In an April 22 memorandum, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its intent to begin preliminary research to assess the EPA’s inspections of, and enforcement against, illegal pesticide imports.

OIG states that its objective with this project is to “determine whether the EPA’s Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) import inspection program is effectively deterring, identifying and confiscating illegal pesticide imports, to protect human health and the environment.”  OIG’s efforts will include determining whether EPA is effectively identifying pesticide imports for inspection and sampling, as well as whether EPA is taking appropriate enforcement action against noncompliant imports.

OIG notes that this project is included in its fiscal year 2016 Annual Plan.  The Annual Plan notes a project commencement date of June 2016 and describes its efforts as follows:

• The EPA’s enforcement program addresses the illegal importation of unregistered or otherwise noncompliant pesticide products into the United States. This project could result in reduced risks to human health and the environment due to Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act imports noncompliance, while assuring effective deterrence through inspections and enforcement actions. We will seek to determine whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act Import Inspection program effectively deters or identifies and confiscates illegal pesticide imports to protect human health and the environment.

OIG’s review of EPA’s activities in this area should come as no surprise considering that the EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) has identified import border compliance as one of its three FIFRA focus areas for the past several years.  For example, OECA’s FY 2016-2017 National Program Manager Guidance (NPMG), which sets forth OECA’s priority-setting strategies, has made EPA Regions aware of EPA’s strong interest in import compliance.  The NPMG suggests that the Regional office efforts in this regard include monitoring import compliance through inspections; focusing on “high-risk” unregistered pesticides and importers with a history of noncompliance or significant importation activities from countries frequently associated with noncompliant shipments; and overseeing the transition of manual review of Notices of Arrival (NOA) to the Automated Commercial Environment in the International Trade Data System (ACE/ITDS).  Indeed, there is a noticeable uptick in EPA Regional office review of NOAs and OECA enforcement of noncompliant pesticide imports. 

Companies that import pesticides should carefully review their import policies and how they prepare their NOAs to ensure they do not invite EPA scrutiny and potential enforcement action.