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- 28 - 8. The availability and low cost of effective per- sistent pesticides have slowed the development and adoption of alternative methods of control. 9. Work on nonchemical methods as alternatives to persistent pesticides has been emphasized in recent years, and continued support for this work is needed. 10. Inadequate attention and support are being given to developing pesticidal chemicals and to improving tech- niques for using them. 11. Persistent pesticides are of special concern when their residues possess--in addition to persistence-- toxicity, mobility in the environment, and a tendency for storage in the biota. 12. A few organochlorine insecticides and their metabolites have become widely distributed in the biosphere, appearing in the biota at points far from their places of application. 13. The biosphere has a large capacity for storage of persistent pesticides in the soil, water, air, and biota, but little is known concerning amounts of persistent pesticides and of their degradation products that are stored in the biosphere. 14. Knowledge is incomplete concerning the fate and degradation of persistent pesticides in the environment, their behavior in the environment, the toxicity of the degradation products, and the interaction of these products with other chemicals. 15. Present methods of regulating the marketing and use of persistent pesticides appear to accomplish the objectives of providing the user with a properly labeled product and holding the amounts of residue in man and his food at a low level. However, they do not appear to insure the prevention of environmental contamination.
- 29 - 16. Public demand for attractiveness in fruit and vegetables, and statutory limits on the presence of insect parts in processed foods, have invited excessive use of pesticides. 17. The National Pesticide Monitoring Program pro- vides adequate information about residues in man and his food, but it does not provide adequate information about the environment generally, because it can detect changes in residues only in selected parts of the biosphere. 18. Contamination of the biosphere resulting from the use of persistent pesticides is an international problem. Changes in techniques for using these pesticides and the substitution of alternatives here and abroad are questions of immediate concern to all mankind. RECOMMENDATIONS The Committee recommends-- 1. That further and more effective steps be taken to reduce the needless or inadvertent release of persistent pesticides into the environment. 2. That, in the public interest, action be increased at international, national, and local levels to minimize environmental contamination where the use of persistent pesticides remains advisable. 3. That studies of the possible long-term effects of low levels of persistent pesticides on man and other mammals be intensified. 4. That efforts to assess the behavior of persistent pesticides and their ecological implications in the envi- ronment be expanded and intensified.
