AG criticizes US EPA over pesticide approval

Attorney General slams EPA for skipping full risk assessment of Flonicamid; refusing to consider negative health, environmental data

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed comments today criticizing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for its inadequate risk assessment of the pesticide flonicamid despite evidence that the pesticide would cause significant harm to pollinators, such as bees.

Flonicamid, manufactured by the Japanese corporation ISK Biosciences (ISK), is currently undergoing regulatory review by the EPA. In its ecological risk assessment, the EPA utilized new studies to determine that flonicamid poses a higher risk to pollinators than previously understood.

However, the EPA failed to collect data from further follow-up studies, which the rules require, and now proposes to move to the next step of the registration process despite significant information gaps.

The Attorney General's letter asserts that the EPA's risk assessment must present a full picture of the pesticide's environmental impacts so that it can impose informed restrictions on the pesticide in order to mitigate its damaging effects.

"Agriculture not only feeds America, it drives both our state and national economies and it wouldn't be possible without pollination from bees," said Attorney General Becerra. "We need to understand the harmful impact of flonicamid on these crucial pollinators — and we need restrictions that mitigate its effects. We demand the EPA seek additional data before moving forward with the registration of flonicamid for an additional 15 years. We cannot ignore the environmental and economic costs of this decision."

Under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, all pesticides must receive regulatory approval from the EPA before they are put into use. The EPA reviews pesticide registration every 15 years to ensure the registration is based on current best information regarding the health and environmental impacts of a pesticide's use.

Many pesticides, including flonicamid, have come under increasing scrutiny in recent years for their adverse health and environmental effects. Flonicamid works by preventing insects from feeding, causing insects to die of starvation or dehydration. However new studies submitted by ISK show that flonicamid exposes bees to up to 51 times more than the amount needed to cause them 'substantial harm', putting the pollinators at significant risk.

The EPA requested that ISK submit a number of additional studies required under the EPA's Pollinator Risk Assessment Framework, including studies on flonicamid's effect on bee colonies. ISK has still to fulfill that request, yet despite new evidence of the pesticide's harmful impacts on pollinators and significant gaps in the data, the EPA proposes to continue with the registration.

Pollinators are critical to California and the nation's economy. Pollination by native bees increases the United States' agricultural output by more than $3 billion each year, and over a third of the country's vegetables and two-thirds of the country's fruits and nuts are grown in California. Studies show that crop yields increase substantially in areas with denser native bee populations. Yet studies also show that California's major agricultural regions, such as the Central Valley, have experienced some of the steepest declines in native bee populations of anywhere in the country.

In the comment letter, Attorney General Becerra urges the EPA to engage in more extensive study of flonicamid's impacts, and demands that the manufacturer, ISK, be required to submit the requested follow-up studies. Only then, the letter concludes, can the EPA adopt fully informed restrictions that both protect the community and properly mitigate the pesticide's harm to bees.

By Simon Tambling