Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Almonds are the number-one crop nationwide using diazinon, followed
by prunes, even though only a fraction of growers apply it annually.
Diazinon use was and is a problem for conventional almond growers and
regulators, not to mention birds and aquatic organisms.
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In the 1970s, UC had promoted the use of diazinon in IPM. When
DDT was banned, many growers had simply replaced it with in-season
organophosphate sprays, exposing farm workers and wildlife to its acute
toxicity and disrupting the summer activity of beneficial insects. A dor-
mant season application of diazinon reduces some of these risks, but
when applied in the wet California winter, it is a vagabond chemical,
readily migrating to streams, rivers, and ultimately to the San Francisco
Bay/Delta before it degrades. In 1987, scientists first identified diazinon
here as a primary water pollutant, and traced it back to orchards and
alfalfa fields. Simultaneously, another group of scientists discovered that
diazanon and other agrochemicals were transported and concentrated by
winter fog in the Central Valley, implicating them as public and environ-
mental contaminants.
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In 1992, the USEPA cancelled ethyl parathion, the
other organophosphate used in dormant sprays, so diazinon use among
almond and prune growers actually increased. Pesticide policy critics
argued that simply swapping new pesticides for older ones as their envi-
ronmental problems became known was an endless holding pattern, and
failed to address the fundamental problems of how growers and agricul-
tural scientists conceptualized the role of pesticides in farming systems.
Diazinon's environmental behavior focused regulatory agency interest
in alternatives. Feder provided some initial funds for almond BIOS,
and then when the first year's results indicated dramatic reductions
in agrochemical use, he argued successfully that support for this kind
of community-based, grassroots project achieved the agency's pollution-
prevention goals far more efficiently than regulatory actions. His
supervisors could not resist his claim that voluntary initiatives were a
more efficient strategy to prevent pollution and achieve agency goals.
Almond BIOS conducted agricultural extension in parallel to—or com-
petition with—conventional UC efforts. Many UC Farm Advisors did
not take kindly to a non-governmental organization (NGO) competing
with them by creating an “alternative extension model,” with its implicit
critique. Indeed, several CAFF staffers explicitly attacked UC for failing
to support BIOS in particular, and pesticide reduction and small growers
