Phase Out Schedule For Diazinon Released

Home and garden uses of diazinon, which account for 75 percent of the 11 million pounds applied each year, will be phased out gradually by 2004. The product still will be available for some agricultural uses, although consumer and environmental groups called for a total ban on the insect pest and grub worm killer.

EPA administrator Carol Browner said the phase-out “will significantly eliminate the vast majority of organophosphate insecticide products in and around the home and ... will help encourage consumers to move to safer pest control practices.”

In a statement, Syngenta Crop Protection USA, a unit of Swiss-based Syngenta, said tests showed diazinon was safe, but that declining profit margins had prompted its withdrawal from the diazinon market. “Although it continues to be an effective product, we recognize that diazinon is at the end of its product life cycle,” Syngenta official Eileen Watson said.

The agreement between EPA and the two makers called for:

• Canceling approval for diazinon in household uses on March 2001, and all retail sales must stop by December 2002.



• Manufacturing of the pesticide for lawn, garden and turf uses will end in June 2003 with sales and distribution to retailers stopping in August 2003. Makers will implement a product recovery program in 2004 to assure phase out of use.



• Curtailing production of diazinon for lawn, garden and turf uses by 25 percent in 2002 and by 50 percent in 2003.



• Beginning the process to cancel about 20 different uses of diazinon on food crops. A farm group spokesman told Reuters that diazinon was approved for about 60 crops.

For more information about the phase out of diazinon announced yesterday, please click here: Syngenta To Phase Out Diazinon Insecticide.