Mr. Chairman and Members of the
Committee: I am Jay Vroom, President of CropLife America. We commend Chairman
Jeffords and the entire Committee on Environment and Public Works for providing
leadership on this complex issue. I appreciate; the opportunity to testify
before you this afternoon on the Persistent Organic Pollutants Implementation
Act of 2002 (S. 2118) and the Bush Administration's legislative proposal for
implementing the Stockholm Convention on POPs and the Long-Range Transboundary
Air Pollution (LRTAP) Protocol on POPs, as well as the Rotterdam Convention on
the Prior Informed Consent: Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and
Pesticides in International Trade (PIC).
CropLife America supports the
POPs and PIC international environmental agreements. The crop protection
industry acknowledges its role and responsibility in protecting human health
and the environment in the manufacture, distribution and use of pesticides. Our
member companies are committed to the spirit and letter of these agreements,
and we welcome the opportunity to make recommendations about their integration
into U.S. law. We also recognize the importance of including a process in the
legislation to address U.S. decision making on pesticides proposed for future
inclusion in the international POPs listing.
CropLife America is the national
trade association representing the developers, manufacturers, formulators and
distributors of plant science solutions for agriculture and pest: management in
the United States. Our member companies develop, produce, sell and distribute
virtually all the crop protection and biotechnology products used by American
farmers. Our mission is to foster the interests of the general public and
CropLife member companies by promoting innovation and the environmentally sound
discovery, manufacture, distribution and use of crop protection and production
technologies for safe, high quality, affordable, abundant food, fiber and other
crops.
It may seem obvious, but our
industry's products provide many benefits to people and the environment. Our
products have an enormous impact on the availability of abundant and affordable
food and fiber while also protecting people, animals, and our homes and
businesses from disease-carrying pests. Pesticides control outbreaks of
crop-damaging fungus, insect infestation and weeds to enhance U.S. food and
fiber production. Pesticides are also used to combat damaging and
health-threatening pests and insects. Pesticides control and eliminate vector
borne illness caused by rats, mosquitoes (West Nile virus and other
encephalitis) and ticks (lyme disease), among others. They combat cockroaches
and mold/mildew in housing, restrooms, cafeterias and elsewhere, reducing known
allergens causing asthma and other disease. Other insects and plant pests, such
as bees (which can cause anaphylactic reactions), poison ivy, fire ants and
spiders, are controlled effectively by pesticides. We are reinforcing the
benefits of our industry's products at every opportunity and recently held a
2-day conference to foster better understanding of the enormous benefits of
pesticides.
We believe the United States has
the strongest and most emulated pesticide regulatory system ire the world.
Congress saw the need for a separate statute regulating pesticides in order to
provide for extensive health and safety testing when it passed the Federal
Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) in 1947. Through subsequent
major revisions to FIFRA in 1972, 1975, 1978 and 1988, Congress has provided
for an increasingly comprehensive pesticide regulatory system as the basis for
EPA pesticide decisions.
Far example, under FIFRA's
strict provisions the process of bringing pesticides to market by securing an
EPA registration is complex and demanding, based on strong scientific
principles and undertaken according to stringent government review and
regulation. EPA requires up to 120 separate scientific safety tests to ensure
that a product, when used properly, does not present health or environmental
concerns. On average, only one in 20,000 chemicals makes it from the chemist's
laboratory to the farmer's field. Pesticide development, testing and EPA
approval takes 8 to 10 years and costs manufacturers $75 million to $100
million for each product.
Given Congress' specific and
recurrent decisions on pesticide law over the years, we believe FIFRA provides
the necessary statutory framework to implement the conventions without adding
pesticide provisions to the Toxic Substances Control Act.
CropLife America supports the sovereign right of
individual countries to decide which pesticides they will permit to be used
domestically and allow to be brought into their country. Importantly, the POPs
and PIC Conventions recognize this and include provisions providing for each
nation's right to implement the agreements within their domestic regulatory
framework. FIFRA, with its protective health and safety provisions, should be
the basis for U.S, pesticide decisions under implementing legislation for POPs
and PIC. Specifically, our industry urges that workable implementation
legislation recognize the existing risk-benefit standards of FIFRA. The United
States may become party to other international agreements, and POPs and PIC
implementing legislation may serve as a precedent for the future. Health and
environmental protections afforded by FIFRA's stringent scientific standards
and U.S. law should be upheld when implementing such agreements.
Our industry is concerned that under S. 2118 an
international POPs listing would constitute a domestic, FIFRA finding of
"unreasonable adverse effect on the environment."' This would trigger
U.S. cancellation of a product without full risk assessment, benefits
consideration or due process currently provided under FIFRA.
EPA must play an active role in upholding the integrity of
the listing criteria and procedures in the POPs and PIC international
agreements. We urge that implementing legislation not enable other countries to
use these agreements to adversely impact the, availability of U.S. registered
pesticide: that meet FIFRA standard's used for agriculture, public health
protection and other purposes. The agreements should not become vehicles to
impose artificial barriers to trade, impose a competitive disadvantage on U.S. growers
or adversely impact public health. 1Ne strongly support FIFRA as the basis for
pesticide decisions by the U.S. government since it provides rigorous
protection for human health and the environment.
LRTAP POPs Protocol and Stockholm POPs Convention
CropLife America actively supported the inter-governmental
negotiations that led to the U.S. signing of both the Convention on Long-Range
Transboundary Air Pollution on Persistent Organic Pollutants and Stockholm POPs
Convention.
Our support of both agreements is based on established
policies and procedures in the POPs agreements for:
1. Identifying new POPs chemicals
within a transparent, science-based, risk/benefit assessment process. Final
determination of the POPs status for a pesticide is based on a consideration of
socio-economic benefits and risks.
2. Recognizing the sovereignty of each nation
to undertake mitigation requirements for POPs or to "opt-in" or
"opt-out" of the international POPs listing based on their domestic
risk management conclusions.
3. Contemplating the process for developing
national regulatory programs for countries that do not have a regulatory
framework in place, while recognizing the sovereignty of existing regulatory
programs.
Our industry believes that if a
pesticide use is contemplated for international POPS listing, then any
alternatives -- if they exist -- synthetic pesticide or otherwise, should be
subject to the same risk-benefit analysis and process to ensure that
appropriate alternatives exist.
We agree with the findings of
the Conventions regarding POPs pesticides, and recognize that beneficial uses
still exist, for example in developing countries, as reflected in the specific
exemptions in annexes of both agreements.
Companies represented by
CropLife International, our industry's global association, have been working
with the United Nations. Food and Agriculture Organization on the safe
collection and disposal of obsolete crop protection product stocks in Africa,
Asia and Latin America. Through partnering and cost-share arrangements with
donor agencies, governments and other stakeholders, this effort hats resulted
in the disposal of over 3,000 tons of obsolete pesticide stocks, including 800
tons of POPs pesticides. In 2000 alone, 1200 tons of obsolete pesticides were
incinerated in Brazil and approximately 180 tons were successfully retrieved
from Gambia, Madagascar, Pakistan and Uganda. Our commitment and work on such
disposal projects will continue.
CropLife
America supports the Rotterdam Convention on Prior Informed Consent. The PIC
Convention is first and foremost an information exchange mechanism to assist
decision-making in developing countries. It makes an important contribution to
developing countries' ability to make informed judgments in their national
interest. Furthermore, PIC affirms the right of each government to make
regulatory decisions that take into account the benefits of product use to
agriculture and the public good. We are pleased with the balanced distribution
of obligations between importing and Exporting countries. The obligations in
PIC are consistent with our industry's product stewardship efforts to ensure
the safe use of our products.
Our
industry has actively supported the voluntary PIC procedure first established
in the late 1980's as part of the FAO Code of Conduct, and we participated as a
non-governmental organization in the intergovernmental negotiations that led to
the current Convention. We look forward to continuing this tradition of cooperation.
We do have several recommendations regarding proposed implementing legislation:
1.
In order to provide broad input into EPA decision-making,
we urge the inclusion of legislative language that directs the Administration to
consult with stakeholders and solicit broad stakeholder input. We recommend
notice and comment rulemaking as well as an ongoing consultative process.
2.
There is no formal mechanism to challenge EPA judgments
in applying PIC definitions and criteria to products for which the agency has
issued a final regulatory action. We believe any implementation of PIC by the
United States should include such a provision, governed under the auspices of
FIFRA and the Administrative Procedures Act.
3.
Voluntary removal for purely commercial reasons should
not by itself constitute a safety risk or reason for PIC listing. For Example,
the U.S. market for a particular pesticide may be too small or even
non-existent to justify registering the pesticide with EPA. We urge that this
provision be explicitly noted in implementation legislation.
Overall Recommendations for
POPs and PIC Implementing Legislation
Our industry looks
forward to the opportunity to fully support implementing legislation to
accompany the POPs and P1C agreements. We are committed to work with thin
Committee to ensure that these agreements are fully implemented, without
unintended consequences, and offer the following recommendations:
We fully support enactment of
POPs implementing legislation (S. 2118) consistent: with POPs and PIC
international agreements. In our analysis, the proposed POPS legislation could
result in U.S.-registered pesticides being removed from domestic use, which is
not consistent with our understanding of what is called for in the Conventions.
We would welcome the opportunity to work with the Committee on clarification.
Safety Standards
We believe that if a pesticide does not meet FIFRA standards and is not eligible for EPA registration, then the U.S. should be authorized to support its inclusion on the international POPs and PIC lists. Health and environmental protections under FIFRA warrant that pesticides meeting FIFRA safety standards for registration in the U.S. should be ineligible for U.S. support for inclusion on the international POPs or PIC list.
We
support EPA as the pre-eminent pesticide regulatory agency that recognizes the
risks of pesticides and the beneficial role pesticides play in protecting human
health and the environment and providing for a safe and abundant food supply.
U.S. decisions on POPS and PIC; pesticides should be based on EPA expertise and
regulatory responsibility, with input from other federal agencies as
appropriate.
Summary
Our industry is committed to the
improvement and building of regulatory capacity, especially in the developing
world. We have been active participants in the DECD and NAFTA international
forums to harmonize pesticide registration processes for the past 10 years.
Most recently our efforts have been focused on harmonization of U.S. and
Canadian pesticide regulation.
This hearing is the first to
consider a very complex matter. We have been evaluating both legislative
proposals and welcome the opportunity to participate in continuing deliberations.
We support strong and workable implementing legislation for the Conventions. We
understand that PIC legislation will be added and look forward to working with
the Committee in this effort.
The crop protection industry is
committed to a transparent, science-based process for implementing the
Conventions and we believe that current statutory framework under FIFRA is
ample, with appropriate adjustments, to successfully implement U.S. industry's
obligations.
Thank
you again for the opportunity to share our views with the Committee. We look forward to working with the Chairman
and other Senators to ensure that POPs and PIIC are properly implemented to
meet the global human health and environmental goals set forth in the three
international agreements.