Aug 3, 2016Felsot to serve as ESA’s pesticide expert
Allan Felsot, a professor and extension specialist at Washington State University, has been selected to serve as a subject matter expert (SME) and liaison with the EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs (EPA-OPP).
As ESA’s SME, he will serve as a liaison between the academic entomology community and the EPA-OPP, and provide unbiased assessments of science to assist the agency in addressing issues related to insect pest management. Assessment will include entomological areas such as IPM in field and specialty crops, medical, urban and structural entomology in which EPA’s regulatory actions and processes impact the use of insecticides, and advice to EPA-OPP as the agency develops efficacy testing of controls for various arthropod groups.
“I would like to be a bridge that helps the regulatory community and the users of crop protection technology better understand each other’s perspectives and needs,” Felsot said. “Furthermore, my goal is to help bring an evidenced-based rationale to decision-making processes.”
Felsot’s research has focused on pesticide technologies, plant incorporated protectants, environmental chemodynamics of pesticide residues, toxicology, risk assessment, and risk communication.
In 1985 he published a historical review of entomological research pre Rachel Carson that showed how the discipline of environmental toxicology evolved from the need for information in pest management research. In the course of nearly 1,000 public presentations and 100 Extension newsletter essays, he has provided various groups (industry, commodity commissions, pesticide applicators, and the public) with information about pesticides, including their role in pest management, as well as the latest toxicological research, regulatory decisions, and public controversies.
He is a past member of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry‘s Crop Protection Chemistry Advisory Committee and he has worked on two Council for Agricultural Science and Technology (CAST) sponsored reports about genetically engineered crops and on applications of the precautionary principle to crop and public health protection technologies.
His current research interests are in probabilistic risk assessment, which he used in a recently co-authored Journal of Economic Entomology article to interpret the results of a study of neonicotinoid insecticide residues in bee bread collected from different landscapes
For more information, visit ww.entsoc.org.
Photo: Entomology Society of America
