Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Good morning, it's Thursday, April 9. We are going to continue our conversation on H739, an act relating to prohibiting the use and sale of the herbicide paraquat. We have Professor David Mortensen on the Zoom with us today and we're going to hear what Professor and Doctor has to say about Welcome, sir. The floor is yours.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Good morning. Are you guys hearing me okay today?

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: We are.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Sorry for the delay. Yeah. So I as you know, we I visited with your committee about a month ago now or so, and I'm happy to entertain questions or if maybe you could give me a little bit of context about things that would be helpful.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: I don't know. Were you with our committee or were you in the house committee? I don't think we've seen you yet, sir.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Oh, I'm sorry. I see. I was assuming this was the same committee with additional questions. Sorry about that.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: If you're not prepared to give remarks, we can do whatever you'd like to do. If you're going to have time to prepare, we're going to be doing this again tomorrow, or if you are comfortable moving forward, it's totally up to you.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah. I'm I'm I'm fine to go ahead and and move forward. And maybe if there's anything that I that you need follow-up on, I'm happy to get back on tomorrow or some other time.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Fair enough.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Sorry for the confusion.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: It's okay.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: I was out of town and just got back. And yeah. So I I have been working just a little bit of background so that you can have some perspective from where I'm coming from with my comments. I have been working in the field of weed science for the last forty plus years, and that work involved working on farmers' farms in a variety of states. I started out in North Carolina, worked out west at the University of Nebraska, Spent a a period of time down in the Mississippi Delta with the US Department of Agriculture Agriculture Research Service. And all of this work was in the field. Seventeen years in Pennsylvania where I was on the faculty there. I was on the faculty at University of Nebraska Lincoln. And then I moved to the University of New Hampshire in 2018 where I continued to do work in weed management, sustainable agriculture, integrated pest management, while at the same time chairing the Department of Agriculture, Nutrition, and Food Systems at the University of New Hampshire, and I retired about a year and a half ago. Over over that period of time, I was engaged in on farm work, meaning conducting research with farmers on their farms over a range of about 300 farms in those different places. I spent about eight or so years spearheading. I was the head of a nine state Midwestern group of agricultural extension scientists, research scientists, where we were developing a herbicide selection tool that would help farmers and consultants with sorting out weed control efficacy data and cost for weed control programs in the crops that they managed in the Midwest. The tool was called WeedSoft. I've taught for about forty years in the field and integrated pest management, weed science, etcetera. So that's my background. Rose to the title of distinguished professor at Penn State before moving here to the University of New Hampshire. I've, About twenty years ago, I saw the need to be more proactive about making sure the research that we were doing was having an impact where where appropriate, having an impact on policy related to the research we were conducting. So back around 2010, I testified in front of congress on a concern that was an outgrowth of the research we were conducting both on farm and at the research station at Penn State about the concern of genetically modified crops driving the resistance of weeds to glyphosate Roundup herbicide and the the associated increase in herbicide use that was going along with that. And we just published a paper this past year documenting what we projected with models in 2012. Actually, it turned out our models underestimated the increase in herbicide use, but a near doubling in herbicide use on the backs on the back of widespread adoption of genetically modified soybean, corn, and cotton crop, something that we were calling attention to back in 02/1011. And so I just lift that up as an example of a place where I was recognizing that it was gonna be important that we not just publish the papers, and they remain not so widely read to actually engaging in talking about the research outside of the academic space. So it's been a practice of mine to to do that where I see a problem, and I've continued to do that. The use of paraquat has been a concern of mine for, really, actually, since I started in the field in the when would that have been? In the early nineteen eighties where we were backpack applying Paraquat along with a number of other herbicides with a team of of folks that I was working with at the time at North Carolina State University. And there, we were conducting efficacy trials where you would compare how Paraquat did with regard to weed control compared to other herbicides, Blazer, Atrazine, etcetera, etcetera. And I had the unfortunate circumstance along with a couple of us actually where we were applying it with backpack sprayers and in very hot weather where you are exposed to both drift as you walk through the field with the backpack sprayer on your back, and the downside effects of breathing in the suspended particles of the herbicide and feeling the effects of that application. So ever since that time, it was very clear in my mind that we were dealing with a very different herbicide compared to pretty much all of the rest of the herbicides that we were applying those summers in North Carolina. I I would just go on to point out as I did with the other committee that the toxicological personnel Yeah. Yeah.

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: I I just you had mentioned that there were some of thank you, mister chair. I'm sorry. No. No. No. You had mentioned that there were some effects. What were those effects that that you you had when when applying?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: So it was it was commonly referred to by the young folks that I was working with. They happened to be all young guys in their mid twenties to late twenties, early thirties as the knockdown herbicide. And what they meant by that was that if you inhaled, obviously, you're not doing that on purpose or deliberately, but if you were to inhale the herbicide while you were spraying it in the field, it would knock you down to your knees on a hot summer day in coastal plain in North Carolina, and that was the effect that it had on me. So the the so called acute effects are very noticeable and rapid. That was the effect. And when that would happen, you would go back to the pickup truck and take the backpack off and take a break and be back at it later on in the day. But it was it was extreme it was very noticeable. And it was something that led all of us to be very careful and actually not very interested in having to apply the herbicide if we didn't have to.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Isn't that why it is now said not to be applied that way? That you need to, that you should have respiratory equipment on and you should have long shirts on and you should protect yourself.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: I was

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: in that application field forty years ago as well and I saw that a lot of chemicals out there that are still being used today that are used a lot differently because of your experience including Atrazine, including some of the other ones that you mentioned. So it's just learning process over the years of, and that is why we evolve?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: It is a learning process. I agree. However, I would say that this is a real outlier. Sorry. I can't see who I'm speaking with. But Sure. I say it's an outlier because there are no other herbicides that we use that have these effects on the applicator or on any on a field worker picking fruit in a an adjacent field block. There are none that have this effect. The other the other and and what I mean by that is that the one of the indicators of these acute effects one of the indicators, an important one for people working in this field, is the the a term called the lethal dose fifty percent. In laboratory experiments, obviously not with humans, but with mice and other organisms, the LD fifty or lethal dose fifty percent is set by exposing these organisms. I actually did this for less than a year after I graduated college. Worked in a lab where we derived LD fifties for solvents, for cleaning metals, to pesticides, etcetera. The l d fifty is in the ballpark of well, not in the ballpark. It is a hundred fifty milligrams per kilogram of animal body weight, a

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: 150

[Prof. David Mortensen]: compared to most all of the rest of her of the herbicides, which is in the two thousand to ten thousand milligrams per kilogram range. So it's orders of magnitude more. Its acute toxicity is orders of magnitude higher than any other herbicide that we use in Vermont or any any field in The United States where you would be growing crops. The other the other thing I would just say about your your comment about learning and and we now have better equipment and all is that in the time that I spent on so many of those farm fields that I mentioned in Mississippi, Pennsylvania, various places, is that the guidance that is given to farmers and commercial applicators, and and maybe I would say particularly farmers who who are a little less inclined to adhere to all of the label guidances associated with the pesticides they apply. And I I say that with brackets around that comment, that the label constraints that are written by EPA often are very difficult to follow in practice in the field. And I've actually been an outspoken critic of some of these label guidances having to do with, for example, drift where you establish a buffer around the field edge. I have collected data, and I have argued that those buffer definitions derived by the EPA and placed in labels for pesticides. And because I'm a weed expert, I particularly know this about herbicides and drift of herbicides, which is something I studied for fifteen years in in great detail, that those buffer distances are really misleading. Like, for example, they'll talk about the prevailing wind direction is this, and therefore, the buffer distance around the field edge should be this. The unfortunate reality is that there isn't well, while there may be a prevailing wind direction, the wind direction shifts a great deal during the course of a day or during the course even of a spray event when you're out spraying a field. So it could be blowing out of the Northeast for two thirds of the time, but the other third of the time is blowing out of the South, and the buffer distances are all off and underestimating, therefore, the potential for drift, and I've and I've actually measured that that problem. The other the other thing that is problematic is it it there there's no question that when it's really hot in the field, applicators, and I'm not saying all of them, but applicators, some that I've worked with, will cut corners on protective equipment in order to remain comfortable enough to be working on a 95 degree day doing hard work during the course of the day. So I I think that these guidances, in my opinion, need to be taken with a, you know, with a significant number of grains of salt. So so anyway, the the high toxicity of this herbicide coupled with label guidance that in my view is difficult to adhere to under a number of circumstances in the field lead me to be very concerned about the continued use of this herbicide.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: So Professor, I think that you make a lot of great points, but I think you're talking about a lot of areas that aren't Vermont as far as the weather and the the hotness and what we've heard from testimony so far. We're hearing more than not that this chemical is being sprayed early in the morning or late in the afternoon when there is no wind and the temperatures are where they are. We're talking about 125 gallons of product that was bought last year, which admittedly we're not going to be using 125 gallons because of such little bit of use that's being used in Vermont. We are not talking about large acreages of this chemical being sprayed. We're talking about pointed hand spraying with droplet sizes that are a lot less apt to drip. So that's where, you know, I have not a doubt of your qualifications and that your concerns about the chemical in itself. We're trying to kind of size it up to how it is being used. I also have another burning thing in my brain. It tells me that of all the agriculture states in this country and the amount of acreage that's being out there that we have picked on this one state to ban it when all these other, you don't mention being in California or those areas, but you have up and down the coastal Eastern Coast, you certainly have enough agricultural fields to go. And I have to wonder out loud why when they're using thousands of gallons of this chemical elsewhere and we're using 100 gallons or less per year. Why aren't those other states concerned?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: I I am not an expert on what state is doing what with this herbicide. I believe that it it would be agriculture in The United States would be well served to ban the herbicide. The herbicide has been banned in 70 countries around the world. The United States has dragged its feet, and and I provided quite a bit of literature to the last committee. If you'd like to read more about how it is that we have been passive about banning compounds that are dangerous for farmers to use and for members of the community that live near that live near those places where the herbicide is being sprayed. This this is not a safe compound for weed control, particularly not when we have alternatives to it. Why is it that there's a move in Vermont? I I I think Vermont is a more progressive place, I would say. That's my my qualitative decision about looking at trying to improve the safety of agriculture. Vermont has a very interesting program that I learned about while I was preparing to talk with your group called Eco Fruit Program that states explicitly that it's emphasizing ecologically oriented farming practices to reduce reliance on pesticides so that they're the last resort in farming. I think this is wonderful that that's the case. Vermont, out of the 10,000 acres from the research that I did preparing for the to talk with your group today, out of the 10,000 acres of vegetables, fruits, and berries, 2,000 of those are organic acres. There's what what was the statistic? In in in any case, there it's you have a progressive agriculture. You have a community of citizens that are concerned, farmers that are concerned about doing the right sorts of things and not using compounds that are hard on humans as well as hard on the environment. And I think those are probably some of the reasons why Vermont is moving ahead to consider the ban, implement the ban.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: Thank you, Mr. Jackson. Question for you. You were saying, what other herbicides would you think would be as useful? We've heard from the growers that are using it that Faraquat, even though it has lethal as it can be, is one of the most effective and quickest to not affect the surrounding plant. Like Roundup will, if they touch their, they touch the roots of the plant that they're trying to protect, kills it. Do you know of any other besides Roundup or I think they gave us one other name and that ends up making, having an effect on the tree. So in all your research, have you found one that is similar to Paraquat that isn't as lethal?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yes. Yeah. So one of one of the things that could help inform your group is the New England Small Fruit Guide. I don't know. It's I'm sure some of you are very familiar with it, and others of you maybe are less familiar with it. But there's there are sections in there for weed control in the crops that you grow in in Vermont. I while I was the chair of the department here at in New Hampshire, members of the department were actively and I I would help with it, but members of the department were actively engaged, particularly those with extension appointments in informing that New England small fruit guide. And and in that guide, along with talking with some farmers here in New Hampshire, there are a number of alternative compounds that could be used. I I was I'm aware that one of the uses that that you're you've been concerned about being able to perform is a directed application in the inter row space in the strawberries. Things like just to give you some names of products and active ingredients, things like carfentrazone, flazifop, cethoxydim. These are post compounds that will burn or kill emerged vegetation in the same way that paraquat will. Of course, there are gonna be some subtle differences between the compounds. Aciflorefin or Blazer, bicyclopyrone, these are all listed as post emergence vegetation control in strawberries with directed hooded sprayers. There's actually there are several tables in there with alternatives. Some of those alternatives are more expensive. Some of those alternatives are the same price as using paraquat in that kind of an application. In addition to that, there's a very helpful section on how you would pair preemergence herbicides that are some of which have foliar activity, meaning they some of those will control emerged plants while others of them only control germinating seeds in the soil where you would pair a residual herbicide like that with a perhaps lower dose of the burn down vegetation control herbicide later in the summer. So there would be quite a few options that would work in that setting.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: So I have a question for you. You you keep mentioning spraying. The testimony we took indicates there is no aerial spraying being done in Vermont with this chemical. And it's not a direct injection, much like we do with fertilizer and other products, but it's probably as close to direct application as you can get. The wand, from what we understand, that farmers are using is only inches away from the ground, so I do not know how much drift there would be. I think the chair had mentioned that, too. When someone says spraying to me, I understand that that may mean more than what we're talking about in terms of allocation. The second point I ask is whether there's any data to indicate that in Vermont we've had someone misuse this to the point where they're medically in jeopardy. I know that the research has shown that people that live around the farm that's using it are somehow compromised, but there's been other environmental factors like age that come into play there. I don't know that there's any direct causation. The third point I'd make is if it's this bad, why isn't the EPA weighed in on this and banned it itself? Then the last point I'd make, are you familiar with the European Society of Medicine?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Okay. Let me see if I can. Think there were

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: I've got them all written down in case we need to

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: go back to the first one.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Okay.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: The area of spraying is the first question.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: We're not doing that.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Right. So so when the herbicide is applied, and and I don't mean to sound like I'm lecturing here. Please cut me off if if it's not helpful.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: We're we're going to learn. Whatever point and however you wanna get it across, we are out to

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah. Okay. So so basically, there there are a range of ways of applying the herbicide. And to my knowledge, though I am not an expert on aerial spraying in Vermont, I would think that most all of it is being applied on the ground as you've said. Yep. As you've indicated. I'm aware that it could be applied if if you're gonna go in to a field and before the crop is in the ground, you could apply paraquat broadcast and burn down the whole field. If the strawberries were in the ground already, you would not do that because the the herbicide is nonselective. So it would burn whatever is out there in the way of plants. Therefore, my understanding is that most of it is used in the inter row space between most likely plastic bedded rows of strawberries or mulched strawberries and then spraying the row metals as the weed control practice. Most of that, I understand, is post directed with some sort of hooded sprayer that would reduce drift into the strawberry row. One of the reasons to still be concerned about that is that you could you can have drift from a hooded sprayer. You can also the the other concern is that volatilization losses, which is to say, once the herbicide has been sprayed and has hit some surface, the soil, plants, crop residue, plastic, Once it's hit that surface, it can then leave that surface as a gas if the compound is volatile. We have thought, based on the data that we had from the Environmental Protection Agency all these years, the herbicide's been used for going on sixty three years now. We have thought that the herbicide would had a very, very low volatility based on the data that was made available by Syngenta and by the Environmental Protection Agency In a rather remarkable report from the Environmental Protection Agency published 10/30/2025, so just last fall, the EPA changed the volatility coefficients for paraquat and indicated that after sixty two years of use of paraquat, we now understand from the EPA that the volatility of the herbicide is some 4,000 fold higher than was previously thought. So what does that mean? That means that the herbicide is much where in the past we thought that when you applied paraquat, it was bound to the soil or to the plastic or to the crop residue and tightly bound in a way that it wasn't rereleased as a gas. We now know based on this 10/30/2025 EPA report that the herbicide is some 4,000 fold more volatile. Their models, the EPA's models, indicate that the herbicide from this form of movement alone can move up to 2.7 miles away from the sprayed area. That's a rather astounding recognition on the part of the Environmental Protection Agency of I don't know. I'm not sure what best way to to describe that. It seems perhaps incompetence or perhaps just a serious series of miscalculations or whatever. But we now would expect that the herbicide can move great distances up to 2.7 miles from the sprayed target.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Okay. But they still have not banned. Correct?

[Prof. David Mortensen]: They still have not banned it. It's it's under review now

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: by

[Prof. David Mortensen]: our AML protection agency, and that report came out as as I've already said in October. So that's that's recent information. So so to the first point then that we don't spray it aerially, I think you were at least it sounded to me like you were implying, therefore, it's not likely to move. In fact, the fact that it's applied on the ground and is so volatile would mean that it almost certainly is moving away from the sprayed target.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Not sure I would have said not likely, but maybe less likely. But you're

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Less less whatever. Your

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: point's well said.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah. What was the second one was?

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Just the EPA not doing anything about it yet, and I'm still looking for data to suggest that the use has a definite causal relationship between Parkinson's disease and the usage of paraquat. I don't know where that data is. We did see testimony that linked farms that use it with neighbors, and I don't know whether they would fall into that two point whatever mile area, but we also had from the person that did the research admitted that some of that was probably due to the fact that it's a very old county and as people age, they're more likely to contract Parkinson's than someone in their 20s and 30s. I just didn't know if you had any data to suggest the specific relationship between the disease and the usage of Teraqua. And then the last one was the European Society of Medicine and the study that we were sent, to to take a look at.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yep. Yep. Okay. In so, basically, the the there's been a lot a lot of work has been done on on the epidemiological effects of the use of paraquat, as you probably know. And I'm thinking you're probably referring to the Douglas Weed paper published in 2021 on paraquat, one of the met one of the several meta analysis papers that have been published. One of the things that that is the most is most compelling from these epidemiological studies is where you have good longitudinal data. Longitudinal data would be data over a longer period of time and where you are not relying on the the folks that are participating in the survey to be the source of information about their health and about where they lived this year and that year over the course of this longitudinal study. They're actually pretty rare studies like that because they're very expensive to conduct and they require the community to cooperate with the researchers and the researchers to be around for a long time to conduct the research. So they're not that common. In my opinion, the best paper of that kind and the most recent paper of that kind was published in 2024 in the International Journal of Epidemiology. The so the first author, Paul, you may have heard about this paper from someone else that you've spoken with. I'm happy to send any of these references, and I have PDFs, paper copies, or digital copies of a number of these. If it's helpful for you guys to look at, I'm happy to share them with you.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: That would be helpful. It is a Doug Wheat, article I'm looking at. It was actually 2024, not 2021.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: 2024. Okay.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Yeah. Conclusion was that there was no provable relationship between using paraquat and contracting Parkinson's. His words, not mine.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yep. Yep. Let me let me finish. Sure. And I'll be brief. But let me finish on the on the Paul paper, and then I'm I'm happy to share my my thoughts about the Weed paper. It's funny that his name is Weed when he's writing about a herbicide that kills. Anyway, so the Paul paper was was a paper where they were looking at a community of citizens, some farmer farmer slash applicator slash field workers, and then folks that lived within, I believe it was a 500 meter distance of the fields that that are being managed agriculturally in California. And that study found a strong correlation between folks that worked in the fields and applied the herbicide and a higher likelihood of having gotten Parkinson's disease

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: K.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Over over the period of the study. So when I say longitudinal, the longitudinal, my recollection is that was about a twenty year period, or they were looking at at someone that lived in a house or someone who worked on a farm, let's say, in 2000, and then they come back and the sample group of people that agreed to participate in the study then would see a physician that the researchers were working with, and the physicians would be able to then determine the health of the participants of the study. And then they're compared to a group that didn't apply the herbicides and that didn't live, you know, the incidence of Parkinson's disease to the control group. And and the the way that this is expressed then is something called an odds ratio. If you are equally likely in the in the control group to have Parkinson's degree disease at age 60, let's say, as in the group that was applying the herbicide, the you would be dividing the likelihood of getting Parkinson's disease in the applicator group by the likelihood of having Parkinson's degree disease in the control group. And that odds ratio then indicates a correlation if there is any relationship, right? If it's one to one, then it means that nobody's got more or less Parkinson's disease. If it's larger than one, then the odds ratio is indicating it's more likely that the group that was, let's say, applying herbicides has a higher incidence of Parkinson's disease. That study indicates that farmers and applicators were about the odds ratio was about two. So twice as likely in in that odds ratio analysis. And I think the community that lived near by over that period of time was like 1.7 or something like that. And that's some 1,500 or 2,000 participants in the survey. That's that and and that is you have these controlled experiments with animals where they do all these very specific tests. These these are so called model system animals like mice or rats, macaque monkeys, whatever the group is that you're working with the testing on. Of course, there they can do things where you're subjecting the organisms to a toxicant and then looking at the response of the toxicant. And there's quite a strong body of evidence to suggest in those control animal studies that paraquat has a number of very concerning experimental effects on the animals. Obviously, we don't do that with humans. That goes without saying. So the best data we have for humans are these epidemiological trials, where you're looking at correlation between, let's say, did he did someone apply it? Was was there some measurable impact of having applied it? If Did they live near where it was applied? Was there some measurable impact of living near where it was applied? So we think of that as a correlative study. Those studies are not designed to demonstrate causation.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Thank you. I appreciate that. Look forward to seeing that report.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: They say correlation is not proof.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: I was just gonna say.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: So, and then I've just been chatting this in the past why other countries have banned it. Most of it is because of the misuse of it. Australia acknowledges that it's a, I'm not even gonna try to pronounce the word, but it's inconsistent and inefficient to establish caus- causa- causation. And then even Japan recognizes its potential risk, but it's not conclusive enough to link Parkinson's as that's what Japan has found. So it sounds like some of the others, again, it's, what we're hearing here by the applicators that it's a tool that they can use and if they use it safely and at minimal effect that the things that we're talking about today are less likely, like you're saying, the downwind hazard and that being, they use less than 15 gallons, most of the applicators, and we're gonna find more. We're trying to find a high application use here in Vermont, but most of them are 30 gallons or less per use. And that's 30 gallons of mixed paraquapna, so it's only like a half a pint. Having that, it's hard to say it- for me anyway, it's hard to say, Hey, we need to ban this completely, if you have a special use for it. Because there's many chemicals that are very bad out there. They have a special use, and if they're not misused, they're the best chemical to use. Would you counter that with an What would you counter that with to say, Hey, this small use is not worth using because

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah. I would say that I think it's good that Vermont is less reliant on paraquad first. I I think that's a good thing. I am of the opinion that well, actually, maybe just back up on a comment that you made about the reasons that countries ban the herbicide was, I think you said, was because it was being misused. I believe you said that.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: Yes. What they said about, like, The United States, we have a strict, you need to be licensed, you need to know the precautions, the PPE you're supposed to wear. It's very regulated and you're supposed to have to be trained.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Right. Right.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: The countries I did

[Prof. David Mortensen]: would say on that point, I don't agree with you. I agree that we have a training program. I agree. And and it's a good training program. Paracord is banned in Europe. I've spent a fair amount of time working in England, in The Netherlands, in Spain, in the fields there. They also have an excellent environmental protection agency like a series of organizations, and it's banned throughout Europe. It's banned in England where they manufacture paraquat, and they sell it to us. It's banned in Switzerland where they manufacture paraquat. It's banned in China where they manufacture paraquat. We don't manufacture paraquat here. We buy the active ingredient from those three places. And now Syngenta has decided that they are not going to continue the manufacture and sales of Paraquat in the I think beginning in June. So it's it may be the case, and it is from what I understand, the motivation behind it being banned in some of the countries in Southeast Asia was driven by acute poisonings, like suicide and and mistaken drinking of paraquat where it was put in a drink bottle or something and someone a child mistakenly drank the stuff. But it is the case in other places with high-tech ag, highly regulated ag, where the herbicide is banned because of the concern about applicator exposure and exposure to folks living near fields that are being sprayed. So anyway, so in in that that that I would say is is pretty for me, that's pretty compelling that that the places with a high level of training on pesticide use have decided to ban the use of the herbicide. The fact that it's a small amount being used in Vermont compared to how much is used in California or something like that, I don't find that to be a very compelling argument to to say that, therefore, it will be safer for the applicators in in Vermont and folks living near the fields that are being sprayed in Vermont. That's that's my opinion. And I say that based on the toxicological properties of the herbicide are the same in California as they are in Vermont. There may have been another question or two there that I didn't answer. I should have jotted them down when you I think went

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: that if you told us what you'd like us to know, I think that our committee is good with your testimony.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah, if there is anything else that I can say.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: We do have a question, Professor. Senator Delamore had talked about the Douglas Weed article that was sent to us, and I know that there was one that was published in 2021. I don't know if the twenty twenty four one is any different, If you're aware of that, you can analyze it off the cuff, so to speak, that would be great. If not, then it would be better if you actually digested it and be able to give us some analysis.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Yeah. So the one of one of the points of at least one of those papers, and I and the the fellow that the gentleman that was that had had asked the four questions earlier, you know, was was pointing out that that that paper had had said that there is no causal relationship. I believe those were your words. Yeah. And and that the the data in from these epidemiological studies will will demonstrate correlations between user pattern folks living in an area nearby. They're not intended to demonstrate causation. So the very title of one of his papers about causation, I think, is misleading because these epidemiological studies are not intended to do that in the first place. Right? That's that's like controlled experiments with subject organisms. The epidemiological studies are intended to explore whether there is a correlation in the test community between proximity to a nuclear power plant or herbicide or a, you know, whatever toxic spill in the Mississippi Delta or something like that. So I think the title is provocative, and the title, in my opinion, is misleading. I paged through the paper. I haven't done a deep dive on the paper. Another another thing that concerns me looking at at least one of these papers by by the author, and this would apply to anything that he's written, is that he doesn't list his affiliation there to a research person. This is very important to understand what is the affiliation of the author. Are they affiliated with the university? Are they affiliated with Syngenta, the manufacturer of Paraquad? And it turns out for the last much of this individual's career, he's been an expert witness for Syngenta on paraquat lawsuit cases. That to me, as a scientist and not not wanting to sound like I'm coming off as a, like, eggheaded academic, that is to me a conflict of interest or at least certainly smells like a conflict of interest. When I was chairing National Research Program in DC, one of the first things that we would do is you would have to demonstrate as an individual that you're not conflicted with the agency we were working with and the funding that we were going to make available to researchers. And you certainly had to publish and share your affiliation. So that would be a concern of mine as well. I've I find the Paul paper addresses all of these concerns. It's not a meta analysis, but is it a compelling finding and and leads me to continue to be very concerned about the use of paraquat herbicide for weed control when alternatives are available.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Thank you. Well, thank you. Thank you for your time. If we have any more that we would need to have some clarification, we will reach out and if you have more thoughts and if you want to follow the progress around, by all means, reach out to us and we'll let you know. We have more testimony. We will be back and talking about this subject tomorrow with apple growers and any other folks that are using the chemical or may not be using the chemical. Just trying to get their opinion on trying to give us more knowledge. I don't know where we are as a committee on this. We haven't really talked about it. I would say we are somewhat divided if I had to guess, but we're just trying to get to what is going to be best for Vermont farmers, and your testimony was valuable.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Okay. It was nice.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you. Yep.

[Prof. David Mortensen]: Okay. Very good. Take care.

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: Have a good day.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: So

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: it was a it was a battle in the EU EU to ban. Is your source? EBT? E E, it's- I don't wanna listen to it. Well, it's still saying that there was an issue. I can now Google that, but it's like- But the same thing what we have there is the farmers are saying this is a vital tool and then environmental groups said, is it worth the risk? EU decided, said it's not worth the risk. And that's why it got banned.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: Well, I'm, curious about trauma.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Me too. You know, I'm

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: gonna hear, and I would suspect these orchard growers, they they're currently using it, or they're using I

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: would like to orchard. I know. Oh, okay.

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: I guess not

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: probably. Southern orchards is a fan of the challenge. So this part of where it was

[Sen. Joseph "Joe" Major (Vice Chair)]: sold, I don't know.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: I haven't talked to somebody about this.

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: But also if if they're not using it, what alternative are they using it? What are they using? And also, the application, just someone saying what the application is, more people saying what the application is. And if there's any there's there's been any, ill effects as well, because I just

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: I think that's what I'm trying to focus on most myself, is is it a problem in Vermont? That's I get it. I get what they're talking about, and I guess, you know, is it problem here? And I guess I would feel better about it if other states who are using a lot of this chemical would be the leader of this. Well, I looked up, and again, no other legislation- No. That's being considered. No, that's not true. There are other states considering it. There's no other state that

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Member)]: has banned it. California uses half a million gallons of this. Yeah, I'll

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: be curious to find out, in terms of, because we talked about our one billionaire per launch, but per capita, we're in the top half of per capita billionaire. So I'm curious about per capita usage of it, and also I kinda wanna just know what's the cost difference, because that's what really boils down to, is it's gotta be easier, so it's less costly to use. How much more does it cost you to save more?

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: I have to four seconds. I

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: get Well, ultimately that leads to you know, yield, and ultimately it's the cost. If you grow more, you make more, and so what's the cost of your life savers, you know, whatever else? Those are my helpful questions. So,

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: like I said, for me, I just need some more testing, just to get a fuller understanding. You know, I I am I leaning away, but I I just and and is there a compromise? Is there a compromise that we can come up with to to see so let and this like I said, this is for me.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Let's let's take a testimony until it becomes clear. Yep. Where where you guys can take a stand of wherever you wanna be on it and be able to defend it.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Clerk)]: Where I'd love to get Yeah.

[Sen. Robert Plunkett (Member)]: Well, then we'll with that.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: There we go. Okay. Are we good for today? Linda, we'll go off, please.