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This past week, a major environmental victory went by barely noticed. A Japan-based pesticide giant, Arysta LifeScience, put out a press release announcing that it was ceasing sales and withdrawing from the U.S. all of its methyl iodide-containing fumigant formulations. The stated reason was too limited a market. What this means is that this toxic-chemical golden-touch will never be reaching out to grab hold of California's strawberry fields or any other U.S. crop.
MIDAS® is Arysta's trade name for methyl iodide, a chemical fumigant whose potential dangers had a lot of people worried. It had already been approved by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency for use in most states, but the jewel in Arysta's crown was meant to have been the lucrative strawberry crop in California. Now it seems that the anticipated coronation will never take place. They were close—very, very close. A lengthy and detailed scientific review of methyl iodide by the California State Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) raised a number of serious questions as to whether the crop fumigant could ever be applied without serious risk to those working with it or even those living nearby. Indeed, residential proximity to the strawberry fields characterizes where and how this crop is often grown. An outside scientific panel closely vetted the DPR review and supported its cautionary tone—with additional concerns to boot. I know—I served as a member of that review panel.
Arysta LifeScience didn't seem too worried. And why should they have been? The DPR director ignored the science and simply created a new, watered-down estimate of methyl iodide risk, recommending that it be approved for use in California. This happened months ago. It seemed as if what should have been a red flashing light instead was glowing green, and not the kind of "green" that means environmentally friendly.
There was, however, the pesky legal problem of approval by an agency director that ignored clearly stated rules. On March 21, 2012 (one day after the Arysta press release announcing its "marketing" change), California Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch called the DPR on the carpet. He was responding to a request for a special hearing called to address a "late-breaking fact" in the case—that is, essentially that Arysta was making its problem go away. The judge announced that he had made a decision in the matter of the Pesticide Action Network V. The California Department of Pesticide Regulation and Arysta LifeScience North America and was in the process of writing up his final text. Judge Roesch gave a preview of his judgment to come and it was scathing: "I will be making a determination that the petition ...must be granted because there is no evidence of any kind that the actual methodology used by the director (of the DPR) has scientific validity. Nobody says that it does."
In the end, Judge Roesch acknowledged that any final judgment may be made moot by the license withdrawal Arysta claimed is already in process. The Pesticide Action Network, which is a citizens' group that fights for better pesticide controls, and the judge both said in effect, let's see that in writing. In hindsight, it seems clear that Arysta saw the writing on the wall, although it is not obvious how they could have known in advance Judge Roesch's intentions. Further, even if the DPR was found wanting, it is unlikely the Arysta LifeScience "kingdom" ($1.6 billion in revenues last year) will be divided any time soon. Nonetheless, this is a good outcome, a very good outcome, for those who work and live in California and, in fact, across the U.S.
