Agricultural News
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Denies Activists Petition for Immediate Stoppage of Dicamba Use in Cotton and Soybeans
Sat, 20 Jun 2020 11:17:43 CDT
Word came late Friday that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has rejected the petition from several environmental activists groups to immediately stop all use of several Dicamba products on millions of acres of soybeans and cotton. Earlier in the week- EPA defended its decision to allow farmers to continue to use the three vacated dicamba herbicides -- XtendiMax, FeXapan and Engenia -- and asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to throw out a motion filed to hold the federal agency in contempt.
After word that the Court has sided with EPA and their plans to allow existing stocks of Dicamba to be used until July 31st- the American Soybean Association offered the following statement:
The American Soybean Association (ASA) is pleased that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has chosen to support the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) legal authority and deny a petition that sought to invalidate EPA's Cancellation and Existing Stocks Order issued June 8. Congress has provided for the certainty needed by growers in critical times like planting season right now by equipping EPA with the "existing stocks" authority it exercised in its June 3 guidance to growers.
Additionally, during its series of late evening orders June 19, the Court granted both CropLife America's and a Grower coalition's requests to file an amicus brief. The grower request was filed June 16 by ASA, American Farm Bureau Federation, National Cotton Council of America, National Association of Wheat Growers, National Corn Growers Association, and National Sorghum Producers, and supports EPA's existing stocks decision. That brief highlighted the devastating consequences that would result if the NGO's request were granted and growers could not use existing stocks.
EPA's long-established policy and practice under FIFRA provides for an orderly management of the distribution, sale, and use of existing stocks of a formerly registered pesticide product, including as in this instance in the context of vacatur. Immediately banning use of existing stocks of Xtendimax, Engenia, and FeXapan would have financially devastating consequences on America's soybean growers, who have invested an estimated $3.35 billion for soybean seed in 2020 and hundreds of millions of dollars more in herbicides, labor, fertilizer and other costs, expecting that over-the-top applications of dicamba would remain lawful.
American growers and the public are fortunate that a proper administrative and judicial-review framework exists. Farmers use countless FIFRA-regulated pesticide products, including herbicides, insecticides and fungicides. They make planting decisions and significant, up-front financial investments based on the rules and regulations in place at the time plans are made. Soy farmers are dependent on those rules not changing in the middle of the game and are glad the Court got it right in these orders.
Source- American Soybean Association
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