Summary: The federal government and private organizations collect information on the amount of pesticides used in the United States, but no data systems exist that track pesticide usage in the United States. GAO estimates that each year at least 56 million pounds of pesticides from U.S. and Canadian sources end up in the Great Lakes watershed, including about 46 million pounds used on crops, eight million pounds used on lawns, and more than two million pounds used on golf courses. Pesticides that are repeatedly applied during the year on fruits and vegetables enter the Great Lakes and stay there, becoming more concentrated with time. The long retention time allows some pesticides to settle in lake-bottom sediments and become absorbed into the food chain. High levels of banned pesticides are still showing up in fish tissue. Preliminary findings by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) show that the effects of nine herbicides in current use may be more long lasting than once thought. EPA needs to complete its water quality monitoring program and use this up-to-date data in its reregistration program, which requires these pesticides to be reevaluated for their health and environmental effects. Data also indicate that millions of pounds of unusable pesticides being stored on farms present a disposal problem for the Great Lakes region. EPA has begun a program in the area to dispose of some of these pesticides, but large quantities remain, including banned, spoiled, and unneeded materials.
