Farmers Speak Out at the EPA: Atrazine is Safe, Effective, and Critical to Our Bottom Line

WASHINGTON (April 28, 2010) -- Farm groups traveled to Washington, D.C., on Tuesday to voice support for atrazine before the third in a series of hearings being held by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to re-review the critically-effective herbicide.


Among those testifying were Jere White, Chairman of the Triazine Network and director of the Kansas Corn Growers Association and Kansas Grain Sorghum Producers Association; Laura Knoth, the executive director of the Kentucky Corn Growers Association; and Richard Fawcett, of Fawcett Consulting, who shared his expertise in weed science and critical yield gains atrazine provides farmers.


Noting that atrazine has been more extensively studied than any other crop protection product and has continually been awarded a clean bill of health, Jere White commented that growers often ask him, “When is enough enough?”


It was only in 2006, after all, after an extensive 12-year review, that EPA concluded that the triazine herbicides, including atrazine, pose “no harm” to the general population, including women and infants. It wasn’t until “the New York Times and Huffington Post supplied their version of ‘peer review’ of an NRDC report to certain political appointees at EPA,” said White, that EPA hastily convened this un-necessary re-review.


White questioned whether this extraordinary break with standard EPA procedures violates FIFRA standards, and highlighted the enormous burden of material the independent scientists have been asked to digest in a relatively short period of time due to the compressed schedule. As White noted, “…though the average number of studies submitted for SAP review per session number around 15, EPA has generously provided you with 123.”

Given that scientific bodies around the world have determined that atrazine is safe to use, and extensive monitoring shows that levels in raw and finished water are steadily declining, White questioned the need for this EPA’s “politically driven second guessing.” He ended by expressing the hope that the high standards of scientific objectivity that enabled the EPA to register atrazine as safe in the past would continue to prevail at the agency.


Laura Knoth outlined the profoundly beneficial effects of atrazine to the environment, especially as a result of no-till and low-till agriculture. By 2008, Knoth noted, “atrazine was applied to 60 percent of conservation tillage and no-till corn acres.” Without such effective weed control, the result would be a massive increase in erosion, “estimated to be more than 300 billion pounds annually.” Sediment has been identified by both the USDA and by individual states as the leading source of water pollution in our nation today.


Atrazine-enabled no-till agriculture also reduces the use (and expense) of fossil fuels to power tractors for field cultivation and keeps crucial nutrients in the soil.


On top of the extraordinary environmental benefits, Richard Fawcett emphasized the critical importance of atrazine to farmers’ bottom line. Analysis of data from two different decades starting in the 80s and in the 90s, showed a very similar – and impressive – boost in yields in both eras. Average yield gains with atrazine from 1986 to 2005 in university field trials were 5.7 bushels per acre compared to alternative herbicides.


EPA itself has estimated that farming without atrazine would cost corn growers $28 an acre in reduced yields and higher costs for less effective substitutes.
The voice of the farm community was clear: atrazine is safe, it’s effective, it’s essential to the environment, and it’s critical to our bottom line. Sound science, sound economics, and sound environmental stewardship would all tell the EPA one thing – leave atrazine alone, so American farmers can get on with the business of feeding the world.

Let's hope atrazine lawsuits go away faster than asbestos

4/18/2010 10:37 AM By Ed Murnane -Illinois Civil Justice League

While the Madison County asbestos meter continues to spin like some kind of hyper-active Las Vegas slot machine, there is a chance another one of the trial lawyer "get richer quicker" schemes from the "A" file may be handed a "get out of our court" card, which is similar to a "get out of jail free" card from Monopoly but much more significant.

Last Wednesday, Madison County Judge Barbara Crowder was scheduled to hear motions to dismiss several lawsuits against manufacturers and a retailer of atrazine, the second most important herbicide in Illinois.

Illinois, if you have forgotten, is a state that depends heavily on corn and other crop production for its economic vitality. Look out the car window in a few weeks and you'll start to see the miracle of Illinois crops breaking ground. Given the current state of the economy, it's a shame crops can't grow year-round, and in highway medians too. And maybe in the chambers of the Illinois General Assembly.

There are several aspects of major significance to the proceedings in Madison County.

First, it will be among the early major rulings by Judge Crowder who is taking over the docket of retiring Judge Daniel Stack. Stack has handled the massive asbestos docket in Madison County and while popular, respected and likeable, the number of asbestos cases filed in Madison County continues to grow and a sign that atrazine cases are being encouraged to follow along the "welcome" path would not be positive.

Second, the ruling could serve as another sign that the good old boys club continues to thrive in Madison County. While not based in Madison County, plaintiff's attorney Stephen Tillery of St. Louis is one of many Southwestern Illinois/Eastern Missouri lawyers who has struck it rich in Madison County and who is a major player in the atrazine litigation.

Six suits against atrazine manufacturers and a retailer, Illinois-based Growmark, were filed five years ago in Madison County, recognized nationally as one of America's "judicial hellholes," primarily because it welcomes out-of-state plaintiffs' attorneys seeking cash bonanzas.

Last month, the same lawyers hedged their bets, filing a federal class action suit for 17 plaintiffs from six Midwestern states in the Southern District of Illinois. The plaintiffs in both suits are local water boards.

Among the lawyers are Baron and Budd - billionaire attorneys from Texas - and Tillery, their local representative.

The trial lawyers are likely to say the lawsuits aim at far-off companies unjustly enriched in Illinois. The truth is their immediate victims will be Illinois corn growers.

Atrazine is no ordinary herbicide. EPA says it brings $28 of value to every acre, in 2003 dollars. By that estimate, it is worth more than $200 million per year to Illinois corn growers and its annual national value is no less than $2 billion, again in 2003 dollars.

Losing that much would hurt all corn growers; it could devastate those who are struggling. In these tough times, it could put them out of business and their families out of their homes.

The lawsuits say runoff makes drinking water unsafe. But atrazine, the most studied agricultural input in history, is found to be safe around the world, in Britain, Canada, Australia, by the World Health Organization and our own U.S. Department of Agriculture and Environmental Protection Agency.

It has been approved for use in the United States for over 50 years. Currently used in 60 countries, it has never been banned due to health concerns. The EPA, in 2006, after a 12-year review that included more than 6000 scientific studies, found atrazine poses no harm to infants or the general population when used as directed.

Trace amounts found in a few handfuls of water systems are so tiny - literally measured in parts per billion - and EPA safety margins are so large, that an average adult could drink thousands of gallons every day for 70 years and still not reach an exposure level at which any health effects have been detected.

In other words, there is no safety issue.

So, why are they suing? Why do many - most? - plaintiff attorneys sue? Why are dozens of asbestos suits filed in Madison County each month?

Public documents show one of the plaintiffs plans a new $4.5 million filtration system. It is no coincidence that the suits demand new, high-end, state-of-the-art filtering systems.

And of course the plaintiffs' attorneys will receive cash for their clients if they win. Big piles of cash. Silos full of cash.

Farming -- and corn growing especially -- is basic to Illinois. Cash-strapped water districts seeking new sources of funding is not a surprise, but neither are out-of-state attorneys trying to cash in.

But we need to remember that their bonanzas are not free to our farmers - or to us.

If atrazine's value is wiped out, jobs will be lost and Illinois farmers will produce less corn. That means less revenue, and that will hurt the economies of our rural communities and ultimately our state economy that already faces so many challenges.

Read the rest of this article on atrazine lawsuits here.

EPA’s Ag Plate Fills -From Atrazine to Nutrient Runoff, Agency Has Ag Issues in Sights

Source: Greg D. Horstmeier DTN Production Editor

COLUMBIA, Mo. (DTN) — Agriculture is becoming a common subject in the halls of the Environmental Protection Agency.

EPA rulings could cast a long shadow over agriculture in the coming year. The agency has a number of regulation reviews and other activities that could affect farming, and some ag leaders are becoming concerned about what they deem an “activist-led agency.”

“We have a whole new administration that’s built on activism,” said Rick Tolman, chief executive officer of the National Corn Growers Association. “So there is a component of the Obama constituent base that feels more empowered, so there’s more opportunity for those voices to be heard than in the past. Whether that’s right or wrong, you can decide. It’s just a reality.”

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, speaking before the National Press Club recently, noted that the agency’s more aggressive stance was partially based on the fact that chemical safety laws in the U.S. “are 30 years old, and the fact that (those laws) are widely perceived as being toothless, I think we owe it to the American people to answer their concerns and pleas for help.”

Here’s a look at some of the subjects EPA is looking at this year that could have an impact on how you farm.

ATRAZINE

The popular corn herbicide is going through agency review for human and environmental impacts. EPA spokespersons say this new review, falling on the heels of a 2006 review that essentially gave the herbicide a clean bill of health, was already being planned, then was stepped up to be part of the discussion of how EPA uses epidemiological and other human health studies to evaluate pesticide safety. Pesticide supporters have called foul, intimating that current EPA leadership is forcing agency employees to look at specific health and environmental studies that never got a glance before, due to questionable science.

New rules, if any, on atrazine use should be finalized by the end of 2010.

In the meantime, water districts from 16 states have joined a federal lawsuit against atrazine manufacturers, asking for compensation for water filtration systems needed to remove atrazine from drinking water.

PESTICIDE APPLICATION PERMITS

Known inside Washington Beltway ag circles as the “Sixth Circuit Court decision,” the issue is based on Clean Water Act regulations that state an entity that could be a “point source” of pesticides or other pollutants that have the potential to run off into water must have a permit for “discharging.” In the past, EPA has said agricultural pesticide applicators, when abiding by pesticide labels, don’t fall under discharge rules, and don’t need a permit. The Sixth Circuit Court disagreed, saying its reading of the Clean Water Act makes any pesticide discharge, whether from an industrial waste pipe or a sprayer nozzle, a potential point “source.”

EPA Administrator Jackson, asked a question on the subject at her National Press Club speech, said creating a proper permitting scheme “is a huge undertaking.” Essentially, every farmer or commercial applicator applying pesticides that have any chance of running off into waterways will have to be permitted. She promised that permits will “be done in a way that I think shows we’re building on programs that are already out there as we comply with the court ruling.” Several state regulators said they likely would handle such permits in a “class” format, in which the state creates one broad permit, and applicators could make a simple application to fall within that permit. Permit rules are expected mid-year.

INERT INGREDIENTS

The agency has proposed that pesticide manufacturers reveal the contents of so-called “inert” ingredients on the product label. Inerts typically include surfactants and other chemicals that can enhance the pesticide’s activity or make it easier to mix and apply.

DRIFT REGULATIONS

EPA presented a draft of new pesticide drift regulations late in 2009. Comments on those rules drew fire from state regulators and farm groups alike, as the draft said applicators would be violating regulations any time drift occurred with a pesticide that “could cause” damage to property, wildlife or humans. Critics said it is impossible to achieve zero drift during a season, and also said the phrasing “could cause” was too open-ended and superseded current pesticide law. EPA is reviewing comments on the draft rules.

INDIRECT LAND USE CHANGE

EPA is expected to release a proposed rule that could include an indirect land use change penalty for biofuels. The penalty is based on the theory that growth in biofuels will spread land use change around the world away from native vegetation and toward biofuel crops. “It’s a flawed piece of policy that has tremendous negative implications for farmers right now,” Tolman said.

NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT

There is concern among many farm groups that the failure of voluntary nutrient management plans to clean up the Chesapeake Bay will create mandatory maximum runoff and nitrogen and phosphorus loading levels. Such maximums could then become the template for controlling nutrient runoff for the rest of the country. Last month, the Chicago-based Environmental Law & Policy Center, part of the Mississippi River Collaborative, called for more consistency in state fertilizer application regulations, increased crop set-backs from waterways, mandatory fencing to keep livestock out of streams, and more teeth in clean water regulations for agriculture.

Read the rest of this article here.

No Award for Ivory’s Inaccurate Atrazine Story

The Huffington Post Investigative Fund’s Danielle Ivory was a finalist for the Investigative Reporters and Editors investigative journalism award for an article she wrote on atrazine. Maybe she didn’t win because her story was inaccurate.

Sure, I crossed over to the “dark side” leaving newspaper journalism for public relations, but I still remember my news roots. Those roots go back to ink-scented offices at my college newspaper, then at the historic Emporia Gazette in Emporia, Kan.  The pay wasn’t great, but I gained a fortune in news smarts from some amazing (and often grumpy) editors.  A lazily written story was always challenged with red ink. Notes to the side like “attribution?”, “source?” or “prove it!” were common even in the simplest of stories. Opinion was to be left on page four, and you had better interview sources from each side of a story. Lots of red pens must be sitting unused in today’s newsrooms.

An example is Danielle Ivory’s almost award-winning reporting on atrazine. While I took issue with many parts of the story, let’s simply look at the lead: “One of the nation's most widely-used herbicides has been found to exceed federal safety limits in drinking water in four states, but water customers have not been told and the Environmental Protection Agency has not published the results.”

The lead is a little long and, but it does portray the breathlessness with which the writer is reporting the story. Breathlessness aside, let’s look at the facts in the lead. Ivory states the herbicide has exceeded federal safety limits. This is incorrect. The federal safety limit for atrazine is three parts per billion based on an annual average. This is specified in the Safe Drinking Water Act’s standards for atrazine.  While test results showed atrazine levels well above 3 parts per billion in some cases, those were found in individual weekly tests that were part of a program designed to take a closer look at atrazine levels in certain areas. The EPA drinking water limits are based on an “annual average” and not individual readings. If the writer was not aware of this, her editors should have been. The atrazine levels in water in these areas fall well within the EPA’s drinking water standards. In fact, there have been no violations of the drinking water standards anywhere in the U.S. since 2005.

According to EPA:  “Under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), the atrazine Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) is intended to prevent longer-term, or chronic, health concerns from occurring even after years of exposure and is calculated against a running average from four quarterly samples. An occasional peak concentration above 3 ppb is, therefore, not cause for concern. Rather, a long-term, consistent value above a yearly average of 3 ppb would be of concern. The MCL is designed to protect all population subgroups.”

An editor once told me, if the lead is wrong, the entire story lacks credibility. He also told me that I couldn’t slant a story based on my personal agenda. Maybe these rules no longer stand.
The Huffington Post congratulated Ivory on being chosen a finalist for the IRE investigative journalism award, claiming that the story played a part in mobilizing Senator Barbara Boxer into pressuring EPA to open yet another evaluation of atrazine, and led  to a class action suit against the makers of atrazine.

I congratulate the IRE for not giving Danielle Ivory an award for her investigative article. I like to think an old editor who serves on the IRE board marked her copy with red ink.

Sue Schulte, Director of Communications

Kansas Corn Growers Association

Kansas Grain Sorghum Producers Association

Stenholm, NRDC Spar on Atrazine

Former Representative Charles Stenholm published an opinion piece in The Hill on March 23, questioning the administration's handling of energy and agriculture issues, including atrazine. NRDC responded, and spurred a response from Rep. Stenholm. See the exchange below:


Obama's energy and ag policies not selling in rural America 
By Former Rep. Charles Stenholm (D-TX) - 03/23/10 
It is convenient for some to see the results of the 2006 and 2008 elections as a mandate for the enactment of a more extreme progressive agenda.  In actuality, many of the Democratic victories in those elections were won in moderate, rural communities – places where traditional liberal policies are not popular.  

Recent polls show that only 23% of American voters consider themselves “liberal,” and I am confident this percentage is much lower in rural America.  The same polls tell us that some 77% consider themselves either “moderate” or “conservative.”  The fact is, all members are going to be facing a tough election cycle this year – and it will be made even tougher because the policies pursued by many of them have lost the approval of most moderate voters.  

This has certainly been the case with the government’s energy and agriculture policies. They may be red meat to the liberal base but they are crippling rural America and commercial agriculture.

Cap-and-trade legislation is perhaps the most publicized example of an extreme policy attack on the agriculture industry. Commercial agriculture relies heavily on energy prices, and this legislation threatened to inflate these prices across the board. When Congress dropped cap-and-trade due to lack of popular support, the EPA stepped into the breach and announced that it would begin regulating greenhouse gasses as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. This is such a radical case of bureaucratic overreach that Congress is now telling EPA that it has stepped outside its legal authority.  Why did EPA attempt to do what they did?  To please a more extreme non-scientific viewpoint.

This same bureaucratic overreach has abandoned science to unnecessarily pursue new regulations on atrazine. Atrazine is an invaluable herbicide that has been in common use in commercial agriculture since 1959. It is estimated that atrazine saves corn farmers $28 per acre in input costs and yield advantages – the difference between staying in business and going bankrupt for thousands of farms across the country.

There are more than 6,000 studies on file supporting atrazine's safety and effectiveness, as well as international reviews by the World Health Organization, Australia, Canada, France, and the United Kingdom. The EPA recently completed a comprehensive study in 2006 and concluded that atrazine poses no risk to humans.  The review also showed that atrazine levels in water are well within the extraordinarily wide margins of safety set by the EPA.

Responding to pressure from the National Resource Defense Council, however, the agency announced last October that it would convene four new Scientific Advisory Panels (SAP) to re-investigate the herbicide.  At the SAP kick-off meeting in November, the scientific chairman remarked that the proceedings were “out of the ordinary.” I agree. And I would add that if farmers across the Midwest see their livelihoods threatened by activist regulation in the EPA, and Congress does nothing to stop it, voters in rural areas won’t be treating candidates too kindly in the coming election.

The same thing is happening on the West Coast, where policies enacted to please the extreme left in California have put the value of a fly and a smelt over the livelihoods of its own citizens and the billions of dollars generated by its agriculture sector. A similarly mis-guided policy was the closure of all USDA-regulated horse processing plants in 2007, which wrecked the market for horses and increased the number of unwanted horses to unsustainable levels. Some estimates put the number of potentially lost jobs in the next few years at 500,000. Congress could help stop the bleeding by reinstating funding for the USDA inspectors of horse processing plants.  Instead, members have proposed new legislation in H.R.503/S.727 that will further destroy the market for horses and jobs in the horse industry.  

I commend the Obama Administration and Congress for beginning to focus on creating jobs and ways to put Americans back to work.  Unfortunately the government’s current policies are job losers in rural America, pure and simple – not just for farmers, but everyone who either sells to them or buys from them. That’s pretty much everyone in America. Unless the Administration and Congress change course soon their electoral prospects may be derailed.

Former Rep. Charles Stenholm (D-Tex.) served 13 terms in the U.S. House of Representatives and was the Ranking Member of the House Committee on Agriculture.  He is a Co-Founder of the Congressional Blue Dog Coalition



On March 25, NRDC's Jennifer Sass Responded...
EPA foe Stenholm lobbies for maker of toxic chemical
By Jennifer Sass, Ph.D., senior scientist, Natural Resources Defense Council - 03/25/10
In a March 23 letter to The Hill, former Rep. Charles Stenholm (D-Texas) asserts that the weed killer atrazine is “an invaluable herbicide.” He goes on to accuse the Environmental Protection Agency of “bureaucratic overreach” because the EPA is fulfilling its statutory obligation to assess the health risks of this toxic chemical.

What the former congressman doesn’t mention is that the $11 billion Swiss company Syngenta — which sells atrazine to American farmers — paid Stenholm’s Washington law firm, Olsson Frank Weeda, $190,000 in lobbying fees last year alone, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Stenholm’s letter to The Hill, moreover, comes fresh on the heels of Syngenta’s latest press release, March 2, hailing atrazine as “safe to use.” Stenholm’s letter is largely a condensation of Syngenta’s own PR material.

Atrazine, in fact, is a known endocrine disruptor. It has been tied to poor sperm quality in humans, birth defects in humans and lab animals, and even sex change in lab frogs. An estimated 33 million Americans drink atrazine in their water, according to The New York Times.

This chemical can’t even be used in Syngenta’s backyard; the European Union has banned it. Instead, the company pays lobbyists like Stenholm to protect its use here in our country.

The NRDC has no financial interest in atrazine but has litigated on the EPA review process and has publicly advocated for phasing out atrazine use.

The EPA has an obligation to protect the American people from this hazardous chemical. And The Hill has a responsibility to inform its readers when we are being exposed to corporate propaganda of a Swiss chemical company. 

Rep. Stenholm's Response:

Bad science means bad regulations for farmers

From former Rep. Charles Stenholm (D-Texas)

Jennifer Sass of the activist environmental group Natural Resources Defense Council has a history of getting her facts wrong, but her letter of March 26 (“EPA foe Stenholm lobbies for maker of toxic chemical,” in response to op-ed) contained a real whopper. Sass’s protest that the NRDC “has no financial stake” in its decades-long opposition to atrazine and other essential agricultural technology is laughable.

Sass likes to accuse everyone else of having ulterior financial interests, so let’s take a look at her own. The NRDC isn’t some struggling nonprofit. According to its 2007 tax return, NRDC revenues topped $100 million and it has net assets almost twice that amount. It raises that money by scaring the wits out of people with false claims, like the one’s she repeated in her letter about atrazine.

The most infamous example of that was the Alar scare, now known to be a black mark on the radical environmentalists, who drove apple farmers out of business on no scientific foundation whatsoever.

To promote that scare, NRDC hired leftwing PR strategist David Fenton, who later boasted, “We designed [the Alar campaign] so that revenue would flow back to the Natural Resources Defense Council from the public, and we sold this book about pesticides through a 900 number and the ‘Donahue’ show. And to date there has been $700,000 in net revenue from it.”

The fact is NRDC’s radical environmentalist agenda includes a fundamental hostility to America’s corn economy. During a recent EPA hearing, Sass herself, out of the blue, shockingly questioned “whether or not we need such overproduction of corn in this country … that’s for EPA to consider.” How revealing.

The purpose of writing my March 23 letter (“Obama’s energy and ag policies not selling in rural America”) was not aimed solely at the Obama administration, but also at Congress. When organizations like the NRDC succeed in their extremist agenda, they hurt our economy.

Just a few of the NRDC’s economy-killers include another slowdown of drilling for oil and gas on public lands, attempting to impose a cost on American business by regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, passing a cap-and-trade bill, putting a fly and a smelt ahead of food producers in California, and forcing a 50 percent downsizing of the horse industry. Our voices must be raised in opposition and sorted out by the political process.

The truth is the world’s population cannot be fed without the use of technology. The population is going to increase 50 percent by 2050. NRDC has every right to its anti-technology opinion. It can continue to cause wasteful taxpayer spending by studying and restudying every issue with the sole purpose of expensive delay and raising more money for their bloated treasuries.

But it’s exactly these types of outrageous attacks that I’ve confronted head-on as a family farmer, in my 26 years as a member of congress, to today in my current role as senior policy adviser with Olsson Frank Weeda.

All 300 million Americans need to know if the activists succeed, there will be a tremendous price paid by our grandchildren.

Federal Lawsuit Filed Over Atrazine

On March 8, 2010, St. Louis trial lawyer Stephen Tillery and his Dallas-based partner, the Baron & Budd law firm, filed a lawsuit in the Southern District of Illinois on behalf of 17 cities in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Ohio, and Missouri, asking Syngenta to pay for water filtration in their communities.

Plaintiffs in the case are water systems in Coulterville, Evansville, Farina, and Gillespie, and Greenville, Illinois; Creston, Iowa; Jasper, Indiana; Carbondale, Dodge City, Marion, Miami County, Oswego, and Plains, Kansas; Cameron and Concordia, Missouri; and Monroeville and Upper Sandusky, Ohio.

These systems are in compliance with drinking water standards. It is not about atrazine. It is about greedy lawyers duping the systems into thinking they will get something for nothing.

It should be noted that a similar federal lawsuit was dismissed in 1999 when the judge ruled that removing safe and approved levels of atrazine from drinking water was unnecessary.

Atrazine Is Safe

Atrazine is an herbicide farmers have safely used for more than 50 years. EPA has more than 6,000 atrazine studies in its files. It was after an exhaustive 12-year review of many of these studies that EPA re-registered atrazine as safe for use in 2006. EPA stated that the cumulative risks associated with triazine herbicides pose “no harm that would result to the general US population, infants, children or other . . . consumers.”

Atrazine has also been given a clean bill of health by the governments of Great Britain and Australia, as well as by the World Health Organization.

For 50 years, atrazine has been used safely in agriculture with no adverse effects on humans or animals.

Not surprisingly, media reports have preceded any actual legal receipt notifying the registrant of this action. Included with this update is the actual filing from the plaintiffs.

For the facts about atrazine, please go to http://www.atrazine.com


Illinois Class Action Complaint Against Syngenta

Tyrone Hayes... Back in the Spotlight Again!

In the spotlight he craves once again, activist-scientist Tyrone Hayes released yet another study this week online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) on the effects of the herbicide atrazine on frogs. The USA Today online article referencing the study can be found at http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2010-03-02-1Aatrazine02_ST_N.htm 

It doesn't appear that his flair for the dramatic has been replaced with the rigors of science in his latest work. Once again, you can expect many errors of fact, inaccurate citations of the scientific literature, and a failure to cite the extensive body of scientific evidence that would undermine his thesis.

It should be noted that Dr. Hayes’ previous work has been repeatedly and exhaustively examined by governmental regulatory agencies as well as independent scientists and found to not stand up to rigorous scientific scrutiny.

This would not be the first time Tyrone Hayes has published studies in a scientific journal which, upon investigation, have proven to be unreliable. After an exhaustive investigation into Hayes’ earlier studies, EPA published a 95-page white paper concluding that his study and other studies he cites are “scientifically flawed.” In reference to Hayes' earlier studies, the former Deputy Director of EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs, Anne E. Lindsay, testified in 2005 that Dr. Hayes’ “data are insufficient” to support what he claimed to have found. 

EPA further complained that Dr. Hayes would not share his raw data: “[EPA] has never seen either the results from any independent investigator published in peer-reviewed scientific journals or the raw data from Dr. Hayes’ additional experiments that confirm Dr. Hayes’ conclusions.”

In response to Hayes' earlier allegations, however, the registrants conducted two, massive, state-of-the-art studies, based on newly developed EPA guidance. Every detail and raw data point of those studies were audited and inspected by the EPA. Both studies clearly and convincingly debunked the claims leveled by Dr. Hayes.

The PNAS Report contains two serious flaws that undercut its credibility: 1) the use of only one dose level of atrazine, when almost all studies used to assess the effects of substances for regulatory purposes are conducted at more than one concentration and 2) the failure to use a positive control – a basic requirement of this kind of study.

Hayes repeatedly cites other researchers incorrectly, distorting their findings in order to bolster his own claims. Hayes completely misrepresents the findings of Carr et al (2003) as supporting his thesis. They do not. On the other hand, Hayes fails to cite other studies, such as those conducted by DuPreez et al, that do not support his findings – something a reputable scientist would do. In fact, the DuPreez studies flatly contradict Hayes’s claims.

Perhaps most notable is that Hayes new claims are inconsistent with his previous work. For both Hayes’ earlier and current claims to be true would be a physiological impossibility. Either his current study discredits his previous work or his previous work discredits this study.

Furthermore, it should be noted that Tyrone Hayes has declared himself an activist and aggressively campaigns for the banning of the herbicide atrazine.  As such, the degree of scientific objectivity one normally expects in such publications is suspect. The fact that he is now using the NRDC to promote his study highlights the political nature of Dr. Hayes’ attacks.

Finally, the manner in which Dr. Hayes conducts himself has caused some to seriously question the soundness of his judgment. In 2009, in fact, Dr. Hayes statements and actions were so extreme that a member of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry asked that Hayes be censured for his “inflammatory and libelous attacks,” adding that Dr. Hayes “demonstrate[d] that it is okay to present provocative conclusions without supporting data.”
 
Apart from all its flaws, if considered at all, this study must be considered in the context of the massive number of studies that have shown atrazine to be safe to use. Authorities around the globe have found no link between atrazine exposure and adverse health effects. The EPA, the Australian government, and the World Health Organization have all looked at atrazine’s effects on endocrine systems and given atrazine a clean bill of health.
 
The EPA estimates pulling atrazine from the shelves would cost corn growers $28 an acre in lost yields and substitutes, and the total negative impact on American agriculture would exceed over $2 billion per year.

No New Findings in Atrazine Study Promoted by Discredited Researcher

"Scientifically Flawed," "Insufficient Data," "Results problematic if not impossible" describe past critiques of studies done by Dr. Tyrone Hayes
Washington, March 1 - Alex Avery, Director of Research and Education at the Hudson Institute's Center for Global Food Issues, criticized new research by University of California Berkeley professor Dr. Tyrone Hayes alleging endocrine disruption in amphibians caused by the popular herbicide atrazine. Prior research by Dr. Hayes has come under scientific scrutiny and criticism by directors of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for lacking basic scientific standards and lack of transparency.

Avery pointed to comments by Anne E. Lindsay, former Deputy Director of EPA's Office of Pesticide Programs, testified in 2005 that Dr. Hayes' 'data are insufficient' to support his claims. She further noted:

" . . .[EPA] has never seen either the results from any independent investigator published in peer-reviewed scientific journals or the raw data from Dr. Hayes' additional experiments that confirm Dr. Hayes' conclusions."

The EPA's independent Scientific Advisory Panel "believed strongly that all of the field studies reviewed had serious flaws that limit their usefulness..." and "these problems render interpretation of results problematic if not impossible."

Lindsay's testimony further invalidated any legitimacy of Hayes' work, saying "all of the available information was scientifically flawed. None of [Hayes'] laboratory studies on atrazine were conducted in accordance with standard protocols.""

Avery's own thorough review of past research by Dr. Tyrone Hayes can be found at http://www.cgfi.org/2002/10/30/frog-sex-change-claims-flawed/

"Dr. Tyrone Hayes has spent more than a decade allied with eco-activists peddling scare stories due to alleged health effects from atrazine. Yet despite his decade-long search and after more than 50 years of widespread use of this herbicide by farmers to minimize soil erosion while combating weeds, Hayes can offer no compelling real-world evidence that atrazine poses any appreciable risk to amphibian populations anywhere," Avery stated. "Aside from his own often-conflicting lab studies, other researchers have not seen the effects Hayes claims to have found. Replication is the gold-standard of science and Hayes' work has failed this test miserably."

"Finally, it should be noted that Dr. Hayes is an admitted anti-atrazine activist and has aligned himself closely with organizations including Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), organizations with a clear track record of campaigns against popular herbicides, large scale farm production and effective tools that have revolutionized agriculture today," Avery concluded.

Alex Avery is an expert in agricultural policy from a global perspective, with reference to both economic and environmental impacts. He has followed extensively the benefits of atrazine and has provided testimony before the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on many occasions during its re-registration process.

In a victory for makers of atrazine, plaintiffs dismiss multiple damages allegations against defendants

EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. (Feb. 23, 2010) — Plaintiffs in the Madison County, Ill., case against the makers of the popular herbicide atrazine handed the manufacturers and Growmark a victory as they voluntarily dismissed multiple damages allegations from their lawsuit.

Today, before Madison County Circuit Judge Barbara Crowder, plaintiffs dismissed even more allegations in direct response to the defendants’ motion to transfer the claims of the cities of Carlinville, Fairfield, Flora, Hillsboro, Litchfield, Matoon, and Mount Olive to their home counties.

Plaintiffs dismissed their entire claim based upon private nuisance, and all their claims for alleged damages to real estate and physical plants, for the use and enjoyment of real estate, for the reduction in value of real estate, for stigma damages associated with any real estate, and for any loss of commercial use of real estate.

The Madison County Circuit Court had previously stricken plaintiffs’ claims for declaratory and injunctive relief and punitive damages. Additionally, plaintiffs had previously withdrawn their claim for a remediation study and cleanup of their water supplies.

“The plaintiffs’ legal theories continue to be whittled down by the Court,” said Kurtis B. Reeg, counsel for Syngenta Crop Protection of Greensboro, N.C. “This is the fourth time plaintiffs have amended their lawsuit as they continue to try to cobble together a case,” Reeg continued. “If and when all the facts are heard, we believe the plaintiffs’ case will be dismissed.”

“Atrazine is a vital input for Illinois’ corn crop. Federal and state regulations are protective of human health and the environment, and the product continues to be an important crop protection tool for farmers in Illinois and across the country to produce safe, abundant and affordable food for the world. We will defend it against these baseless attacks on behalf of the growers, the consumers and those who benefit from the production of Illinois corn,” Reeg said.

Read the rest of this article here.

Water Quality Studies Show Atrazine Levels Meet Federal Standards

- None of the 122 community water systems monitored last year in 10 states where atrazine is used most exceeded the federal standards set for atrazine in drinking water or raw water
- The federal lifetime drinking water standard for atrazine is set at 3 parts-per-billion — a level containing a 1,000-fold safety factor
- The EPA concluded that the triazine herbicides - including atrazine - pose “no harm that would result to the U.S. population”

GREENSBORO, NC, August 26, 2009 MaiMai News — As a popular herbicide in more than 60 countries around the world, atrazine has been carefully studied for years. In 2008, none of the 122 community water systems monitored in 10 states where atrazine is used most exceeded the federal standards set for atrazine in drinking water or raw water.

“Atrazine can be occasionally detected in water at extraordinarily low concentrations (parts per billion ), but these low levels pose no threat to human health. A person could drink thousands of gallons of water containing 3 parts per billion atrazine every day for a lifetime, and still not be affected by atrazine,” said Tim Pastoor, Ph.D., principal scientist for Syngenta.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sets very conservative standards for chemicals in drinking water that are protective of human health. In the case of atrazine, EPA adopted a federal lifetime drinking water standard for atrazine is set at 3 parts-per-billion (ppb) — a level containing a 1,000-fold safety factor.

In raw (unprocessed) water, atrazine concentrations also declined significantly between 1994 and 2006 at 103 frequently monitored sites. This is due in large part to the best management practices growers now use with waterways and buffer strips. These practices have done much to protect water quality over the last 15 years.

Syngenta continues to work closely with growers in many watershed projects and in other stewardship programs to ensure that atrazine is used according to EPA guidelines and best management practices.

Atrazine recently underwent a rigorous, up-to-date safety evaluation by the EPA and was re-registered for use in agriculture. In 2006, the EPA looked at all of the triazine herbicides together — atrazine, simazine and propazine — and determined they pose “no harm that would result to the general U.S. population, infants, children or other major identifiable subgroups of consumers.”

Tens of thousands of such tests continue to show that atrazine poses no dietary health risk to the general population or to children and infants. World-renowned institutions including the World Health Organization, the National Cancer Institute and EPA all have studied atrazine and found no health concerns when used as directed.

For more information, visit www.atrazine.com.

Read the full press release here.

Are Studies Linking Atrazine to Birth Defects Junk Science?

Are studies linking atrazine to birth defects Junk Science?

Listen to toxicologist Tim Pastoor: “All these studies have basic fundamental academic epidemiological flaws that render them less than useful. If you look at the birth defect uptick in infants that were conceived in that late spring and early summer months, it can be correlated with just about anything else that occurs with an uptick at that period of time—rainfall, tornadoes, lightening strikes. And, you see the same trend in both high-use and low use atrazine states.” Dr. Pastoor’s conclusion: “There are absolutely no statistical correlations between atrazine concentrations and birth defects.” 

Pastoor also said: “the same uptick in birth defects in spring months is seen throughout the United States, regardless of atrazine usage."

NCGA Testifies on Atrazine’s Importance

Feb. 3: NCGA Director of Public Policy Jessica Bennett testified Tuesday, Feb. 2 before an Environmental Protection Agency Scientific Advisory Panel on the importance of atrazine. The panel was convened in the wake of the agency’s announcement of a comprehensive review of health and ecological risks associated with the commonly used herbicide.

“For more than 50 years, more than half of all American corn growers have relied on atrazine to protect their crops from a variety of grass and broadleaf weeds,” Bennett said. “By EPA’s own estimate, atrazine saves corn farmers as much as $28 an acre in reduced herbicide costs and increased yields. For all these reasons, atrazine is not just a good product. It is a vital product.”

NCGA has previously testified on the thousands of existing studies that have been considered over the past decade by EPA in supporting the registration and safe use of atrazine in the United States. NCGA has also signed on to a letter that more than 150 agricultural organizations sent to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson outlining their concerns on the potential ban of atrazine.

“Atrazine not only supports corn production but also provides environmental benefits. Every farmer is, of necessity, a conservationist,” Bennett said. “We care deeply about our impact on the land and water and what we will leave behind for our children and grandchildren. That is why so many corn farmers are proud to rely on atrazine for no-till conservation agriculture on more than 44 million corn acres—a practice that is preventing soil erosion, protecting waterways and sequestering significant amounts of carbon dioxide across America.”

Click here for NCGA's testimony

Tim Pastoor: Atrazine is proven safe, despite critics' assertions

By Tim Pastoor | Posted: Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Winona (MN) Daily News

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture said last month that "atrazine regulations protect human health and the environment in Minnesota."

This finding, publicized in a department news release Jan. 15, reaffirms what we've known all along - the herbicide atrazine can be used safely by farmers in the U.S.

But here we go again. This month, two environmental activist groups escalated their attacks on Syngenta and atrazine in Minnesota, suggesting the United States Environmental Protection Agency and Min-nesota need to rethink atrazine.

These claims are baseless and wrong. The EPA just completed a 12-year evaluation of the corn herbicide atrazine in 2006 and concluded that it can be re-registered for use. The EPA's painstakingly detailed review of more than 6,000 scientific studies led it to state very clearly that atrazine poses "no harm that would result to the general U.S. population, infants, children or other ... consumers."

One would think such a thorough review with this much data and with so many qualified scientists examining each aspect of atrazine's safety would be enough. But not for the agenda-driven activist organizations that just don't like EPA's conclusions. Political pressure by these groups has pushed the EPA to announce yet another "comprehensive" re-evaluation of atrazine.

Been there, done that.

But we'll do it again. Even though atrazine has been through one of the most comprehensive reviews in EPA's history, Syngenta, as a science-based company, looks forward to bringing the same high-quality science into an open and transparent safety review of atrazine by the EPA in 2010.

Follow this link for more:

follow this link for the full column

AGRICULTURE GROUPS DEFEND ATRAZINE AGAINST AGENDA-DRIVEN ATTACKS 53 groups representing tens of thousands of farmers in nearly every state and commodity call for decisions based on science, not politics

 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                Contact:  Sue Schulte
Date:    1/21/10                        Phone: 785-448-6922

AGRICULTURE GROUPS DEFEND ATRAZINE AGAINST AGENDA-DRIVEN ATTACKS
53 groups representing tens of thousands of farmers in nearly every state and commodity call for decisions based on science, not politics

Washington, D.C. – A broad coalition of agriculture groups have written to Lisa Jackson, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, in defense of the herbicide atrazine, which has become the target of a coordinated attack by environmental groups seeking to eliminate its use.  See copy of the letter to the EPA here.  Atrazine, a critical tool in growing crops as diverse as corn, sorghum, sugar cane, and citrus, has been used safely in over 60 countries for 50 years.

The EPA will begin a re-re-evaluation of atrazine as part of a series of Scientific Advisory Panels, which will begin on February 2nd.  Recent media events by agenda-driven organizations such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, Land Stewardship Project and Pesticide Action Network North America suggest a coordinated campaign to call atrazine’s safety into question and politicize what should be a scientific process.  In fact, in an unprecedented move, the EPA itself identified NRDC material as part of its justification to launch the new review.

“We want to set the record straight on the agriculture community’s broad support of this very effective herbicide that has been used by farmers for more than 50 years,” said Jere White, executive director of the Kansas corn and grain sorghum growers associations. “Atrazine is used on more than one-half of all U.S. corn and two-thirds of sorghum.  It is one of the primary elements that make American agriculture so phenomenally productive.  Every EPA Administration since the EPA was founded – Republican and Democrat – has endorsed atrazine’s safety and that is why we join together to pledge our support and confidence in this product.”

“Atrazine is the foundation for weed control programs in Florida sugarcane and has withstood thorough scientific testing in the U.S. and around the world,” said James M. Shine, Jr., Agriculture Division Vice President for Sugar Cane Growers Cooperative of Florida.  “Extensive research conducted by scientists inside and outside the government have weighed all the data and concluded that it is safe for the environment, human health, and crop protection.  Our communities should feel confident that rigorous science has determined its safety.”  It is estimated that atrazine is used in 90 percent of U.S. sugar cane production.

"The use of atrazine and the triazine family herbicides in citrus production have dramatically reduced the need for cultivation and water applications, provided protection against freeze damage, and created a better quality product," said Joel Nelsen, President of California Citrus Mutual.  "Their loss would have a devastating impact on our growers."

The coalition of agriculture groups will be actively involved in the EPA re-evaluation of atrazine and will insist that transparent, peer-reviewed science utilizing accepted practices govern regulatory decision-making.

For more information on this coalition or on atrazine, please contact Sue Schulte at sschulte@ksgrains.com or 785-448-6922.

Read Ag Groups' Letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson

Ag Groups' Letter to EPA