Pesticide case nets Oahu farm $26,700 fine

A government crackdown on Oahu basil farms and their pesticide use practices has led to a settlement with a Waianae farm that has agreed to pay a $26,700 penalty.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Thursday that Wonder Farm Inc. settled a case that alleged violations of worker safety and pesticide misuse stemming from state Department of Agriculture inspections between 2012 and 2015.

Alexis Strauss, acting administrator for the EPA’s Pacific Southwest region, said in a statement that reducing pesticide exposure is a high priority for the agency.

“With our state partners, we’re focused on protecting agricultural workers,” she said. “All agriculture companies must follow pesticide label instructions and ensure their workers are trained properly to use, apply and work in treated areas.”

The agency said Wonder Farm, which state filings show is led by Qing Xiao Wang, didn’t let workers know what pesticide was applied where and when, didn’t train workers about pesticide safety or follow pesticide label instructions, didn’t properly clean pesticide containers and didn’t ensure workers used protective clothing when handling pesticides.

The EPA also said inspectors found that Wonder Farm had applied several pesticide products with active ingredients that are prohibited for use on basil. These active ingredients were malathion, carbaryl and dimethoate.

A person who answered the phone Thursday at Wonder Farm said no one who could comment on the allegations or the settlement was immediately available.

Improper use of pesticides on Oahu basil farms has come under scrutiny in recent years after one random test of basil at a wholesale distributor in 2012 by the state Department of Health revealed residue of pesticides not approved for use on basil.

The department followed up by going to five wholesale distributors to take 10 samples of basil grown on six farms. Tests showed that seven samples from four farms had methomyl, dimethoate and carbaryl residue in violation of federal and state regulations.

Those four farms — S&Z Farm LLC, Green Produce LLC, Luo’s Plantation and Fat Law’s Farm — were ordered to stop selling and distributing the tainted basil, and the farms were forced to destroy some plantings.

In 2015 the Health Department ordered and witnessed the destruction of about 5,000 pounds of Thai basil grown at Wong Hon Hin Inc., a farm in Waianae, after malathion was found on the crop.

The Health Department said it routinely screens raw fruits and vegetables from major distributors, farmers markets and large farms for compliance with health and food safety standards.

Basil is a popular crop in Hawaii, where some farmers grow it for export. The herb was ranked as Hawaii’s 11th-biggest crop in 2011 with a value of $6.2 million but in 2015 was not included among the 20 largest crops by value, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service.

The state Department of Agriculture has noted that some pesticides being misused by Hawaii basil farmers are approved for use on other crops, but such approval typically requires costly investments in studies and federal regulation changes that can be economically justified for big crops but not for smaller crops. Still, such pesticides may only be used for approved crops and can be dangerous for farmworkers if they are not trained and if safety standards are not followed.