A new EPA crop grouping proposed rule

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A new EPA crop grouping proposed rule

The EPA has amended several pesticide crop groupings that are open to public comment.

Ed Messina, director of EPA’s pesticide program, says his office works to ensure growers have the tools they need to address pest pressures making sure pesticides are approved in a responsible way.

“The crop grouping rule allows industry to submit studies and reduce the number of studies they need to submit because we group those commodities together.”

For example, Messina tells Brownfield Ag News, “If you’re eating quinoa, which many Americans are eating more of, we’ve incorporated that into the wheat group. So, rather than having to do individual tests on about 31 different commodities, the industry can submit a test that’s representative of all the things that are in that crop grouping.”

And, he says, that means less testing overall which can be a great benefit for specialty crop growers.

“If we’re grouping them with larger crops that are associated and similar to those crops we can get the studies and add those specialty crops to labels so growers have tools to address pest pressures  on those specific specialty crops.

The crop groups will now include certain minor or specialty crops, many of which have become more popular since the crop groups were first established.

Interview with Ed Messina ^

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