http ipmworld umn edu chapters fqpa96 htm Home Chapters Food Quality Protection Act Food Quality Protection Act C DiFonzo difonzo msu edu Department of Entomology Michigan State University East Lansing MI 48824 This document is reproduced with the permission of author C D Difonzo and Michigan State University Presented here is Dr Difonzo s summary statement on the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act from a Michigan State WWW publication ENT 812 Pesticide Policy and Michigan Specialty Crops Food Quality Protection Act Background The Food Quality Protection Act FQPA was passed unanimously by Congress in July 1997 and signed into law in August The Act amends two other pieces of legislation These are 1 the Federal Food Drug and Cosmetic Act FFDCA which covers food safety and tolerances for pesticides in food and 2 the Federal Insecticide Fungicide and Rodenticide Act FIFRA which sets guidelines for pesticide registration classification general versus restricted and use as well as applicator certification Several factors contributed to the passage of FQPA One of these was the Delaney Clause a law passed in 1960 that stipulated a zero tolerance for potential carcinogens in processed food The Delaney Clause attempted to address the possible link between some pesticides and human cancer However the law soon produced problems It did not hold raw foods to the same standard as processed foods hence the Delaney Paradox a pesticide that could legally not be found in any amount in processed foods under Delaney could be used on the raw commodity Another problem was that detection of pesticides improved greatly over the years making a zero tolerance standard difficult to meet Another factor that contributed to the passage of FQPA was a 1993 National Academy of Science that examined pesticides in the diets of infants and children The study pointed out that children are not small versions of adults They instead are growing and developing and therefore have different physiology than adults The study speculated that some pesticides may have a greater impact on growing developing children than on adults so it concluded that food tolerances for pesticides should be lowered to account for the potential differences in sensitivity of children Finally in 1996 Our Stolen Future was published This book dealt with endocrine disrupters compounds which mimic or block hormones It chronicled human health problems linked to endocrine disruption as well as alleged developmental and reproductive effects on wild and domestic animals It also listed actions that could be taken to protect humans from endocrine disrupting compounds some of these suggestions were apparently incorporated into FQPA Changes to FIFRA The FQPA makes several changes to FIFRA Some of the more important changes are highlighted below Reregistration of pesticides The EPA began reregistering pesticides in 1988 That reregistration process will now continue so that each pesticide will be reviewed approximately every 15 years to examine new health safety or efficacy data Reduced risk pesticides The EPA is developing a category of reduced risk pesticides Pesticides which fall into the category such as Bt products will be reviewed at a faster pace Antimicrobial pesticides A new division at EPA was developed to handle registration of antimicrobial pesticides which should streamline the process Minor use definition The old definition of a minor use was a use on a crop grown on less than 300 000 acres That definition is now expanded to include a use that is not supported by the registrant but which i is the only effective alternative ii is safer than other alternatives or iii is important in an IPM program Under this new definition even major crops like corn or soybean could support minor uses if the previously listed criteria are met Minor use incentives FQPA contains incentives for registrants to develop and maintain minor use registrations These include developing a separate minor use program in EPA speeding minor use registrations giving registrants extended exclusive rights for data to support an original registration and providing funds for minor use development programs Changes to FFDCA The changes to the Food Drug and Cosmetic Act are more significant than the changes to FIFRA The overall impact will be to fundamentally change the way tolerances for pesticide residues in food are determined Delaney is Dead The FQPA repeals the Delaney zero tolerance Clause for pesticides Instead the Delaney Clause is replaced with a single health based standard for raw and processed foods The standard requires that tolerances assure with reasonable certainly that no harm will result from aggregate exposure Infants and children Up to a ten fold safety factor can be added to tolerances to protect infants and children This is in addition to the current 100 fold safety factor which is already used to account for the use of animals versus humans in laboratory testing and the variability in potential adult response to pesticide exposure Although the safety factor is geared towards pesticides used on food crops non food pesticides used in areas that could impact children must also provide additional data on potential effects on and safety for children This would include for example pesticides used in swimming pools or applied for mosquito control Toxicity aggregate exposure When setting a tolerance the EPA now must consider aggregate exposure to compounds with a common mechanism of toxicity Aggregate exposure includes not only dietary food sources of residues but also exposure to non food residues through water gardens lawns golf courses pets homes businesses etc Compounds with a common mechanism of toxicity would be such groups as OPs pyrethroids or Bts and would also include pesticides with food and non food uses The risk cup is filled with the risk from aggregate exposure to pesticides with a common mechanisim of toxicity When the risk cup is full registrants must reduce risk prior to adding pesticides to the cup or eliminate uses Review of tolerances All existing tolerances will be reviewed over the next 10 years 33 within 3 years 66 within 6 years and 100 within 10 years The first reviews will focus on the Worst First 1997 B2 probable human carcinogens pesticides which cause cancer in lab animals but human evidence is lacking Includes EBDC fungicides 1998 Organophosphates OPs pesticides which are toxic to humans due to their effect on acetylcholinesterase function