EPA trying to address crop changes and backstock of now unusable chemical.
District Court Judge David Bury vacated the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) previous decision to approve dicamba-based weed killers for agricultural use. These weed killers, manufactured mostly by Bayer and BASF, are toxic to most crops but are used on varieties of soybeans and cotton that were genetically engineered to withstand them.
The EPA made the decision to reapprove dicamba-based herbicides in 2020, one of the policy changes the administration made before former President Trump left office. Judge Bury took issue with the quickness of the policy change, saying that the EPA neglected key procedures, such as a public input period, before finalizing the decision.
President Biden’s administration is now having to manage the results of this decision. Officials now have to address farmers who must switch out profitable crops and businesses stocking now unusable industrial weed killer.
“We haven’t yet quite figured out what our response is to the decision itself,” EPA Assistant Administrator Michal Freedhoff said at the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture conference in Washington. “We recognize there are some very near-term existing stocks questions we have to answer and we’re definitely prioritizing those.”
As the Lord Leads, Pray with Us…
- For Assistant Administrator Michal Freedhoff as she heads the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
- For the judges of the U.S. federal judiciary as they assess and rule on cases surrounding federal regulations
Sources: Reuters, The Western Producer
