One basic reason that pesticides may not be registered in the United States is that the U.S. market is too small to justify the cost of registration for a specific application - e.g., for bananas as opposed to melons. U.S. Customs Service export volume data from prior years also suggests that there still may be a continuing, though relatively small, flow of these goods today. While the Rotterdam Convention is a relatively recent achievement of international diplomacy, much of the U.S. industry has been cooperating with the principles of prior informed consent since 1986, says John McCarthy, the vice president for science and regulatory affairs at the American Crop Protection Association, or ACPA, in Washington. Nonetheless, of the 150 active ingredients which ACPA members produce in the United States, about 10 percent are not registered for use in this country, he says. ACPA members account for about 95 percent of all pesticides manufactured in the United States.
Some environmentalists say no.
In many countries they have one or two people with responsibilities that would require a staff of 200 to carry out. In Ecuador, the country receiving the highest number of such U.S. shipments in 1998, the reaction was one of definite concern. Morales is not alone in his concern about possible hazardous pesticide residues in foods exported to the United States. In 1989, the seizure of a single imported box of contaminated grapes at Philadelphia brought Chile's fruit export industry to a grinding halt. Noting that the EPA has conducted a series of seminars in Costa Rica, Gonzalez says that it has been several years since his office has received reports about Costa Rican agricultural products that might have been detained in the United States because of pesticide residues.