Court to EPA: Chlorpyrifos ban is on!
As of Thursday morning, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has 60 days to finalize its ban of the neurotoxic pesticide chlorpyrifos.
Aug 9, 2018
Pesticide Actio...
In the U.S. and the world, pesticide use is up
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) used to release “Pesticide Industry Sales and Usage” reports every two years — but that was almost 20 years ago. Several months ago, after fielding a question from a colleague, I found the most recent iteration of this report, released at the end of 2017 and covering market estimates from 2008 to 2012.
Aug 2, 2018
Emily Marquez
PAN Fellows build a brighter tomorrow
The PAN Fellowship Program supports a pathway to leadership for food and farming activists from frontline communities. Leaders with a deep and personal understanding of the issue —including their social, political and cultural context—can craft meaningful and appropriate solutions for their communities and the system as a whole.
Jul 30, 2018
Pesticide Actio...
Monsanto’s dicamba crisis: guilty as charged
It’s mid-July and temperatures are soaring. So are the numbers of dicamba drift-related crop injuries sweeping across rural America. Also rising: the outrage of farmers, gardeners and rural residents, as they watch this unnecessary chemical debacle unfold, once again. Watching unperturbed from the sidelines: Monsanto (recently acquired by Bayer) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Jul 26, 2018
Marcia Ishii
A Dow alum nominated to USDA. Again.
Earlier this week, a new appointment for chief scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) was announced, and it’s a 30-year veteran of Dow Agrosciences. Really?
Jul 19, 2018
Kristin Schafer
On Pruitt, pesticides & progress
It was clear from the minute he was appointed that Scott Pruitt was a wildly inappropriate choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA.) Last Thursday, after months of public pressure and outrage, he finally submitted his resignation.
Jul 12, 2018
Kristin Schafer
Landmark initiative promotes farmworker justice
We know that ending reliance on hazardous pesticides can only happen by creating healthy, just food and farming systems — and this means for all of us. One way we can do this? A safer, more transparent food chain.
Jul 6, 2018
Margaret Reeves
Holding strong to the Senate Farm Bill
Last week, the U.S. Senate passed its version of the 2018 Farm Bill by a vote of 86-11. While still flawed, the Senate bill is much better than the widely criticized House version of the bill, which narrowly passed a week prior.
Now the Farm Bill will go on to conference where the two versions will be reconciled into one final bill — and along with partners we’re pressing for the preservation of the Senate version of the bill, rather than retreating to the House version.
Jul 2, 2018
Margaret Reeves
Decades of deceit on glyphosate
It's been clear for years that the pesticide industry has too much influence on public officials and the policies they set. Veteran journalist Carey Gillam’s new book Whitewash: The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer and the Corruption of Science digs into one egregious example of this: Monsanto’s (now Bayer) aggressive efforts to protect their RoundUp Ready seed and pesticide empire.
Jun 28, 2018
Pesticide Actio...
We have work to do.
Last week, after an early morning call with international colleagues, I had a moment to chat with my friend Susan from PAN Germany. She asked what in the world is going on in the U.S. these days.
It was hard to know where to begin. The constant firehose of chaos and crisis that is now our national politics is so exhausting — and the root causes so complex and deep — that describing “what’s going on” is no simple thing.
But one thing is very clear: we have work to do.
Jun 28, 2018
Kristin Schafer