Fumigant Fair Play When It Comes To Clean Air
August 1, 2007 First off, let me make one thing perfectly clear: I’m all for clean air. I’m raising two children who used to have a little trouble with asthma. But I live in California’s San Joaquin Valley which, while the most productive agricultural region in the world, also has the nation’s worst air. (It’s nothing compared to China, though.) That’s not all ag’s fault, by the way, as the pollution from the many people on the coast rides the prevailing westerly winds into the valley, then slams into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and stops. But I can appreciate that ag has to do its fair share to clear the air.
That’s why I understand why the state’s Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) is proposing to sharply reduce and cap the use of certain soil fumigants. Though I’m not sure the fumigants contribute as much volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions as DPR says, let’s leave that aside for now. I understand that VOCs react with other airborne substances in the presence of sunlight, which forms smog. And being pro-clean air, I’m anti-smog.
Don’t Let Your One Chance Get Wasted
What does concern me, however, is how DPR lumps all fumigant uses together. And if you grow a tree fruit or nut crop, you should be concerned too. Row crop growers such as carrot, tomato, and most of all, strawberry growers, use up the lion’s share of methyl bromide, chloropicrin, and other fumigants. But if they have a problem of some kind, it’s not so bad, because they’ll be planting again before you know it. Not you. You only get one shot to fumigate the soil every 20 years or so.
That’s why I’ve never understood the guys who don’t fumigate. If you’re planting on virgin soil, sure, OK, but let’s face it, there’s only a finite amount of land, and most orchards are re-plants. The research on this topic is simply overwhelmingly in favor of fumigating before replanting. The fruit’s bigger, better, higher quality — you name it. And you only get one chance. Tim Smith, a Washington State University Cooperative Extension agent, and a member of our Editorial Advisory Board for whom I have a lot of respect, just shakes his head when you ask him why more growers don’t fumigate.
Tim claims it’s so clear which replant orchards haven’t been fumigated that he can point them out while driving down the freeway. “There’s never been anything I’ve worked on in my career that’s such a black and white issue,” Tim, who’s been working in Wenatchee for 31 years, once told me.
But even though you, being a smart tree crop grower who does fumigate, might only use a fumigant on a given piece of ground every 20 years or more, you get lumped in with the row crop guys who are fumigating regularly. That means that when you go in to get a permit to fumigate, you might get rejected because the row crop guys have already used up all the cap space in your area. Hardly seems fair, does it?
Many ag associations are asking DPR to revisit this notion, as well as others. For instance, many pesticide consultants say the DPR is using old data and not considering all the newer, more environmentally sound methods. When you really think about the ramifications of this, it’s pretty scary. For example, if there’s only so much product to be applied in a given area, who do you think will get it — the large wealthy row crop grower who’s applying it all the time, or the smaller, entry-level tree fruit or nut grower who’s coming in for the first time? I think we can all answer that one.
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