The Role of Pesticide Safety Education

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The Role of Pesticide Safety Education

• Joanne Kick-Raack
• The Ohio State University Extension

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Different Viewpoints of Certification Training

• Means to get a job, keep a job or get a
  promotion/raise
• Way to enhance companys credibility, marketing
  tool
• Necessary/Unnecessary cost
• Indoctrination-deliberately tell them what to
  think, believe and do.
• Provide information and develop skills for good
  decision making and practices

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• Education plays a key role
• In influencing human decisions, attitudes, and
  behavior in the real world by providing reliable
  information and developing critical
  decision-making skills
• And ultimately reaching human and environmental
  protection goals

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Integrated Pesticide Risk Reduction Program

• Proper registration and labeling
• Enforcement
• Education

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Importance of Training

• One of the most important underlying
  philosophies of FIFRA relates to knowledge and
  competency. What really happened was that
  Congress had given formal endorsement to the
  principle that training is a reliable and
  workable ingredient in a regulatory process. It
  is the legal recognition of the essentiality of
  education and the competent person.
• John Osmun, Professor Emeritus, Purdue University

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• Congress also amended FIFRA to clarify EPAs
  obligation to appropriate funds annually, on a
  matching basis, for training.

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• Less than 1 of federal funding provided for
  FIFRA related activities (registration,
  regulation, and enforcement) is used to train or
  educate the individual responsible for selecting,
  applying, storing, and disposing of a pesticide
• AAPSE Strategic Plan

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• Laws and enforcement themselves do not
  necessarily teach correct action/practices
• Set standards but may not always explain or help
  people meet those standards.
• Applicators need knowledge not entirely
  conveyable through labeling.
• Do not contaminate water on a label, storage
  and disposal
• Recordkeeping regulations etc.

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What is the end goal?

• The applicator/worker is protected
• The water is clean
• Endangered species survive
• Food is safe
• Children are healthy
• Labels, laws, enforcement and education are tools
  to achieve the goalnot the goal themselves

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Exams/Training

• Means to reach/influence every applicator who
  does come through the system
• The opportunity to build and measure competence
• Share enforcement actions in training
• Enforcement is essential deterrent and can be
  educational but also can often be after the
  fact complaint driven
• Drift has occurred
• A spill wasnt handled
• A worker is sick

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Risk reduction needs to be proactive

• TQAtotal quality assurance
• You cant build in quality at the end of
  production by inspecting
• The individuals involved in the production
  process have to be doing a quality job and know
  what they are doing
• In other words, its ultimately the applicator
  who protects the environment and humans

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Provide Consistency

• Exams, manuals and teaching should be in
  alignment
• Standards should reflect what a competent
  applicator NEEDS to know and address real world
  situations
• Too many inconsistencies obscure the message

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Balanced Viewpoint

• Not the pro-pesticide view
• Not the anti-pesticide view
• Information in the public interest, based on
  science and based on values

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Education in the Public Interest

• Public perception generally is that universities
  are unbiased, most reliable source of information
• Public more likely to trust risk mitigation
  efforts by public institutions--maintain
  credibility of pesticide regulation programs
• Also need to collaborate with industry/environment
  al partners

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A fundamental truth..

• Learning is ultimately controlled by the learner
• Ultimately protecting people and the environment
  is controlled by the applicator

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Limits

• People can know whats proper and legal and
  choose to do otherwisefor many reasons
• Financial costgain may outweigh consequences
  like fines
• Ex. Revenue generated or the cost of buying new
  equipment
• Personal cost--too difficult/time consuming
• Invincibility thinking
• Perceived lack of relevance

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Individual Responsibility

• Plato argued that good people do not need laws to
  act responsibly and bad people will find a way
  around the law
• Most people chose to do the right thing if they
  understand and agree with the consequences
• Education promotes understanding
• Always will be people who defy the law regardless
  of enforcement consequences and education

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Performance measures/outcomes

• Education can help achieve outcomes
• Challenge--Things that are easy to measure often
  dont matter. and the things that really matter
  often arent easy to measure.
• Ex. How many spills, poisonings etc. have been
  averted because of good education?

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• If you think education is costly, you havent
  priced ignorance
• Ex. of lack of educationSuperfund methyl
  parathion cases.

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Summary

• Certification and training is the mechanism to
  reach every licensed applicator
• Proactive approach not reactive
• Key to individuals reaching competency,
  increasing competency and staying updated
• Plays a key role in influencing human
  decisions in the real world
• Although it is not the ONLY influence
• Key component in reaching human health and
  environmental protection goals

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students cannot be mere sponges, absorbing the
wisdom of a teachers lecture. Rather, they
must realistically engage subject matter and
actively practice the art of critical thinking
(Meyers, 1986, p.9)