"ORGANIC" RULE COMPROMISES INTEGRITY 
May 21/98 
Manitoba Co-operator 
Robert G. Lewis 
Washington -- The decision by Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman to 
yield to pressure from the organic foods industry by excluding foods grown  or 
processed with the use of biotechnology, irradiation and sewage waste from 
eligibility for the "organic" label is, according to this story, a 
misfortune for American agriculture and impeaches the integrity of the 
department. 
The fault, according to Lwewis,  lies with the U.S. Congress, which 
unwisely passed a law eight years ago that imposed upon USDA the 
obligation to establish and enforce standards under which foods may bear 
the label "organic." 
It is a fault that is being manifested more and more frequently. A small 
minority proposes a measure to which the wider public is largely 
indifferent but it seems vaguely appealing and has no readily apparent 
opponents. An intense publicity and pressure campaign persuades 
legislators that they can please a small but fervent constituency at no 
political cost. Soon a new duty, or a new tax loophole, and often 
unforeseen new problems are added to the government's burdens. 
Responsible professional officials in USDA have been as reluctant as they 
were tardy in carrying out this unwelcome and unwise mandate. They 
recognize that it complicates and may handicap their performance of 
important activities. 
A century ago, Congress began taking measures to protect public health and 
safety by empowering the government to establish and enforce standards of 
composition and use that foods, medicines, drugs and chemicals must meet 
in order to be permitted to be sold. Those standards always have been 
based on the best scientific evidence available at the time. 
Secretary Glickman has now determined that the new "organic" labeling 
rules to be issued later this year, and thereafter to be enforced by the 
police powers of the government, will be based on something other than 
sound scientific judgment. Bill Wolf, president of the industry's Organic 
Materials Review Board, was quoted as describing this non-scientific 
standard as "an intuitive sense of how nature works." 
The story goes on to say that three immediate consequences of the proposed 
organic labeling rule are: 
It gives at least tacit support to the notion, which is openly charged by 
some "organic" advocates, that the American food supply is not safe. 
It gives tacit support also to the notion that "organic" automatically 
means "safe." In fact, some of the most deadly recent instances of food 
poisoning in the U.S. have been traced to organic farms. In some cases, 
illness and deaths caused by organic foods would have been prevented by 
measures which the pending label rule would prohibit. 
It undermines the United States' argument in international trade disputes 
that restrictions on access must be based upon recognized scientific 
grounds. American grains, soybeans and meats face what we have hitherto 
denounced as "non-tariff barriers" that are substantially identical to the 
organic industry's objections to USDA's original proposed label rule. The 
government should remain impeccably neutral as between its public's 
diverse food fancies and aversions, as it is obliged by the Constitution 
to be among its public's diverse religions. We should let the organic 
community define and defend its own peculiar "intuitions" by private 
means, as our religious communities do theirs. 
 
 

U.S. PESTICIDE RESIDUE SHOWS NO DECLINE - GREEN GROUP 
May 21/98 
Reuters 
Julie Vorman 
WASHINGTON -- Ken Cook, head of the Environmental Working 
Group, a nonprofit research group that issued a new report on pesticide 
use in the U.S., was cited as saying American children are eating more 
pesticides on fresh fruits and vegetables than ever before despite Clinton 
Administration promises to reduce the use of farm chemicals, adding, "We 
see no indication that the administration is going to take the steps 
they need to take. There is no plan to develop a plan for reducing 
pesticides in 
agricultural use." 
The story adds that while green groups criticize the Environmental 
Protection Administration for failing to move fast enough to tighten 
pesticide regulations, agribusiness claims the agency must carefully weigh 
the benefits of chemicals that produce the nation's food supply. 
A new EPA advisory panel, appointed at the request of Vice President Al 
Gore, will meet for the first time next week to try and map out how the 
agency should review a group of pesticides known as organophosphates. 
Large doses of organophosphates, a class of pesticides widely used by 
farmers, are, the story says, believed to disrupt a growing child's 
nervous system, according to scientists. 
In 1993, the EPA announced it would reduce the use of pesticides and 
promote the use of biological pest management rather than chemicals. 
An analysis of U.S. Agriculture Department data of fresh produce eaten by 
children showed the same or slightly higher level of chemical residue in 
1996 as in 1993, the Environmental Working Group report said. 
After washing and peeling fresh produce, apples, spinach, grapes, carrots 
and oranges still have trace amounts of between three and ten different 
pesticides, the report said. Under current EPA regulations, the average 
overall pesticide level of 0.6 parts per million in the produce was within 
legal limits. 
Only green beans showed a decline in pesticide residue in the USDA data, 
the report said. 
U.S. chemical makers contend that the actual use of pesticides on the farm 
has been steadily falling. 
The American Crop Protection Association was cited as saying in a 
statement that "Pesticide use on the nation's farm has declined since 
topping out in 
1979. Over the same 1979-95 period, use of insecticides to protect the 
nation's fruit and vegetables has dropped more than 50 percent." 
Claire Regan, director of scientific affairs for the Grocery Manufacturers 
of America, was quoted as saying, "They ignore the fact that properly 
applied pesticides protect crops from insects and damage caused by 
disease." 
Under the Food Quality Protection Act passed by Congress, the EPA must 
review what pesticide residues are safe in food, and order an extra margin 
of safety for children. 
 
 

FARMS LOSE LEEWAY ON CHEMICAL LABELS: LAWSUIT WIPES OUT DISCLOSURE EXEMPTION 
May 20/98 
The Sacramento Bee 
Jim Miller 
WASHINGTON -- In a lawsuit settlement that has major implications for the 
nation's agricultural industry, environmental groups have erased a 
provision of the U.S. Clean Air Act that exempts farm products from having 
to disclose certain chemicals hazardous to the environment on packaging. 
Goods made with chemicals like chlorofluorocarbons and halon gasses 
already carry labels to that effect. Next up, as a result of the 
settlement, could be foods made with ingredients treated with methyl 
bromide, a popular agricultural fumigant for nuts, dried fruits, 
vegetables and grains. 
Products from flour to pecans, cereal to baked goods and ice 
creamQanything whose manufacture involves the use of methyl bromideQwould 
be covered by the noticing requirements. The label could take the form of 
a logo or written text. 
The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Friends of the Earth and the 
International Brotherhood of Teamsters, according to this story, filed the 
suit in 1994. On Tuesday, representatives of the groups said they hope the 
federal-court settlement will put pressure on farming interests to find a 
safer alternative to methyl bromide, as well as making consumers aware of 
products that use the chemical. 
Corinna Gilfillan, Friends of the Earth's ozone protection campaign 
manager, was quoted as saying, "When you have a label it's pretty 
powerful. A lot of people know that consumers care about the environment 
and the ozone layer. I think it sends a very strong message to industry to 
implement alternatives." 
However, the story adds, shoppers shouldn't expect labels to appear 
overnight. Tuesday's settlement eliminates the Clean Air Act exemption for 
farm products and no more. For labels to appear, one of two things need to 
happen: 
Food manufacturers voluntarily agree to place the labels, or a citizen or 
group sues to force the issue. 
Lawrie Mott, a senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense 
Council, one of the plaintiffs in the 1994 suit, said the organization is 
considering filing a second suit. Her group, however, hopes manufacturers 
will "switch rather than fight" the labels. 
San Joaquin Valley farmers' reaction to the legislation was one of anger 
and frustration. They said made-with-methyl bromide labels would hurt 
struggling farmers. Moreover, they said, farmers still do not have a 
viable alternative to the fumigant. 
Under international law, methyl bromide is supposed to be outlawed in the 
United States by 2005, though legislation is pending in Congress that 
would keep it around until 2015. 
 
 

DISAPPEARING DDT? 
May 21/98 
Los Angeles Times 
MARLA CONE 
Two miles off Palos Verdes Peninsula, according to this story, the 
nation's largest deposit of the powerful pesticide DDT lies spread across 
the ocean floor. As the chemical has lingered there for decades, poisoning 
eagles, fish and other marine life, scientists have puzzled over a pivotal 
question: 
Is nature doing its own cleanup? Or must humans intervene? In a scientific 
finding that could have profound importance for hundreds of environmental 
cleanups, researchers reported this month that DDEQthe residual of the 
banned pesticide DDTQdisappears naturally as it breaks down into a less 
hazardous substance. 
The Michigan State University scientistsQusing sediments from the Palos 
Verdes shelfQconducted laboratory tests showing that DDE is quickly 
gobbled up by bacteria found in ocean sediments. The microbes replace a 
chlorine atom with a hydrogen oneQa transformation that reduces the danger 
to ocean life. Yet, even with this promising news, critical questions 
remain regarding what the laboratory experiment means about DDE in the 
real worldQespecially the 130 tons polluting 27 square miles of the ocean 
floor off Palos Verdes. 
The story says that for a quarter-century ending in 1971, Montrose 
Chemical Co. manufactured DDT, one of the most widely used pesticides in 
history, at a plant near Torrance. During that time, the factory 
discharged millions of pounds of the chemical into Los Angeles County's 
sewage pipeline, which empties onto the Palos Verdes shelf. 
DDT was banned in the United States 25 years ago after it wiped out vast 
numbers of birds, including bald eagles, peregrine falcons and pelicans. 
But the legacy of the chemical that remains off Palos Verdes still poses a 
daunting environmental challenge, and lawsuits over it make up one of the 
largest natural resource cases in U.S history. The EPA's likely remedy is 
to cap part of the ocean floor with a thick barrier of sand, an 
unprecedented effort that could cost as much as $300 million. Montrose 
Chemical Co. has long argued that a cleanup is unnecessary because DDEQthe 
site's most prevalent pollutantQis vanishing on its own. 
But until now, most scientists believed that it was a stubborn, stable 
compound that didn't break down in oxygen-free places like ocean 
sediments. 
Fred Schauffler, the EPA's project manager for the Palos Verdes Superfund 
site was cited as saying the discovery that DDE is transformed by natural 
microbes "is news to everybody. This experiment demonstrates that this 
degradation pathway really can occur." But Schauffler said the compound 
probably degraded much more quickly in the laboratory than it does in 
nature. 
Schauffler added that "Although Mother Nature may be doing something out 
there to take care of the DDE, it is not at all clear that it is happening 
at a pace quick enough to satisfy our concerns. I certainly don't see this 
[DDE discovery] as a compelling reason for not taking any action out 
there." Federal officials argue that if the pesticide off Palos Verdes was 
breaking down in a matter of months, as it did in the laboratory, the 
30-year-old deposit would be long gone. Instead, a massive volume remains, 
and they suspect that it will take many more decades to naturally degrade. 
As long as the chemical lies on the surface of the ocean floor, Southern 
California's marine life will suffer the effects of the poison. 
Michael Aitken, an associate professor of environmental engineering at the 
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, called the experiment 
well-designed but added that the rate of the transformation found in the 
laboratory "cannot be extrapolated" to the ocean because the test, in 
several ways, does not replicate natural conditions. A major difference 
between the lab and nature is that DDE was added to the water for the 
tests instead of being bound up in the sediment for years. That probably 
makes it much easier for the microbial "bugs" to consume it, Aitken said. 
The lab tests were also conducted in room-temperature waterQabout 35 
degrees Fahrenheit warmer than the ocean bottom. Microbes thrive in warmer 
water. 
To address such uncertainties, the Michigan team has mounted new 
experiments that more closely replicate the temperature and other 
conditions of the ocean floor. Results are expected this year.