Ban Most Toxic Pesticides
Banning the most toxic pesticides—and sharply reducing overall pesticide use—is essential to protecting people and the planet. Working closely with scientists, legal experts, growers, farmworkers, and communities who are disproportionately exposed and harmed, CPR pushes to phase out hazardous pesticides entirely and, in the meantime, to strictly limit, monitor, and regulate their use.
Currently, CPR is dedicated to eliminating organophosphates and fumigants.
Organophosphates
Organophosphate pesticides are highly toxic chemicals linked to serious harm to the nervous system, especially in children and farmworker communities. Phasing them out and banning their use is a crucial step toward protecting brain development, preventing acute poisonings, and safeguarding the health of those who grow and live near our food.
Fumigants
Fumigant pesticides are among the most dangerous chemicals used in agriculture, drifting far from fields and exposing entire communities, including children and farmworkers, to toxic air. Fumigants are responsible for several incidents in California where hundreds of people have been poisoned from a single pesticide application. They can also keep off-gassing for days or weeks after they are applied, resulting in continuous exposure for nearby communities These gases can damage lungs, irritate eyes and skin, and are linked to long-term health harms, all while degrading soil life and ecosystems.
California agriculture relies heavily on fumigants: they make up approximately 20% of the pesticides applied each year, and are most commonly used for growing strawberries, almonds, potatoes, raspberries, carrots, tomatoes and peppers.
The most widely used fumigant pesticides in California agriculture are 1-3 dichloropropene (Telone), chloropicrin, metam sodium and metam potassium. These pesticides are all highly acutely toxic, and are either neurotoxicants, reproductive or developmental toxicants, and/or probable carcinogens.
The future resilience and continued prosperity of California agriculture depend on a commitment from the Governor and the California Department of Pesticide Regulation to support farmers in a transition to innovative, safe and profitable replacements for hazardous fumigants. There are many promising replacement technologies for fumigant pesticides, but they need support to become market-ready.
Learn more about our victory in banning the cancer‑causing pesticide methyl iodide in California, which helped drive its withdrawal from use nationwide.
1,3-Dichloropropene (Telone)
1,3‑Dichloropropene (1,3‑D) is a cancer‑causing soil fumigant pesticide used on crops like strawberries and carrots, and it is one of the most heavily used toxic gases in California agriculture. It can drift from fields into nearby neighborhoods and schools, exposing farmworkers and residents to a chemical linked to increased cancer risk and serious respiratory harm. Furthermore, 1,3-D is classified as a Volatile Organic Compound, Toxic Air Contaminant and Prop. 65 carcinogen. This pesticide is banned in 34 countries, but in California is the third most heavily used pesticide in agriculture—over 7 million pounds in 2024.
The CPR coalition calls on Department of Pesticide Regulation to ban or severely restrict 1,3- Dichloropropene (1,3-D, or Telone).
In 2018, the CPR coalition and our allies won a legal victory against DPR and Dow, ruling that the rules for 1,3-D use were illegal, and forcing DPR to develop a lawful regulation. The verdict was upheld on appeal in 2021.
However the draft rule, announced in November 2022, defies the court order by failing to protect farmworkers laboring near 1,3-D treated fields, removes the existing use cap along with real-time tracking of total use, and adopts a lifetime cancer risk level that is 14 times less protective than the level proposed by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.
In June 2022, OEHHA set a strongly health-protective Prop.65 No Significant Risk Level, or “safe harbor” level, of 3.7 micrograms per day. We urge DPR to use this target in its rulemaking.
Meanwhile, communities across California, and particularly in the San Joaquin Valley, continue to experience high levels of exposure to this cancer-causing chemical. Several very high levels measured by DPR’s air monitors since 2018, including in Shafter (Kern County), have so far gone unmitigated.
