News Releases from Region 09
EPA takes action to protect agricultural workers in Nevada
SAN FRANCISCO -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency fined Moana Nursery in Reno, Nev. $2,640 and issued a warning to Genoa Trees and Landscape Materials of Minden, Nev. for violating federal pesticide worker safety laws. These actions are part of a larger effort focused on the enforcement of requirements that protect farm and nursery workers from the risk of illness due to pesticide exposure.
The violations were discovered during inspections conducted in June 2015 by the Nevada Department of Agriculture and referred to the EPA for enforcement.
“Notifying workers about pesticide applications and medical information is essential to protecting their health, and the health of their families,” said Kathleen Johnson, EPA’s Enforcement Division Director for the Pacific Southwest. “We appreciate the opportunity to work with our state partners in this important public health action.”
Moana Nursery failed to provide appropriate pesticide safety training to its workers, failed to display required information notifying its workers of a recent pesticide application, and failed to display emergency medical information for its workers. Genoa Trees and Landscape Materials had similar violations, failing to provide safety training to its workers, and also failing to display required information notifying its workers of recent pesticide applications.
The Worker Protection Standard, part of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, aims to protect workers from occupational exposure to pesticides. The standard contains requirements for pesticide safety training, decontamination supplies, emergency medical assistance, personal protective equipment, as well as restrictions on reentry into fields where pesticides have been recently applied. EPA recently strengthened these standards, with many of the new requirements going into effect in January 2017.
For more information on the federal regulation and enforcement of pesticides, please visit http://www.epa.gov/pesticides
For further information on the Worker Protection Standard, please visit: https://www.epa.gov/pesticide-worker-safety/revisions-worker-protection-standard
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