By Frank Giles
It has become standard practice when new presidential administrations of opposing political parties come to office that a raft of executive orders are signed to undo actions of the previous administration.
People in various sectors often look to these executive orders to roll back regulations that might be burdensome to their businesses. That’s true in agriculture, and interested parties are watching what actions President Trump takes in that regard.
One big area of regulatory movement over the past few years has been new rules being written by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) related to the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
The new rules are complicated and will impact how pesticides are registered and applied if a farm finds itself in an area where certain endangered species are located. The EPA has been forced to take these actions due to lawsuits brought by environmental groups that contend the EPA has not adequately accounted for the ESA in its regulation of pesticides. The agency has routinely lost these lawsuits. That has been the key driver in these new rules.
I’ve spoken to several folks in the specialty crop sector who have been monitoring this issue closely and asked the question whether or not this might be one of the regulations that get rolled back with the new administration.
The feedback I received was that it’s difficult to predict. However, the odds are that these regulations are too far along to turn the big ship at EPA around at this point, especially since much of this action has been driven by lawsuit settlements.
President Trump campaigned on climate and energy policies, so executive actions focused on these areas are likely to come. His pick of Lee Zeldin to head the EPA hails from New York City and has never been focused much on agriculture.
So, the bottom line is don’t look for anything to be rolled backed, changed, watered down or put on hold. If you’ve not studied how these new ESA rules will impact your farm, now it the time to get educated.
But there are some positives being reported. Brett Bultemeier, director of the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Pesticide Information Office, has been working very closely with growers to educate them about the changes that are coming.
“I plan to still educate our stakeholders on how to be prepared, what compliance looks like, and what they can do to be the most ready,” he says. “The more time I have spent in the nuts and bolts of these rules, I truly think a huge majority of our farmers will be able to comply without much change to practices. They will have to document more and keep records, but the overall farming practices won’t change much.”
He adds one caveat, which is within the EPA herbicide strategy’s buffer zone reduction requirements. He says these are very complicated and will be confusing to growers. But, on the whole, herbicides will be available and used very similarly to how they are today.
The EPA insecticide strategy might be a different story. Those rules are not as far along as the herbicide strategy and may be more restrictive. But he added that EPA officials have been fairly responsive to agriculture industry concerns as the rules are developed.
“My key message to every group I talk to is to pay attention and be involved with your advocacy groups, because having a collective voice does make a difference,” Bultemeier concludes.