The Failure of Laws and Regulations
Most people who are sickened or whose property is contaminated or made unus-
able by other people’s pesticide use have less protection and recourse under the law
than someone whose property is defaced with paint (with the exception of plaintiffs
in Louisiana, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Washington). In light of the illness, economic
loss, and ecosystem disruption associated with pesticide drift, major changes must be
made in the laws and regulations related to pesticide drift in order to protect public
health and the environment.
The fact of the matter is that spray drift is poorly regulated by current state and
federal laws and regulations. Post-application drift, which can occur for many days af-
ter an application, is barely regulated at all. It is not acknowledged by the EPA as a
source of exposure except for the case of fumigant pesticides and mosquito fogging
agents. Even then, protection measures to reduce exposures are in place only for a
single fumigant, Telone.
Inadequate enforcement compounds the problem, making it easy for pesticide
applicators to be careless with applications with little threat of punishment for viola-
tions. However, not all problems from drift are the result of illegal applications. Drift
that occurs when applications are conducted in accordance with the label law also
cause problems. Here is where changes in laws and regulations are most needed.
The EPA and other state agencies have the authority to regulate drift, with EPA
policies setting the regulatory floor for states. States are authorized to create more
stringent regulations if they wish. California has done so with respect to drift, and is
somewhat ahead of most other states in this regard. However, even in California, reg-
ulations have not been successful in preventing acute poisoning or long-term expo-
sures that exceed levels of concern. Thus, federal and state regulations covering
pesticide drift largely fail to protect human health and the environment.^21
Pesticides in Water
High-quality water is more than the dream of the conservationalists, more than
a political slogan: safe water, in the right quantity at the right place at the right
time, is essential to health, recreation, and economic growth.
—Edmund S. Muskie^22Background
Even though today’s chemically intensive agriculture is partly responsible for pro-
viding abundant low-cost supplies of food and fiber, it has also created water-quality
problems. When the chemical revolution first began there was little concern about
environmental consequences. Scientific testing indicated that DDT and other agricul-
tural chemicals were generally not harmful to humans if used as directed. By the
mid-1960s, however, there was a growing awareness that some agricultural chemicals
were damaging the environment, and possibly harming humans as well. Awareness
Pesticides in the Air, Water, and Soil | 199