On July 1, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued in the Federal Register an interim final rule adjusting penalty amounts for Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) violations by more than three times the current level, in some cases. The rule also adjusts the level of statutory civil monetary penalty amounts for the other statutes that EPA administers. EPA issued this interim final rule pursuant to 2015 amendments to the...
July 11, 2016
Ninth Circuit Affirms EPA Order Denying Request for Uniform Buffer Zones to Mitigate Exposure of Children to Spray Drift
On July 5, 2016, a three judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a brief opinion denying a petition for review of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) order in which EPA declined to “immediately adopt interim prohibitions on the use of toxic drift-prone pesticides … near homes, schools, parks, and daycare centers or wherever children congregate.” Petitioners Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA), United Farm Workers, and Pineros...
On June 29, 2016, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (Court) issued an opinion dismissing the complaint and denying the motion for summary judgment of the Center for Environmental Health, Beyond Pesticides, and Physicians for Social Responsibility (CEH, et al.), and granting the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) motion for summary judgment. Background This case stems from a petition filed in 2006 requesting EPA to initiate a rulemaking to...
July 7, 2016
EPA Requests Six Month Extension of Deadline for Decision on Chlorpyrifos Tolerance Revocation
On June 29, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) submitted a status report in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals case concerning a petition by Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA) and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) to revoke the tolerances and cancel the registrations for chlorpyrifos. The Court of Appeals issued an order on December 10, 2015, requiring EPA to take final action concerning the PANNA and NRDC petition no later than December...
On October 30, 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it is requesting comments on a proposal to revoke all tolerances for the insecticide chlorpyrifos. EPA issued this proposal in response to an August 10, 2015, writ of mandamus by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The court granted this unusual relief in response to a 2007 administrative petition to cancel chlorpyrifos registrations or to revoke chlorpyrifos tolerances by the...
June 10, 2016
EPA Solicits Comments on Draft Guidance for Pesticide Registrants on Managing Pesticide Resistance
On June 7, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it was making two draft Pesticide Registration Notices (PR Notices) available for public comment: (1) PR Notice 2016-X: Draft Guidance for Pesticide Registrants on Pesticide Resistance Management Labeling; and (2) PR Notice 2016-XX: Draft Guidance for Herbicide Resistance Management Labeling, Education, Training, and Stewardship. In its news release, EPA states that it has started a...
On June 2, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) and Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) released harmonized product chemistry templates for use by registrants when submitting pesticide registration packages. These templates were developed by EPA and PMRA under the United States — Canada Regulatory Cooperation Council (RCC) workplan. EPA stated that the templates are based on the Organization for...
On May 10, 2016, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) issued guidelines on highly hazardous pesticides (HHP) (Guidelines) as part of the International Code of Conduct on Pesticide Management (Code of Conduct). HHPs are defined in the Guidelines as “pesticides that are acknowledged to present particularly high levels of acute or chronic hazards to health or environment according to internationally accepted...
On Wednesday, June 1, 2016, Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Susan L. Biro issued an Initial Decision in the matter of Bayer CropScience LP and Nichino America, Inc. (BCS/NAI), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Docket No. FIFRA-HQ-2016-0001. This decision was issued following BCS/NAI’s request for a hearing to contest EPA’s Notice of Intent to Cancel Pesticide Registrations (NOIC). BCS/NAI challenged EPA’s position that a conditional registration term in the relevant...
On May 11, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Compliance (OC) and Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) issued a memorandum to its regional Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) Division Directors and Branch Chiefs to establish a joint position of OC and OPP “for how regions should respond to requests for EPA-issued Certificates of Establishment (COEs) and Certificates of Origin (COOs).” OC and OPP state that the need for a joint...