Source: NCDA&CS, 4/19/21


The NCDA&CS Pesticide Disposal Assistance Program (PDAP) hardly collected any pesticides in the first half of 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic. Still, the 2020 annual collection total was the seventh-most in the program’s 41-year history. That’s because, in the second half of the year, the program set a record for most pounds of pesticides collected in a six-month period.

“Demand is there, and this stuff doesn’t just disappear, just because we’re not collecting,” said Derrick Bell, who heads the PDAP. “People wait, and then we get inundated with volume like we did last fall.

Bell said if the pesticides do just “disappear” they’re likely being disposed of improperly in places like the trash, fields, ditches or other waterways. That’s exactly what the Pesticide Disposal Assistance Program is designed to avoid. It helps farmers and homeowners dispose of banned, outdated or unwanted pesticides/herbicides. The goal is to protect human health and the environment by reducing the potential contamination of soil, water, and air from leaking containers, spills, and illegal dumping or burning

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