The Environmental Protection Agency is allowing farmers to use existing stocks of an industrial weedkiller through July 31 after a federal appeals court last week invalidated the government’s approval of the chemical for certain uses.
The EPA said late Monday it was allowing farmers to continue to use the chemical herbicide dicamba, which was developed in conjunction with genetically modified dicamba-tolerant cotton and soybean crops
“At the height of the growing season, the court’s decision has threatened the livelihood of our nation’s farmers and the global food supply,” EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in a release.
“Today’s (Monday’s) cancellation and existing stocks order is consistent with EPA’s standard practice following registration invalidation, and is designed to advance compliance, ensure regulatory certainty, and to prevent the misuse of existing stocks.”
Missouri and Arkansas banned the sale of dicamba in 2017 because of complaints of crop damage due to the chemical’s drift.
The Ninth Circuit of Appeals last week overturned the EPA’s 2018 approval of dicamba, claiming it “substantially understated risks that it acknowledged and failed entirely to acknowledge other risks.”
Monday’s decision by the EPA drew howls of outrage from the groups that brought the suit to ban dicamba.
“They don’t have the legal authority to do that,” George Kimbrell, the legal director of the Center For Food Safety, told TheHill.com. “The court said what it said and held what it held and now they’re trying to relitigate that, which is improper.”
Kimbrell and Stephanie Parent, a Center for Biological Diversity attorney, said they will challenge the EPA’s new order in court.
“In the face of clear evidence that this stuff drifts offsite and has caused damage to crops and other plants, EPA’s just pushing forward to continue to allow that to happen,” Parent said.
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