Although the term "minor use" doesn't sound significant, in reality it is—very much so. Minor use pesticides are applied to "minor use" crops. And minor use crops include many of our fruits, vegetables, nuts, ornamentals, and nursery products.

Although grown on only 8 million acres in the United States, minor crops are valued at around $24 billion annually, about 40 percent of all agricultural crop sales.

In general, minor use of a pesticide in the United States means it is applied on a commercial agricultural crop or site to protect public health when the crop is grown on less than a total of 300,000 acres. The term also applies when the use on a major crop does not provide an economically viable return sufficient to merit pesticide registration with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which can be an expensive process. There usually isn't sufficient economic incentive for registrants to provide data to support initial or continuing registration of the pesticides. About 70 percent of registration and reregistration actions by EPA's Office of Pesticide Programs involve minor use pesticides.

Methyl bromide is the primary fumigant used to protect minor crops from soil pathogens and to meet export-import phytosanitary requirements. And since there are only three crop seasons remaining before this fumigant is banned, concern is growing throughout the agricultural community. How will growers of minor crops survive this loss?

Minor crops are so important that Congress requires the EPA to consult growers on minor use issues, registrations, and amendments. The vehicle that carries specific congressional language to this effect is the new Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA).

The new FQPA, which became effective on August 3, 1996, mandated the establishment of minor-use programs in the USDA and in EPA. Often, potential registrants of alternative pesticides for minor crops have opted not to remain in the marketplace because of the cost of producing data required to register minor-use pesticides.

Because the new FQPA sets a higher standard for conventional pesticides, it encourages development of reduced-risk pesticides. As part of implementing the new act, USDA, EPA, and the Minor Crop Farmer Alliance held a news conference on September 8 to announce new plans.

"USDA has a new approach to the minor use pesticide issues," says Edward Knipling, acting administrator of the Agricultural Research Service (ARS). "Deputy Secretary Richard Rominger has established the Office of Pest Management to integrate and coordinate pesticide issues within USDA, while working with EPA, grower organizations, and crop specialists at land grant institutions. The expected results are accurate, high-quality data on pesticide use practices for regulatory decision making."

At the same time, EPA created a Minor Use Program Team charged to work closely with USDA, grower organizations, registrants, and other stakeholders to get the best data available.

Both new groups will work hard to develop an open dialogue with the minor use community and to promote development of safer pesticides for minor uses.

"USDA and EPA have been working to get funds to collect additional data on children's food consumption patterns and to collect pesticide residue information. These efforts are mandated by the Food Quality Protection Act, which requires that minor use issues be handled in a more efficient, coordinated, cross-agency way," Knipling reports.

The new group at USDA will coordinate issues such as pesticide use surveys, minor use registration data development, pesticide residue data, food consumption surveys, the pest management activities program, and integrated pest management.

"We recognize that maintaining a close, cooperative relationship with EPA is vital to ensure that the best possible data are given those at EPA who will make regulatory decisions on these issues," Knipling explains. "And because most of the pertinent information must come from growers and crop specialists at land grant institutions, our new Office of Pest Management will strengthen our cooperation and communication with them."

"In addition to initiating a minor use program in EPA, we're also offering incentives to manufacturers of minor use pesticides," reports Stephen Johnson, deputy director of EPA's Office of Pesticides Program. On a case-by-case basis, the new act allows EPA to

• extend time for exclusive use and submission of residue data,
• be flexible on data requirements,
• expedite registration,
• allow adequate time for submitting minor use data,
• extend, temporarily, continued use of unsupported uses,
• extend the comment period for voluntary cancellation to 180 days.

In ARS, Knipling says that Interregional Project No. 4 (IR-4) will continue to be a major part of USDA's minor use program.

"For years we've carried out major work on the minor use program through IR-4 research, which is partially funded from ARS congressional appropriations," he says. "The priorities have been on registering and reregistering pesticides for food crops, registering pesticides for ornamental crops, and registering biological pest control products for minor crops."

USDA's Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service supports IR-4 through its Special Research Grant Program and from regional research funds earmarked by state experiment stations.

Established at the request of the state agricultural experiment stations in 1963, IR-4, with an annual budget of more than $8 million, is headed by Richard T. Guest, New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station/Cook College/Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey. Its purpose: collect data to support minor use registrations.

"The minor use issue could mean major problems if we don't find alternatives for growers when methyl bromide is banned in 2001," says Kenneth W. Vick, USDA methyl bromide coordinator. "If pest-induced losses increase, not only would growers be affected, but consumers would feel the pinch as well. Crop losses mean fewer products on the market and increased prices for what is available."

Dan Botts, chairman of the Minor Crop Farmer Alliance's Technical Committee, is encouraged by the recent joint action by USDA and EPA. He thinks there is hope for growers of minor crops.

"We've worked closely with USDA and EPA over the past year to establish these new offices that will address the concerns over minor crops. And we feel confident that producers' needs and interests will be more efficiently addressed under the current cooperative spirit between these two agencies," Botts says.