scientists purchased products around San Francisco and Washington DC. 28 samples of conventional and 16 samples of organic oat products were collected. Approximately 300 grams of each General Mills and PepsiCo product were packaged and shipped to Anresco Laboratories, in San Francisco. Detected glyphosate residues were compared to EWG’s own health benchmark of 160 parts per billion (ppb). This benchmark is based on risks of lifetime exposure and what EWG scientists consider allowable and protective of children’s health with an adequate margin of safety. 

EWG’s results detected glyphosate residues in all 28 samples of conventionally grown oat products. The vast majority (all but two) of sampled products containing conventionally grown oats had residues well above 160 ppb. The highest level of glyphosate detected by the lab was 2,837 ppb in Quaker Oatmeal Squares breakfast cereal. Surprising to some, glyphosate was also detected in five of the 16 organic samples at concentrations of 10 ppb to 30 ppb. EWG notes that organic oats can be exposed by neighboring drift or at facilities where conventional oats are also processed. Any evidence indicating cross-contamination from conventional to organic underscores the urgency of protecting organic integrity.

“How many bowls of cereal and oatmeal have American kids eaten that came with a dose of weed killer?” asked EWG President Ken Cook in a press release. “That’s a question only General Mills, PepsiCo and other food companies can answer.”

In response, General Mills and Quaker Oats Company have gone on the defensive, insisting their products meet the legal standards. However, it is important to note that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) legal limit for glyphosate on oats, 30 parts per million, was set back in 2008. This was well before the International Agency for Research on Caner (IARC) cancer classification, or any of the recent Dewayne Johnson vs. Monsanto trials, in which glyphosate was shown to have caused a school groundkeeper to contract non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Advocates affirm outdated legal limits, not based on the best and most current science, fall short of adequately protecting public health.

Children and developing fetuses are particularly vulnerable to carcinogens and immune system suppressants. Repeated pesticide exposure increases susceptibility to disease later in life. Without strong protections in place, parents can be unknowingly feeding their children daily breakfasts tainted with toxic pesticide residues.

“Glyphosate and other cancer-causing chemicals,” says Mr. Cook, “simply don’t belong in children’s food, period.”

Many health and environmental advocates are calling for a glyphosate ban, in which products containing glyphosate are removed from the market. However, though glyphosate is troubling on its own, there are also other equally toxic pesticides and synthetic fertilizers that perpetuates “the pesticide-treadmill.” For comprehensive results, champion an organic systems approach wherever pesticides are routinely used.  Calling glyphosate “the poster child for the bigger pesticide problem,” in “Decades of Deceit,” U.S. Right to Know investigative reporter Carey Gillam said, “I do think [glyphosate] is very representative of what is going on in terms of the way [pesticides have] been pushed, and the way [Monsanto] has manipulated public policy and the regulatory authority.”

Products manufacturers can expand markets for farmers through a commitment to source only organically grown ingredients. In the meantime, grassroots coalitions must continue holding companies accountable. The need for a global transition to regenerative, organic agriculture is urgent and ongoing. Instead of prolonging land management practices that lead to widespread weed resistance, consciously choose to avoid conventional products. Turn your lawn into an organic garden. Cook, share and enjoy organic foods for your friends and family whenevr possible.

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

Source: Environmental Working Group

(Beyond Pesticides, November 7, 2018) Brazil’s rapid industrialization of its agricultural sector may be coming at the cost of resident health, according to a new study published in Chemosphere by an international team of scientists. The researchers link the rise in the country’s pesticide use since the turn of the century to significant increases in colon cancer, particularly in the country’s most intensive agricultural southern regions. With the recent election of far right president Jair Bolsonaro, who has supported policies that would loosen Brazil’s pesticide regulations, advocates are concerned the county’s farming industry is moving in an unsustainable direction.

Researchers note that as Brazil’s agriculture industry has grown over the last two decades, it has become the world’s leading consumer of pesticides. In the year 2000, roughly 160 million tons of pesticides were used in the country. By 2012, that number reached nearly 500 million tons. Scientists compared pesticides sold to standard mortality rates (SMR) in each Brazilian state. SMR measures mortality by comparing observed mortality to expected mortality when adjusting for age and gender. A rate above one indicates that there is excessive mortality.

Despite improvements in detection and treatment, colon cancer deaths recorded in the country increased from roughly 950k in 2000 to over one million by 2012. Using a series of statistical models, researchers showed that as the amount of pesticide sold in the country increased, the SMR for colon cancer increased in close correlation. This trend held for both male and female populations.

“The results show a strong link [between pesticides and colon cancer mortality] and as such cannot be ignored,” said study co-author Francis Martin, PhD, of the University of Central Lancashire’s School of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences in the United Kingdom to SciDevNet. “It is now critical to determine whether [exposure to pesticides] has the potential to turn normal cells into cancer cells by acting as endocrine disruptors or by damaging DNA.”

Beyond Pesticides’ Pesticide Induced Diseases Database lists a number studies linking agricultural pesticide use to colon cancer. Much of this research focuses on the risk to farmers and applicators, but residents can also be exposed to pesticides through drift, runoff into drinking water sources, and residues on food. Authors of the study are concerned with Brazilian government data showing that 20% of food sampled between 2013 and 2015 was considered unsafe due to high pesticide residue.

Researchers made the following findings using U.S. data in Pesticide use and colorectal cancer risk in the Agricultural Health Study:

“We investigated the relationship between agricultural pesticides and colorectal cancer incidence in the Agricultural Health Study. A total of 56,813 pesticide applicators with no prior history of colorectal cancer were included in this analysis. Detailed pesticide exposure and other information were obtained from self-administered questionnaires completed at the time of enrollment (1993-1997). Cancer incidence was determined through population-based cancer registries from enrollment through December 31, 2002. A total of 305 incident colorectal cancers (212 colon, 93 rectum) were diagnosed during the study period, 1993-2002. Although most of the 50 pesticides studied were not associated with colorectal cancer risk, chlorpyrifos use showed significant exposure response trend (p for trend = 0.008) for rectal cancer, rising to a 2.7-fold (95% confidence interval: 1.2-6.4) increased risk in the highest exposure category. Aldicarb was associated with a significantly increased risk of colon cancer (p for trend = 0.001), based on a small number of exposed cases, with the highest exposure category resulting in a 4.1-fold increased risk (95% confidence interval: 1.3-12.8).”

Researchers indicate that their data reveal pesticide exposure to be a potential risk factor for colon cancer, and indicate their correlational findings warrant further investigation. As a result of increasing attention to pesticide dangers, earlier this year a Brazilian judge ordered a suspension of glyphosate, the most widely used herbicide in the world. Reports from other South American countries such as Argentina indicate that there is widespread poisoning arising from the increasing use of genetically engineered crops developed to tolerate repeated sprayings of glyphosate and other pesticides.

As evidence continues to accumulate on the dangers of increasing pesticide use, developing countries still have an opportunity to shift to safer, sustainable organic farming practices. For more information on why organic is the right choice for the future of farming, see Beyond Pesticides’ organic program page. And for more information on the dangers of pesticide exposure, see resources on the Safer Choice webpage.

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

Source: SciDevNet, Chemosphere

(Beyond Pesticides, November 6, 2018) Scientists working for USDA’s Agricultural Research Service in Lincoln, Nebraska have discovered natural compounds derived from coconut oil that are more effective than DEET at repelling mosquitoes, ticks, biting flies, bed bugs and other insects. Given the long-lasting efficacy of the compounds researchers tested, commercialization could make the regular use of toxic insect repellents, like DEET, obsolete. Advocates are praising USDA researchers for the results, indicating that this is exactly the type of research government agencies should be funding and promoting.

It is important to note that USDA scientists did not find coconut oil itself to be an effective repellent. Lab equipment was used to analyze and isolate medium chain fatty acids within coconut oil for their repellent properties. Scientists zeroed in on a blend of C8 (caprylic acid), C10 (capric acid), and C12 (lauric acid) fatty acids as the most effective repellent mixture. Individually, only C12 exhibited anywhere near the same efficacy as the specific blend identified. The study indicates that more research is needed to understand why coconut oil itself was ineffective, and how the synergy between the fatty acid combinations resulted in such effective repellency.

To verify their hypothesis on the efficacy of the fatty acid blend, scientists tested the compounds on range of well-known pests that threaten public health and the agricultural economy. They began with a focus on biting flies (the stable fly and horn fly), which can reduce meat and milk production in cattle, and spread disease to humans. For the horn fly, researchers formulated the fatty acids in a starch blend and found it effective for up to four days, when used on cattle in the field.  While the prevailing treatment against stable flies, catnip oil, provided 24 hours of protection, the coconut fatty acid blend showed effectiveness in the lab up to two weeks. Compared to DEET, which provides 50% control against stable flies, the coconut oil compound is 95% effective.

Researchers then looked at the effect of this blend on bed bugs. Both DEET and the fatty acid blend displayed roughly the same effectiveness after 24 hours, but the coconut-derived blend retained efficacy for much longer. After seven days, the coconut fatty acids were still 80% effective against bed bugs, while DEET lost much of its repellent activity after three days.

The dog and lone star ticks tested by scientists exhibited a response similar to bed bugs. The coconut oil blend was found to be nearly 90% effective for both tick species up to seven days. According to EPA’s insect repellent search tool, the longest effective time for a tick repellent currently on the market is the 14 hour protection provided by the picaridin-based Sawyer Picaridin Insect Repellent Lotion. The closest DEET-based product only provides 10 hours of tick repellency.

Scientists last tested their coconut-derived fatty acid blend on Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which can spread yellow fever, dengue fever, chickungunya, and Zika, and are increasingly prevalent throughout the United States due to a warming climate. While the fatty acid blend was effective at repelling these mosquitoes, the concentrations needed to be much higher than DEET in order to be effective. However, at concentrations above 25%, both substances exhibited the same ability to provide 90% repellency against Aedes aegypti.

It is not an understatement to characterize this research as groundbreaking in its implications for the future development of insect repellents. DEET, which is widely recommended by government agencies and even some well-intentioned non-profit organizations, has been linked to a range of health impacts, with particular concern for children.  Symptoms of DEET exposure in humans can include headache, exhaustion, and mental confusion, together with blurred vision,  salivation, chest tightness, muscle twitching and abdominal cramps. It is often applied to clothing in combination with synthetic pyrethroids, causing potential synergy that has been linked to brain damage and Gulf War syndrome. A 2009 study found a mother’s use of insect repellents, like DEET, during the first trimester of pregnancy to be associated with the birth defect hypospadias in newborns.

Most natural alternatives provide nowhere near the same length of efficacy as that displayed by the fatty acid compounds. The blend that researchers tested are also very cheap to produce and can be isolated through other plant compounds. Researchers estimate that cattle ranchers switching to this formulation could see significant savings on cattle fly repellents, as the cost of the coconut-derived fatty acids would only be roughly 10 cents per cattle.

USDA indicated in a press release that it has filed a patent application for this new technology, and is working with companies to develop formulas that replicate their work. This underlines the critical importance of the U.S. government investing in pest research and technology. As the Agricultural Research Service notes, “each dollar invested in agricultural research results in $20 of economic impact.” This is not government waste, but a successful method to develop new, safer products for the consumer and commercial market. Beyond Pesticides will continue to monitor and update its readers should a coconut-oil fatty acid based natural product be approved for use.

In the meantime, continue to avoid DEET-based products. Currently, given that the efficacy time for natural and least-toxic insect repellents is similar to DEET, there should be no reason to opt for the compound that could put one’s individual health at risk. See Beyond Pesticides’ least toxic mosquito repellent fact sheet for more information on safer, alternative repellents. See, also, Beyond Pesticides mosquito management webpage and Public Health Mosquito Management Strategy for Decision.

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

Source: Agricultural Research Service PR, Scientific Reports

(Beyond Pesticides, November 5, 2018) As you know, the stakes in this midterm election are high. Many races are too close to call and will be decided by voter turnout. As we have read, our vote  will make a difference!

 The stakes are high. People and the environment are being poisoned. Pollinators are disappearing. Waterways are being contaminated. Biodiversity is threatened. Children –especially farmworker children—are suffering brain damage, and pesticide exposure is linked to the increase in ADHD and autism. Pesticide exposure is implicated in cancer, Parkinson’s disease, reproductive dysfunction, diabetes, learning disabilities, and more.

We need people in elected positions — from local officials to national offices — who will listen to constituents who know the need for protection from pesticides and understand the urgent need to adopt of organic practices. Learn about your candidates and vote!

What more we can do. Take someone with you to the polls. Offer assistance to your neighbors who need help getting to the polls. Offer to watch children of those who need childcare. If you want to do even more, contact candidates to see how you can help with canvassing or phone banking.

Make a difference with your vote!
VOTE LIKE YOUR HEALTH AND THE ENVIRONMENT DEPEND ON IT!

(Beyond Pesticides, November 2, 2018) A group of leading toxics experts, who published a paper in the journal PLOS Medicine on their research on organophosphate exposure during pregnancy and impacts on child development, are calling for a ban on organophosphate pesticides. The study evaluates current science on the risks of this class of compounds, produced by Corteva Agriscience (formerly Dow AgroSciences); its conclusions warn of the multitude of dangers of organophosphates for children, and makes recommendations for addressing these risks. The experts conclude that: (1) widespread use of organophosphate (OP) pesticides to control insects has resulted in ubiquitous human exposures; (2) acute exposures to OPs is responsible for poisonings and deaths, particularly in developing countries; and (3) evidence demonstrates that prenatal exposures, even at low levels, put children at risk for cognitive and behavioral deficits, and for neurodevelopmental disorders.

Among the authors’ recommendations are these:

• Governments and subsidiary agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), should phase out chlorpyrifos and other organophosphate pesticides; ban non-agricultural uses of OP pesticides (including in household products); monitor watersheds and drinking water sources of human exposure; promote the use of integrated pest management (IPM) through incentives and training; and establish pesticide use and illness reporting programs.
• Healthcare professions and training institutions should implement training and curricula on the health impacts from OP exposures, how to treat acute exposures, and how to educate patients and the public about these hazards and the best means for avoiding them.
• Schools of nursing and medicine should incorporate curricula on environmental hazards (including pesticides), and medical boards ought to include environmental health in their examinations.
• Agricultural entities should provide training on the handling and application of pesticides, and on worker protection standards; accelerate the development of nontoxic approaches to pest control through IPM; and ensure worker safety through appropriate protective equipment and training.

Developed approximately eight decades ago, initially as nerve gas agents for military use, and later amended for use (at reduced concentrations) as pesticides, organophosphates are widely used for agricultural pest control, but also, in hospitals and other healthcare institutions, schools, and public spaces (e.g., parks, golf courses, playing fields), and for mosquito control. The best-known among the organophosphate pesticides (OPs) — some of which have been proscribed or limited in the past decade or so — are probably chlorpyrifos, malathion, and diazinon. The study authors note that the extensive use of OPs has “led to ubiquitous human exposure.” A recent example of that ubiquity — in which every single home in rural New York State counties showed the presence of pesticides, often including the organophosphates malathion and/or chlorpyrifos — was covered by Beyond Pesticides.

High-dose exposure to OPs causes “acute poisoning from the irreversible inhibition of the enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AChE), resulting in cholinergic syndrome (including narrowed pupils, excessive salivation, bronchoconstriction, mental confusion, convulsions or tremors, and in some cases, death). Additionally, delayed polyneuropathy has been described in association with high exposures.” Farmworkers and pesticide applicators are generally most at risk for these kinds of exposures, but they are not the only victims. In 2013, for example, at least 25 children in India died after an acute dietary exposure to high levels of organophosphates. In addition, children, who are most vulnerable to the harmful effects of OPs, may be exposed if they live near, and/or their parents work in, agricultural fields treated with the compounds.

Lower-level exposures, even those previously considered safe, and to which many members of the public are subject, can lead to myriad neurodevelopmental, reproductive, and respiratory health problems. A plethora of studies, including the subject investigation, has linked exposures during fetal development with neurodevelopmental issues, i.e., poorer cognitive, behavioral, and social development in children. Cognitive problems may include reduced IQ, developmental delays, and greater risk for learning disabilities; numerous investigations, cited in the subject research paper, have implicated OPs in the development of autism spectrum disorders.

The EPA stated in 2016 that there was sufficient epidemiologic evidence of “neurodevelopmental effects occurring at chlorpyrifos exposure levels below that required to cause acetylcholinesterase inhibition.” Chronic, low-level exposure is a huge concern, particularly prenatally and for young children, given their rapid development and the potential deleterious effect during multiple developmental windows. Such exposures get insufficient research and clinical attention, and are often dismissed because pregnant women and fetuses may not show obvious clinical symptoms or signs, and developmental deficits may not manifest until months or years later.

Frighteningly, the study notes that outcomes related to fetal exposures to OPs seem to persist, with associations observed into middle and late childhood. It further pointed out that neuroanatomic alterations (such as differences in brain volume in regions responsible for attention, receptive language processing, social cognition, and regulation of inhibition) were seen in children with high levels of OPs in their umbilical cord blood. These observed associations may “potentially constitute a pathway from pesticide exposure to the associated behavioral and cognitive deficits [and] may be permanent.”

More than 40 organophosphate pesticides are considered, by the EPA and World Health Organization (WHO) Food and Agriculture Organization, to be moderately or highly hazardous to human health. These toxic compounds are used on a huge array of agricultural crops, as well as for the uses noted above. The EPA moved in 2016 to ban chlorpyrifos for agricultural uses; the Trump administration reversed that decision in 2017. In August 2018, the NInth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the ban must executed, based on “scientific evidence that its residue on food causes neurodevelopmental damage to children” — a decision the Trump administration has said it will appeal. Some countries have instituted bans on a few OPs, the European Union has denied approval of 30+ OP compounds, and early in 2018, Hawaii became the first state to ban chlorpyrifos.

Beyond Pesticides has written extensively on organophosphates and their implications in human health problems and diseases, including those related to reproductive, cognitive, and respiratory function. These compounds are implicated, as well, in the dysregulation and dysfunction of bodily systems because of their impacts on endocrine function. Through its Pesticide-Induced Diseases Database, Beyond Pesticides keeps track of emerging research on pesticide exposure and human health.

Several study co-authors have been quite direct in their commentary on the research results. Past president the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and president-elect of the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics Jeanne Conry, M.D said, “Health care professionals are on the front line of responding to organophosphate pesticide exposure, but the only way to make sure families aren’t exposed in the first place is to ban them completely.”

Bruce Lanphear, M.D., physician-scientist at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, BC noted, “We found no evidence of a safe level of organophosphate pesticide exposure for children. Well before birth, organophosphate pesticides are disrupting the brain in its earliest stages, putting them on track for difficulties in learning, memory and attention, effects which may not appear until they reach school-age. . . . Government officials around the world need to listen to science, not chemical lobbyists, and protect our children from chlorpyrifos and all organophosphate pesticides.”

“Alternatives to these toxic pesticides exist, and many farmers have successfully eliminated use of organophosphate pesticides. The agricultural community has a responsibility to use these alternatives. We need federal support for research on less toxic pest management and support to our farmers so they can farm sustainably and profitably, as well as alternatives to organophosphate use to control mosquitos and other public health threats,” said Asa Bradman, Ph.D., environmental health scientist at UC Berkeley.

Lead author, director of the UC Davis Environmental Health Sciences Center, and co-director of Project TENDR (Targeting Environmental Neuro-Development Risks) Irva Hertz-Picciotto, Ph.D. opined, “Children deserve to be healthy and safe from exposure to toxic chemicals. We have compelling evidence from dozens of human studies that exposures of pregnant women to very low levels of organophosphate pesticides put children and fetuses at risk for developmental problems that may last a lifetime. . . . Current U.S. EPA policy is failing to protect children and fetuses here in the U.S. from these dangerous chemicals. By law, the EPA cannot ignore such clear findings: It’s time for a ban not just on chlorpyrifos, but all organophosphate pesticides.”

EPA’s decision in 2000 and subsequent action removed chlorpyrifos’ residential uses and retains all agricultural uses except tomatoes (allowable residues on apples and grapes were adjusted), golf course and public health mosquito spraying. The agency argued at the time of its decision that it had adequately mitigated risks through the removal of high exposure uses to children in the residential setting, but ignored the special risks to farmworker children’s exposure as well as the availability of alternative agricultural practices and products that made chlorpyrifos unnecessary and therefore its risks unreasonable. The decision at the time was hailed as a victory for the public because it eliminated high hazard exposures and showed that EPA could remove uses of a widely used chemical. Except, it did not do the job. The risk assessment process does not force a consideration of those who suffer disproportionate risk or groups of people (such as those with neurological diseases in this case who are disproportionately affected).

Beyond Pesticides welcomes the recommendations of this paper, and in particular, the enthusiasm of several of its authors for banning these compounds and transforming agricultural practices to less toxic, sustainable methods. Keep abreast of developments on the organophosphate issue, and pesticides generally, via Beyond Pesticides’ Daily News Blog, its journal Pesticides and You, its Safer Choice pages, and its coverage of the need for a transition to organic approaches for the sake of human and environmental health.

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

Source: https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1002671

(Beyond Pesticides, November 1, 2018) A new study offers fresh evidence that wild bumblebee pollinators are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of neonicotinoid (neonic) insecticides, finding that exposure to these compounds interferes with mating success and population stability. Researchers from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts, measuring real-world harms of neonicotinoids, indicate that the impacts they found to bumblebee “reproducers,” namely queen and drone (male) bees, does not bode well for the array of plant species that relies on them. Though advocates warn that destabilizing managed pollinators could threaten U.S. food production and exports, with food prices increasing as cost of bringing pollinators to farms increases, the study’s authors and advocates insist that the impacts of such widespread poisoning of wild bees could be felt well beyond agriculture.

Researchers in the lab compare behavioral and psychological responses of virgin queens, workers, and male Bombus impatiens from multiple colonies to field-realistic doses of the neonicotinoid clothianidin. While every bee was given a replenishing supply of pollen based on body weight and energy demands, four distinct concentrations of diluted analytical-grade (pure) clothianidin (including a control with no pesticide added) were mixed into a nectar-like solution and fed to the bumblebees orally for 5 days. Bees were housed in well-ventilated environmental chambers, with suitable temperature and humidity, and all tests were conducted in red light to minimize additional stress on bees. To ensure tests were field-realistic, researchers sent clothianidin solutions to USDA Agricultural Marketing Service’s National Science Laboratories Testing Division for verification.

After administering the toxicant and recording the bees’ behavior, researchers used gene-specific RNA analysis to test how clothianidin sensitivity and ability to detoxify differed based on sex and “caste” (colony role).

The amount of pesticide-laced sugar solution administered varied by body weight/size, with the queens’ unique role demanding they consume over twice as much solution per day as both workers and males. While field-realistic consumption of clothianidin reduced survival rates in all test bumblebee populations, worker bees showed higher tolerance to chronic oral clothianidin exposure than queens. However, though queens are known to show reduced fertility following neonic exposure, bumblebee males, revealing surprising vulnerability, showed reduced sperm production and 50% mortality at the lowest administered doses.

RNA testing results also revealed even low doses of clothianidin damaged 332 genes associated with major biological functions, including immune system response, learning and memory, locomotion, and reproduction.

Noting the significance of neonic toxicity to the life cycle of wild bees, the consequences of exposure are greatest during bumblebees’ mating and nesting phases. Neonics like clothianidin could be dramatically impacting bumblebee populations by lowering the number of reproducers in late summer and, consequently, the number of queens establishing new colonies the following spring. 

“[Neonicotinoids] pose a potential hazard to wild bumblebees at every stage of their annual life cycle” says Robert Gegear, PhD, coauthor of the study, in an interview with Mass Live. “All of these vulnerable points get missed when you focus on bees in an agricultural context.”

With the true trans-generational cost of chemically-dependent land management rarely brought into consideration, many decision makers attempting to regulate pesticides may remain unaware of the unintended consequences stemming from application of systemic toxins.

Federal regulation of neonics is far from effective and at odds with latest independent science. Even in 2018, scientists remain unable to test the total list of ingredients in formulated neonic products, the majority of ingredients remaining undisclosed by chemical manufacturers. Without regulators devoting equal attention to the additional harms of bee-toxic inert ingredients, even this study, using analytical-grade clothianidin, cannot offer a complete measure of neonic toxicity. For many city officials, protecting soil, surrounding ecology, and people will only be considered given persistent grassroots intervention. All the while, people continue applying pesticides in urban and rural areas understanding only a fraction of their full ecological cost.

“As [the] bumblebees and other native pollinators disappear,” says Dr. Gegear, “so too [would] our native flowering plants and the animals that use them for food, shelter, and nesting sites.” Dr. Gegear warns that for toxicity research on wild pollinators to be complete, scientists must note the potential for a destabilization of ecosystem services resulting from reproductive losses among critical wild pollinating species across the globe.

Native plants offer uniqueness to land regions and local watersheds. Without regionally-adapted bumblebees, biodiversity becomes limited, foodchains become destabilized, and ecological niches become vacant, allowing opportunistic “invasive” plant species to flourish. Protecting pollinators is about more than protecting agriculture. Any neighboring native plant or animal species surviving past our front doors is intrinsically reliant on the unsung service provided by pollinators like bumblebees. Their pollination habits enliven the ecosystems interspersed among modern cities and human civilizations throughout history. The areas at risk from a loss of biodiversity are the views we visit on vacations; the stream we sit beside to self-reflect, or catch fish.

Endangered species need protection to support biodiversity and life. Given research showing neonics kill-off bumblebee queens during the critical nest-building period, policy makers must be made aware and take action, or more interconnected species could be lost. With the EPA under the Trump administration heavily influenced by industry, help oppose legislation weakening the endangered species act from sneak attacks. Act locally to insist that your governor ban neonicotinoid insecticides.

Uncover what Dr. Gegear calls the “cascading negative effects that ripple throughout the ecosystem” by learning about trophic cascades and the countless ecological interconnections historically overlooked as part of our industrial growth economy.

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

Source: PLOS One

(Beyond Pesticides, October 31, 2018) Residents in the town of Great Barrington, MA are concerned about the health effects that could result from creosote-coated railroad ties stored in their neighborhood. According to a report in the Berkshire Eagle, soon after the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MDOT) parked a load of railroad ties along tracks that cut through a neighborhood, community members began to complain about the smell. Creosote is a mixture of thousands of different chemical compounds. Derived mainly from coal tar and regulated as a pesticide by the U.S. Environment Protection Agency (EPA), the material represents a significant hazard that puts people and the environment in danger, and can be readily replaced by safer, alternative materials.

“I would want to roll up my windows immediately,” Beth Rose told the Berkshire Eagle. Another Great Barrington resident, Jeanne Bachetti, told the paper, “I started to smell them right after they moved [them] in there. Sometimes we get a propane smell from [nearby] AmeriGas, so I couldn’t tell. Then it dawned on me — that’s not gas.”

MDOT is currently in the process of a project to upgrade roughly 40 miles of freight line, and is using 60,000 railroad ties as part of the construction. Many of these ties were parked in the Great Barrington neighborhood over the summer, across from Ms. Bachetti’s house. She indicated to the Berkshire Eagle that her mother, sick with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), now requires a second liter of oxygen after the rail load began wafting creosote vapors into the town.

The Berkshire Eagle interviewed Beyond Pesticides’ Community Resource and Policy Director Drew Toher, who indicated that the use creosote-coated ties was “unnecessary” given the availability of alternatives. In 2002, Beyond Pesticides joined with other health advocacy groups to petition EPA to suspend and cancel the use of creosote. As part of that petition (Table 1), groups created a lifecycle cost-comparison between wood ties and the use of recycled plastic composite ties, finding significant savings in favor of composite ties. With the economics on the side of alternatives, there is simply no reason to continue using these toxic ties and subjecting communities to hazardous chemicals off-gassing from creosote.

Creosote is considered a probable human carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the World Health Organization, and EPA, and is listed as a carcinogen by the European Union and under California’s prop 65.  The material has also been linked to organ damage, reproductive toxicity, and certain chemical compounds, such as benzopyrenes and phenols in creosote are considered endocrine (hormone) disruptors. Its use as railroad ties means there is an outsized risk of run-off from contaminated waterways, and fish in creosote-polluted water have displayed lesions and neoplasms after exposure.

The material was once used for a range of pesticidical properties. Up until the mid-1980s it was used as a right-of-way herbicide along roadways, sold to consumers as a garden weedkiller, employed as a fungicide on ropes, and its oil was used an insecticide to fog for mosquitoes. As a result of studies showing cancer and genetic mutations in lab animals, and higher rates of skin cancer for workers that handled the substance, EPA restricted use to only certified pesticide applicators. In its decision to allow the material to remain in production, the agency cited the economic benefits of its use as a wood preservative. However, that was before the improvements in alternative railroad ties, principally a composite material, made over the several decades since the material was first restricted. Composite ties, or if conditions warrant, steel or concrete ties, can effectively eliminate the need to both use and produce hazardous creosote.

The horrible smell described by Great Barrington residents represents a risk of health effects, as well as the failure of EPA regulators to adequately weigh the public health impact of this material. Similar to another wood preservative, pentachlorophenol, banned as a persistent organic pollutant by the Stockholm Conventions, EPA and U.S. regulators have failed to take appropriate action.

For more information about the hazards of wood preservative pesticides, see past Daily News articles, as well as Beyond Poison Poles, a recent update to Beyond Pesticides’ original 2000-era reports Poison Poles and Pole Pollution.

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

Source: Berkshire Eagle

(Beyond Pesticides, October 30, 2018) The conclusion of a recent population-based cohort study of 68,946 French adults brings promising, though perhaps predictable, news. Greater consumption of organic food — as opposed to food produced conventionally, with use of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers — is associated with a reduction in overall cancer risk, and reduced risk of specific cancers, namely, postmenopausal breast cancer and lymphomas. The NutriNet-Santé Prospective Cohort Study was published on October 22 in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine. It is important to remember that correlation is not causation; but the findings were strong enough that researchers concluded that more research is not only warranted, but also, could “identify which specific factors are responsible for potential protective effects of organic food consumption on cancer risk.”

The project tracked subjects — who were 78% female and 44.2 years old, on average — for 4.5 years. Those subjects reported the frequency of their consumption of 16 organic food products as “never, occasionally, or most of the time.” Those included: fruits, vegetables, soy-based products, dairy products, meat and fish, eggs, grains, legumes, breads, cereals, flour, vegetable oils, condiments, ready-to-eat meals, cookies, chocolate, sugar, marmalade, dietary supplements, and some beverages (coffee, teas, and wine). An organic food score was then computed and assigned to each subject.

Annual follow-ups screened for first-incident cancer diagnoses in the study’s subjects. Results showed that a higher “organic” score was positively correlated with overall decreased cancer risk, and lower risk of developing those specific cancers previously mentioned; no association was detected for other types of cancer. The study controlled for multiple confounding factors, including sociodemographics, lifestyle, and dietary patterns.

The researchers note that environmental risks for cancer include pesticide exposure, whether direct (for pesticide applicators and handlers, e.g.) or through the other primary vector, which is diet. They go on to say, “Epidemiological research investigating the link between organic food consumption and cancer risk is scarce, and, to the best of our knowledge, the present study is the first to evaluate frequency of organic food consumption associated with cancer risk using detailed information on exposure. . . . Among the environmental risk factors for cancer, there are concerns about exposure to different classes of pesticides. . . . The role of pesticides for the risk of cancer could not be doubted given the growing body of evidence linking cancer development to pesticide exposure. While dose responses of such molecules or possible cocktail effects are not well known, an increase in toxic effects has been suggested even at low concentrations of pesticide mixtures.”

The Los Angeles Times reports, “At least three [pesticides] — glyphosate, malathion and diazinon — probably cause cancer, and others may be carcinogenic as well, according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer.” Foods grown or produced organically are far less likely to harbor such pesticide residues (than is conventionally grown produce) because the National Organic Standards forbid use of virtually all synthetic pesticides, except the few that meet the standards of the Organic Foods Production Act. Unsurprisingly, people who consume a relatively “organic” diet have lower levels of pesticide residues in their urine. One of the key points made by the study authors is this: “If the findings are confirmed [by future research], promoting organic food consumption in the general population could be a promising preventive strategy against cancer.”

The health advantages of organic agricultural production for workers and consumers — compared with conventional agriculture, which uses toxic pesticides and synthetic, petrochemical inputs — are legion. There is a strong case that a switch to a generally organic diet confers not only some protection from development of any number of pesticide-induced diseases and other harmful impacts via, e.g., endocrine disruption and subsequent dysregulation and dysfunction, but also, other significant health benefits because it reduces the body burden of toxic chemicals.

One ready example is the evidence for pesticides’ impacts on sperm quality. The ongoing global drop in fertility is strongly associated with pesticide exposures. A 2015 study demonstrated that eating produce containing pesticide residues adversely affects men’s fertility, leading to fewer and poorer quality sperm — adding to a growing body of research showing impaired reproductive function. The results of that study also underscore the importance of an organic diet in reducing pesticide exposures. Interestingly, a fairly old Danish study (1994), published in The Lancet, showed “unexpectedly high sperm density in members of an association of organic farmers, who manufacture their products without use of pesticides or chemical fertilisers. This is of interest in the light of evidence that indicates a world-wide decrease trend of sperm density in the general population.”

The benefits of organic are perhaps most dramatic for children, whose pesticide exposures come largely through diet (unless they live on or near conventionally managed farms), although they may also be exposed via school or recreational properties. Children are particularly vulnerable to pesticide impacts because their brains, organs, and reproductive systems are still developing. One study showed near-immediate benefit when kids’ diets were switched to organic — their urine showed lowered-to-undetectable pesticide levels within hours of the switch. The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a report that said, “In terms of health advantages, organic diets have been convincingly demonstrated to expose consumers to fewer pesticides associated with human disease. Organic farming has been demonstrated to have less environmental impact than conventional approaches.”

Beyond Pesticides advocates choosing organic because of the health and environmental benefits to consumers, workers, and rural families. The Eating with a Conscience database, based on legal tolerances (or allowable residues on food commodities), provides a look at the toxic chemicals allowed in the production of the food we eat and the environmental and public health effects resulting from their use. See more on the benefits of organic agriculture, and an overview of organics.

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

Sources: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2707948 and http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-organic-food-cancer-20181022-story.html

(Beyond Pesticides, October 29, 2018) Protect the integrity of the organic standard setting process that determines whether a synthetic substance will be allowed in food labeled organic. Help stop an attack on the meaning of the organic label in the Farm Bill, which may be voted out of conference committee by the end of November. By changing the substance review process, a provision will open the floodgates to allowed synthetic chemicals in organic production, handling, and processing under the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA). OFPA incorporates values and principles that build and regenerate soil, protect pollinators and biodiversity, eliminate toxic pesticide use, and contains a default provision that strictly limits synthetic chemicals in certified organic products. This will all change with the Farm bill amendment.

Ask your U.S. Representative and Senators to tell Farm Bill conferees to reject Section 10104(e) National Organic Standards Board in the Senate Farm Bill (S.3042), a provision that will increase the use of synthetic substances in organic food production.

OFPA incorporates language that ensures that the process for allowing synthetic chemicals in organic production, handling, and processing is very rigorous. This meets a public expectation that food labeled organic is subject to a higher degree of scrutiny than food produced by chemical-intensive agriculture. This distinguishes food labeled under OFPA from food produced with pesticides registered under the pesticide law, the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA).

If synthetic materials are allowed in organic production, they, by law, are subject to a no adverse effects standard, a cradle-to-grave analysis, a determination of essentiality (necessity) of the material, and a sunset clause that subjects allowed synthetics to a rigorous reevaluation every five years. This time-limited sunset contains a default assumption that continued allowance of the synthetic substance will not be permitted unless the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) votes decisively to recommend its continued allowance to the Secretary of Agriculture.

OFPA implements a belief that organic growers will continue to adopt methods not dependent on outside inputs –that there would be continuous improvement. At the same time, the NOSB’s deliberations on the allowance of a synthetic substance is informed by new science as it emerges and is reviewed in Technical Review documents prepared for the NOSB. By design, this process contrasts dramatically with the allowance of pesticides under FIFRA, where once a decision is made to allow a chemical, it is extremely difficult or virtually impossible to reverse that decision without serious political or public pressure –typically as a result of a crisis or litigation. The continued allowance of a synthetic chemical under organic law is subject to the same rigorous review that was conducted when the substance was first permitted on the National List, which requires that two-thirds of the board must vote to list. As intended by Congress, this review process repeats at the end of a five-year cycle, when the board again must vote by two-thirds to relist the synthetic chemical, under current statutory language.

A Change in NOSB Process will Weaken Oversight of Synthetic Chemicals in Organic Production. This Senate Farm Bill provision brings uncertainty to the five-year sunset process and undermines a basic tenet of the law. Without this sunset provision, synthetic materials may remain on the National List and attempts to introduce alternative materials and find new creative management practices will be disincentivized.

The Senate provision [Section 10104(e) National Organic Standards Board] may seem like it does not do anything (changes in law always do something, whether intended or not): “Any vote on a motion proposing to amend the national list shall be considered to be a decisive vote that requires 2/3 of the votes cast at a meeting of the Board at which a quorum is present to prevail.” A likely interpretation of this provision is that any change to the National List is an amendment to the list (or amends the national list) requiring a 2/3 vote to make a change – whether taking the synthetic off or putting it on the National List. However, OFPA as written has been historically implemented with the default assumption that synthetic materials come off the list after five years unless the board votes decisively (2/3) to keep it on the list.

This NOSB process has worked for two decades to help grow the organic sector to a $53 billion industry with public trust in a rigorous review process. With the erosion of this basic tenet of the law under the Senate Bill provision, consumer trust in the USDA organic label is seriously threatened by an inability to remove synthetic materials shown to be hazardous or unnecessary.

Ask your U.S. Representative and Senators to tell Farm Bill conferees to reject Section 10104(e) National Organic Standards Board in the Senate Farm Bill (S.3042), a provision that will increase the use of synthetic substances in organic food production.