Long-awaited EPA pesticide protections a 'mixed bag' for farmworkers
Long-awaited EPA pesticide protections a 'mixed bag' for farmworkers
By Ronnie Greeneemail
Ushering in what it called milestone changes to better protect the nations farmworkers from pesticides, the Environmental Protection Agency this week proposed a slate of updates to its agricultural Worker Protection Standard.
The enhanced protections come 22 years after the EPA last revised the rules intended to safeguard the nations 2 million farmworkers from pesticides perils. Among other steps, the new rules would increase the frequency of mandatory pesticide training from every five years to every year, and include no-entry buffer zones to shield workers from spray and fumes.
EPAs proposal aims to pull farm workers up toward the same level of protection from environmental and health hazards that other professions have had for decades, Gina McCarthy, the agencys administrator, wrote in a blog post titled: A Step Forward: Protecting Americas Farmworkers.
Farmworker advocates agree the proposal represents a step forward.
But the long-overdue update falls short of the more sweeping changes advocates envisioned. It fails, for instance, to require medical monitoring of applicators handling toxic chemicals; sets 16, not 18, as a minimum age for those handling pesticides; and eliminates a requirement that growers display in a central location information on pesticides being applied.
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http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/02/21/14287/long-awaited-epa-pesticide-protections-mixed-bag-farmworkers