EPA Comments, Member and Stakeholder Work on Persistent Herbicides This Fall

USCC provided educational expertise to several regional events and urged US EPA to change its position to evaluate downstream impacts of persistent herbicides during the past month, keeping the focus on the effects of the pyridine class of herbicides (such as picloram, clopyralid and aminopyralid) since a number of incidents last spring.

The US EPA communication, which also indicated USCC’s eagerness to serve on a USEPA/USDA workgroup on persistent herbicides, also pointed out Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)’s position that downstream impacts of persistent herbicides does not fall under the provisions of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). "As documented in the comments received from home gardeners … and in the cases reported through our confidential reporting form, these herbicides are clearly having negative economic and social impacts,” USCC’s letter stated, which can be found here.

Associate Director Cary Oshins presented on the impacts of persistent herbicides on compost and the compost industry to the Texas Compost Summit in October, and to the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association in November. In addition, he and Dr. Fred Michel of Ohio State University, a national expert on persistent herbicides, held a USCC webinar on the topic on October 21. That webinar, free to members, can be found here, along with other USCC webinars.