Challenges and Successes of the EPA's Pesticide Environmental ...

Partnership Programs at EPA OPP• Environmental Stewardship Branch:• Pesticide Environmental StewardshipProgram (PESP)• IR-4 Bio-demonstration Project• Lawn & the Environment• Golf & the Environment• Strategic Ag. Initiative

Partnership Programs Gaining Momentum• Partnership programs are taking on increasedimportance at the EPA• The value of innovative approaches toenvironmental issues is becoming more clear• The EPA is using partnership programs as acomplimentary tool to regulatory activities• However, with this new visibility comes newscrutiny• Measuring the success of these partnershipprograms is critical in the coming years

Measuring our Success of PartnershipPrograms• Taking on a renewed focus within the EPA• Following a larger trend in business,government, and charity – a stronger focus onaccountability• Within EPA, partnership programs are beingevaluated – defining programs, evaluatingefficiency and impact, working towards someglobal recommendations

How does this Impact our Partners in thePesticide User Community ?• Measuring impacts of PESP projects becomescritical• Picking successful collaborations – partners,expected outcome, scale up potential, impact• Agriculture (diverse commodities)• Non-agriculture (schools, residences,commercial buildings, golf courses and more)• Energy Star – PESP communications challenges

Emerging Topics for PESP• Concept, partners, how can we measure thesuccess• Power of food processors and certificationprograms• Community IPM – where we live, work, learn, andplay• Communication potential from the scale up fromproject level to larger success – ADOPTION• Invest resources to demonstrate an innovativetechnique – the broader adoption is a truemeasure of the success

Future Challenge – Technology Transfer• EPA and partners often work together to eitherresearch or demonstrate new Integrated PestManagement (IPM) practices• Adoption of these practices will allow us todocument the broader impact of our researchdollars• Documenting the adoption also sets thefoundation for building a success storyregarding human and ecological health impactof an IPM technique

What our Partners Bring to the Table• They provide a great platform to develop anddocument IPM success• A commitment to human and ecological healthissues and to being good neighbors• Many PESP sectors (like the golf industry)have education system that can adjust toenvironmental stewardship issues and trends• Already have 180+ PESP partnerships in place

What do we need to do Better?• I need to work harder to better characterize ourchallenges and success (properlycharacterizing our successes as compared toother programs like Energy Star)• Pesticide environmental stewardship iscomplex, situational, location, topographical,and thus is hard to define what success lookslike – education both with pesticide users andwithin the EPA• EPA needs to do a better job of describingwhat data we need to frame our partnershipsuccesses in a pesticide risk reduction context

What do we need to do Better (continued)?• Partners to continue your environmentalstewardship efforts• Work to frame your successful techniques inways that others will be able to adopt the newpractices• Document and communicate success in termsof the EPA label: did you reduce the amountused, the applications needed to achievecontrol? An IPM practice that “beats” the labeluse directions is a fundamental way tomeasure success

What do we need to do Better (continued)?• Document the adoption of IPM practices andwhere appropriate share with us at the EPA• PESP can help you frame your success, reachnew partners, and document the progress yourmaking

Final Thought• Documenting and promoting the success ofyour efforts is taking on new importance• Partnership programs are under new scrutinyto show their value and efficiency• Partners who develop and share IPM practicesdemonstrate the innovation and commitmentto stewardship values that cast the bestpossible light on our EPA partnershipprograms• Welcome your help and in turn work to helpyou efforts get the recognition they deserve

Thank youTom BrennanBrennan.thomas@epa.gov(703) 306-0540