Regulators Must Ban Pesticide or Tell Consumers it is Safe for Children, Says Court Order

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) needs to either tell consumers the use of chlorpyrifos on food is safe for children or ban use of the pesticide by farmers, concluded the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in an order to the agency Thursday.  

Several environmental and other advocacy groups, as well as New York and California, lodged a lawsuit against the EPA in 2019 in an attempt to force the regulator to take a stand on the safety of the pesticide. The plaintiffs claimed that, despite more than a decade of research, the EPA said it could not determine whether chlorpyrifos is safe to use on the food supply.  

Indeed, the conflict began even earlier, in 2007, when environmental groups petitioned the EPA to ban the pesticide because they said that the residue it left on food was not safe for humans.  

A decade later in 2017, the regulator denied their petition, but failed to respond to objections in time, prompting the lawsuit filed in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  

The Ninth Circuit appears to have sided with the petitioners, telling the EPA to take action.  

“Rather than ban the pesticide or reduce the tolerances to levels that the EPA can find are reasonably certain to cause no harm, the EPA has sought to evade, through one delaying tactic after another, its plain statutory duties,” said the majority’s opinion.  

The EPA has said that it has conducted extensive testing to try and assess the safety of the pesticide; however, the environmental groups and states who lodged the lawsuit say that the Ninth Circuit’s order requiring the EPA to act is a win for consumers.  

“Because of the Trump administration’s refusal to make a required safety finding on chlorpyrifos, parents in California and across the country were left to question whether everyday fruits and vegetables were poisoning their children,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta reportedly said in a statement. “I hope today’s critical victory allows them to rest a little easier.” 

Are you concerned about this pesticide or others used on food? Tell us your thoughts in the comment section below! 

The environmental and community petitioners are represented by Patti A. Goldman, Marisa C. Ordonia and Kristen L. Boyles of Earthjustice. 

The states are represented by their attorneys general. 

The Chlorpyrifos Pesticide Lawsuit is League of United Latin American Citizens et al. v. Andrew Wheeler et al., Case No. 19-71979 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. 

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