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8B—GREENS6URG DAILY NEWS—Tuesday, March 15,188*Handling chemicalsafarm concernByDOUGMANAHAN Staff WriterAlthough farm economics is still a very large agricultural issue, it is beginning to be overshadowed by environmental and health concerns with respect to chemical handling by both farmers and agricultural chemical dealers.Maurice Jordan, the farm center manager at Crop Production Services, County Road 350 West, Greensburg, said the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act of 1986 (commonly called the Community Right to Know Act) requires chemical dealers and farmers to report the chemicals they handle.Additionally, Jordan said, SARA put several farm chemicals on a restricted use list which requires farmers to get a use permit before they are allowed to handle listed chemicals. Before they are given a permit, farmers must take an open book test through their county extension office.When handling chemicals such as herbicides and pesticides, Jordan said basic common sense should be used.“Most farmers know you don’t smoke, drink or eat around them, and they also know to use glovesand goggles when handling them’’ he said. “You’ve got to use common sense and safety precautions.“It’s pretty easy when you’re out pouring pesticide and someone hands you a sandwich to eat it, but with many of these chemicals intake is through the skin and gloves are very important to use because of the residue which remains after handling many ag chemicals. With some chemicals a taste to a teaspoonful will kill you, and others you could probably drink without having any problems.”Some of the more highly toxic chemicals in widespread use by farmers today, according to Jordan, are ammonia nitrogen, paraquat (a contact killer herbicide similar in effect to Agent Orange used by the military in Vietnam) and anhydrous ammonia.“With ammonia nitrogen you definitely want to use gloves and goggles when pouring it,” Jordan said. “A taste to a teaspoon of paraquat will kill you. ”Jordan credits the Community Right to Know Act as having “shed a lot of light on chemical problems and it is one of the biggest things which has happened in agriculture recently.“The State Chemist’s Officewithin the last three years required farmers to an open book test before they buy or handle restricted use pesticides. They’re mainly concerned about the safety aspect. Also, we have to have a list of private applicator permit numbers on file or we can be levied a heavy fine, so it’s in our best interest not to sell to farmers who do not have a permit.”Jordan said the list of restricted use chemicals will do nothing but continue to grow. He added Monsanto’s Lasso and Lariat herbicides will be added to the list in July.“In the next three to five years, most of the chemicals farmers use will have some sort of restriction put on them,” Jordan said. “We have to be even a little more cautious than the farmer does because we do a lot of transferring from bulk plants to mini bulk plants — generally in the neighborhood of 2,500 gallons per tankful.“We’ve diked each of our bulk storage tanks and we could hold the amount of chemical we have stored in each of our tanks if a tank were to rupture. It’s not cheap to dike, and the state hasn’t come up with guidelines yet on what is needed, so a lot of companies are holding off.”Jordan added further regulations are coming down the pike and in the not-too-distant future rinse pads and holding tanks will be required at custom applicator sites. Rinse pads are poured cement with steel grates which will allow for the draining truck tanks into a large storage tanks underground. Tanks are generally rinsed, according to Jordan, when they go from applying one-type of chemical to another type of chemical.The tanks are rinsed to wash out chemical residue left over from one type of crop which couldprove harmful to another crop, for instance, if the custom application went from applying chemicals to com to chemicals for soybeans.Custom applicators generally deal more in bulk sales because it easier for them, according to Jordan.“It’s easier for us to operate in bulk rather than packaged material and price differential between bulk and packaged materials is what makes it attractive to farmers,” Jordan concluded.TERHUNE HOOSIER PROPANEFamily owned and operated for 3 generations Home — Farm — Commercial We install Bryant Furnaces.Call for your free estimate Milroy (317)629-2426
Newspaper Details
Greensburg Daily News
Greensburg, Indiana, US
Tue, Mar 15, 1988
Page 20
Full Page
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