08/08/08 Biomonitoring; a new strategy from ag chem opponents

Washington Ag August 8, 2008 West coast states are at the epicenter of the issues facing the crop protection chemical industry across the U.S. That's what Jeff Case of CropLife America, an industry trade association, told those attending this week's Far West Agribusiness Association's Annual Managers meeting in Spokane. Case said a new issue that is emerging is activist organization pursuit of laws requiring biomonitoring. Case: "One was actually passed in California that would require the state to basically test people to see what kind of chemicals are bio-accumulating in their bodies. So they would take blood tests and determine what low levels of man-made toxins are in their blood stream and then try and draw some kind of relationship to health effects to what they are finding." Case said products are subject to over 120 different tests, some costing five million dollars each, before they are brought to market, so he thinks it's a stretch to think anything will be found that isn't already known. I'm Bob Hoff.