Count Bayer as a voice that is not supportive of a path offered last week to reauthorize the Pesticide Registration Improvement Act (PRIA) through 2023. To be clear, the company supports reauthorization, but is concerned about the precedent that could be set by backing an approach offered by four Senate Democrats. That approach, reported last week by Agri-Pulse, is in the form of an amendment to the PRIA bill that would prevent the EPA from changing rules governing the Worker Protection Standard and the Certification of Pesticide Applicators Rule and respond to concerns over allowing the use of chlorpyrifos. But Luke Tomanelli, deputy director of federal relations and policy for Bayer, says this isn’t the right approach. He says PRIA reauthorization should move as a standalone bill and not be tied to other conditions. “I don’t think we support that language,” he told Agri-Pulse. “We would like to see it as a standalone item. We think that by accepting the compromise language … you’re going to be setting a new precedent for how you handle PRIA.”
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