LOS ANGELES — The nation’s most productive agricultural state will ban a widely used toxic pesticide blamed for harming brain development in babies, California officials said Wednesday. State Environmental Secretary Jared Blumenfeld said it’s the first time the state has sought to ban a pesticide and the move was overdue. “This pesticide is a neurotoxin and it was first put on the market in 1965,” Blumenfeld said. A University of California at Berkeley study in 2012 found that 87% of umbilical-cord blood samples tested from newborn babies contained detectable levels of the pesticide. To help farmers make the transition away from chlorpyrifos, the state is adding a $5.7 million to fund safer alternatives.

Source: National Post May 08, 2019 16:30 UTC