US EPA updates guide to help translate pesticide safety labels into Spanish

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing updates to the Spanish Translation Guide for Pesticide Labeling (Spanish Translation Guide), a resource for the translation of the required human health and safety sections on pesticide labeling from English to Spanish. The Spanish translations ensure that workers have access to important information to protect themselves and others from pesticide exposure, protect the environment, and get appropriate help if exposed to a pesticide product.

EPA initially developed the Spanish Translation Guide in 2019 in response to feedback from stakeholders who believe that having bilingual pesticide labeling is critical to the wellbeing of pesticide handlers, applicators, and farmworkers, many of whom do not speak English as a first language. The Pesticide Registration Improvement Act of 2022 (PRIA 5), enacted on Dec. 29, 2022, amended the Federal, Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) to require Spanish language translation for sections of the end use product labeling where translation examples are available in the Spanish Translation Guide. The Spanish Translation Guide is written in a universal form of Spanish to reach as many Spanish speakers as possible. It helps registrants maintain accurate, consistent translations on product labels and ease their burden when adding Spanish translations.

Drawing on stakeholder feedback, the 2024 version of the Spanish Translation Guide includes additional info on:

• Restricted use pesticides;

• Misuse statements;

• First aid and precautionary statement label language;

• Personal protective equipment (PPE) label statements;

• New sections on engineering controls, environmental hazards, and physical or chemical hazards; and

• Storage and pesticide container disposal instructions.

EPA generally allows pesticide registrants to translate their product labels into any language as long as there is an EPA-accepted English version of the label, and the translation is true and accurate. Registrants will need to translate all sections of the label contained in the Spanish Translation Guide beginning in 2025, as specified in PRIA 5. The guide includes several new sections required to be translated, such as environmental hazard statements. Registrants who have already translated the new sections into Spanish and verified that the translations are 'true and accurate' do not have to revise those sections of the label.

The revised Spanish Translation Guide is available for download from EPA’s website and in docket EPA-HQ-OPP-2024-0521 at www.regulations.gov. For more information on the PRIA 5 requirements and deadline to implement bilingual labeling visit EPA’s bilingual labeling page.