Welcome. This is Chapter 1 of the
Grower Pesticide Safety Course Manual,
How Pesticides are Regulated. Chapter 1
starts on page 1 of the manual. There
are twenty slides in this presentation
and it will take you about 15 minutes to
review. What will I learn? By the end of
this lesson you should be ready to,
define a pesticide, identify the main
purpose of the federal Pest Control
Products Act, name other federal Acts
that regulate pesticides, name the
provincial law that regulates pesticides,
describe how pesticides are classified
in Ontario, explain how Certified Farmers
must supervise their assistants. First,
What is a pesticide? A pesticide is a
substance used to prevent, control or
destroy a pest. There are three main
classes, groups of pesticides.
Insecticides control insects. Herbicides
control weeds. And fungicides control
fungi that cause disease. Other common
pesticides include rodenticides, miticides
and nematicides. Federal regulations.
Pesticides are regulated federally under
the Pest Control Products Act or PCP Act.
This is the federal law, Canada's law,
that regulates pesticides. Pesticides
must be registered, approved, and given a
registration number before they can be
sold or used in Canada. The Pest Management
Regulatory Agency, PMRA of Health Canada,
administers the PCP Act and Regulations.
Before a pesticide is registered, the PMRA
scientists review lots of
scientific studies about the potential
risks of the pesticide to human health
and the environment. They make sure that
the use of the product doesn't pose
unacceptable risk to plants, animals or
human health.
They also review the efficacy data to
make sure that the pesticide works. You
may visit the PMRA's website for
more information about pesticides in
Canada. Incident Reporting. An incident is an
adverse, bad effect, on humans, animals, or
the environment from an exposure to a
pesticide. Anyone can report a pesticide
incident to the PMRA and you can use
the form on their website. PMRA
reviews the incidents and decides what
to do to stop similar instances from
happening. Reported incidents are
available on the PMRA website. It's
important to read the label every year,
it may have changed. Last year's label
may not be the same as next year's label.
Pesticides are reevaluated on a schedule
and so reevaluation may provide
different information and therefore the
label may be updated. Emergency use may
happen and so there may be an additional
use on a pesticide label. And information
is always updated. The minor use program
would add additional uses to a pesticide
or rates may change or there may be
different precautions. So you really need
to read every the label every year. You
want to look for new information: are
there new pests or are there changes to the
crops, rates were changed. Is there an
additional buffer zone and are there new
precautions that you must follow?
PMRA reevaluates registered
pesticides. So are there risks to human
health or the environment?
That's the question PMRA looks to
answer. All registered pesticides must be
re-evaluated by the PMRA on a schedule
to make sure that they continue to meet
modern health and environmental safety
standards and continue to have value.
PMRA may decide upon re-evaluation that a
product now needs to be suspended or
cancelled. Here's an example: Gramoxone
Liquid Herbicide, registration number 8661,
went through re-evaluation. Now, the
last date of sale of this Gramoxone
product was September
30th of 2017. This was the decision. The
last date of registration of this Gramoxone
product - December 31st 2018. There
will be a new Gramoxone product with a
new registration number with different
label statements and it must meet
different requirements, new requirements,
from the PMRA to put it up into
current environmental and health safety
standards. Emergency Use Registration. A
product might get an Emergency Use
Registration, and three conditions must
exist for an emergency:  an outbreak
causes significant economic
environmental or health problems,  there
is no product registered in Canada for
control of the pest, and there's no
alternative control method available.
When those three conditions are met then
we have an emergency use registration.
And usually your pesticide vendor or
your crop specialist will know if
there's been an emergency use
registration. Read and follow the
Supplemental Label for the emergency
use.  There'll be a statement for
"Emergency Use Only". In this example, the
emergency use was for control of powdery
mildew in greenhouse cucumbers, and
there'll be a date when that emergency
use expires, "can be used up until
December 20 blank blank".
Just be aware there are other federal
laws that govern our use of pesticides
in Canada besides the Pest Control
Products Act. Most importantly would be
the Food and Drugs Act, and it prevents
the sale of food that contains any
harmful or poisonous substance which
includes pesticides. The Maximum Residue
Limits allowed for pesticides in a food
is established under this Act. And this
will be shown in a pesticide label with
statements such as "do not apply within
10 days of harvest".  So you
would make sure you were going to leave
that crop in the field, after the last
date of application, for 10 days before
harvest so that there's time for the
pesticides to break down and degrade
down to what be the Maximum Residue
Limit allowed. So other federal Acts that
come into play: Agriculture and Agri-food
Administrative Monetary Penalties Act
and they're sometimes shortened to be
called AMPs. The government can issue
fines or violations under various Acts
including the Pest Control Products Act
and they can do that under the AMPs Act.
The Fertilizers Act regulates
fertilizers and pesticide combinations. The Pesticide
Residue Compensation Act pays for the farmer
damages if the sale of the crop is
stopped because of residues greater than
the Maximum Residue Limit, the MRL. Feeds
Act, the Fisheries Act, the Migratory
Birds Convention Act, the Transportation of
Dangerous Goods Act. There are some
pesticides that are classified under
this Act as dangerous goods and we'll
talk more about that under the
Transportation of Dangerous Goods in the
Transportation of Pesticides chapter. And
the Canadian Environmental Protection
Act protects the environment as
well as human life and health. I will
mention here the Canadian Food Inspection
Agency.  Canadian Food Inspection Agency,
CFIA, safeguards Canada's food
supply by inspecting and monitoring
plants and animals in Canada. And you may
be interested in going to their website
and looking at what they actually do.
They ensure that Canada has a safe and
high-quality food supply. They provide
inspection and support for animal and
plant health programs, and they work with
organizations to develop national farm
level plant and animal biosecurity
standards and guidance to minimize
the introduction and spread of
diseases and plants. Moving on to
provincial laws, in Ontario
it's the Ontario Pesticides Act and
Regulation. And that controls the use, the
sale, the storage, display,
disposal, and transportation of
pesticides, and fertilizers containing
pesticides in Ontario. And you can find
more details of both the regulations as
we go through the other chapters in the
Grower Pesticide Manual, and you can look
at it, available online at E-Laws Ontario.
Most importantly under the Pesticides
Act in Regulation 63/09 the MOECC or
the Ontario Ministry of the Environment and
Climate Change classifies federally
registered pesticides into different
groups called Classes, and each Class has
specific education, licensing, and/or
permit requirements and restrictions on
its use and sale in Ontario. So
pesticides are classified depending on
their federal classification, whether
they are products or active ingredients,
whether they're labeled for cosmetic or
non cosmetic uses, how poisonous they are
to human health in the environment, how
long they last in the environment,
persistence, or how they are used. A
pesticide can be sold in Ontario as soon
as the approved classification is posted
on the Pesticides Classification
Database and once classified, a pesticide
may be reclassified or declassified. Each
Class has different requirements for
the pesticide sale and use. Now Table 1
and that's on page 10 of your Grower Pesticide
Safety Course Manual, lists all the
Classes from 1 to 12. Most importantly
the products that we can go out and buy
and use are Classes two, three, four, five,
six, and seven. There is also a Class
of treated seed, Class 12.  Corn seed or
soybean seed that is treated with
pesticide that contains imidacloprid,
clothianidin or thiamethoxam
would fall into treated seed Class 12. But
let's just concentrate on our pesticide
products which fall into Class 2 to
7, are the ones that we can buy and
use. And you can see it varies by hazard.
Number 2 being very hazardous, and then
moving down 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 having a combination of less to
least hazardous. So how does that relate
for which of these Classes for use by
which farmers? So if we look in detail at
Table 2 on page 11 in your Grower
Pesticide Safety Course Manual, Class 2
and Class 3, they may be used by
Certified Farmers and supervised Farmer
Assistants. Class 4, can be used in
addition to Certified Farmer and
supervised Farmer Assistants, by farmers
who are not certified. And 5, 6, & 7, anyone
can buy and use those products.
Please note, to buy Class 4 pesticides a
farmer must verify that she, he meets the
definition of a farmer under Regulation
63/09. A farmer must provide the vendor
with his/her Farm Business Number or
a signed copy of the government form,
Farmer Self-declaration to Enable
Purchase of a Class 4 Pesticide and a
sample of that Famer Self-declaration
Form is in your Grower Pesticide Safety
Course Manual on page 19 and 20, and it's
also available on the MOECC website.
Let's just look briefly at the Ontario
Pesticide Classification Database. So you
should go to that database online. You
can put in the registration
number of the product and up will pop
the pesticide Class. So you'll know
whether it fits into a 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 and then you'll know
who can use that product on your farm.
These classification numbers are also
next to the pesticide name in the crop
production books published by the Ontario
Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural
Affairs, OMAFRA, and those production
books are online if you go to the OMAFRA
website as well. So, you'll find the
pesticide classification there, in
their tables as well. Remember the reason
you need to know the Class of a
pesticide is so that you know who is
qualified to buy and use a pesticide on
your farm.I just want to talk about who
is a Certified Farmer. Then the farmer part
of that is the person must be a farmer
as defined under the Pesticides Act in
Regulation 63/09, and we'll go through
that on the next slide, and the Certified
part is the person has successfully
completed the requirements of the Grower
Pesticide Safety Course. And you'll get a
credit card type certificate that you
can carry in your wallet that looks very
similar to this one. The retail pesticide
vendor must record the certificate
number and the expiry date for each sale
of a Class 2 or 3 pesticide and
they can only sell them then to a
Certified Farmer. So who is a farmer?
Under the regulation of the Pesticides
Act you are a farmer if you own or
operate an agricultural operation and
the agricultural operation is defined to
include activities such that, excuse me, a
farmer will grow, produce or raise farm
animals or crops, produce eggs, cream or
milk, operate agricultural machinery or
equipment, process farm products, manage
nutrients, support the agricultural
operations such as use of transport
vehicles or storage containers or
maintenance of a shelter belt.
Who is a Farmer Assistant?  Farmer
Assistants may mix, load or apply a Class
2 or 3 pesticide under supervision
of a Certified Farmer.
They must have training. Farmer
Assistants are trained in two ways: they
must either 1) participate in the
Grower Pesticide Safety Course, so they
must be there during the day listening
to the information. They do not have to
write the test. And number 2) they may
participate in a Pesticide Safety for
Farmer Assistants Course. And that's
given by a qualified On-Farm Pesticide
Safety Instructor. Now to qualify to
train Assistants you must have a valid
certificate from both the On-Farm
Instructor Course that we offer plus the
Grower Pesticide Safety Course. And so
it's good to get qualified to train your
own Assistants. They will be issued a
yellow paper card like this one shown
here, and on the back of that card shows
some restrictions of their duties. So
they're only allowed to mix, load and
apply. Now how can you supervise them
directly? You can be there when the
Assistant mixes, loads and applies the
pesticides, the Class 2s or 3s. For
indirect supervision, if you need to be
away from them when they're using the
pesticide, you must provide written
instructions and leave them with written
instructions, if they're using the Class
2 pesticides. Be available for
immediate response through a communication
system. And be physically present within
a reasonable time to respond to an
emergency situation if it happens.
So you could be further away, another
part of the farm, being able to respond
quickly if they need help and that
they're able to contact you for that so
you can supervise them indirectly.
Remember, the supervising Certified
Farmer's responsible when an Assistant
uses that pesticide. There are some other
Ontario laws also that come into place
for pesticides, being Environmental
Protection Act,
the Ontario Water Resources Act, the
Clean Water Act, and the Weed Control Act.
So just be aware of those and know that
they also may come in place. So that
covers Chapter 1 very briefly and please
take the time to read through Chapter 1
and if you have any questions you can
always email us rcopep@uoguelph.ca
and we're pleased to answer
any questions.
