At issue is the passage of "The Pesticide Export Reform Act of 1990" (originally S.2227), which includes a number of provisions that would significantly change the export of pesticides, the importation and testing of food products, and the procedures used to notify other countries about pesticides. The Bill's passage may depend, not on its intrinsic merits against which many of its critics do not argue, but possibly on a prevailing political philosophy which will determine the priorities of its objectives. One could also wonder about the alternatives Senator Leahy might have considered in 1990, as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry in a Democratically-controlled Congress and a Republican President , if he had a hint of a forthcoming totally-opposite political construct in 1994.
S.2227 was designed primarily to eliminate the export of U.S. manufactured pesticides that had not been registered for domestic use and which were not, under existing legislation, subject to the EPA's registration procedures. Chemicals produced for example, for use on bananas would need a U. S. registration even though virtually no bananas were grown in the United States. It was a judicious decision: "Mr. Bell is sterile. He is a banana worker and, like several thousand other Costa Rican men in the same boat, he blames his trouble on a pesticide, DBCP, used on the plantation . . . and manufactured or used by . . . Dow Chemical, Shell Oil, Standard Fruit and Chiquita Brands."1 The Costa Rican episode points out the failure of information distribution or processing: "When they were formulating or canning DBCP, [Arco] workers were supposed to wear coveralls, rubber boots, and plastic safety glasses . . . The workers were [also] supposed to wear gloves."2
A secondary provision of the Bill requires importing country governments to consent in writing before certain hazardous pesticides could be shipped to their country fr...