7.4 Chemical Security, Risk Communication & Professional Stewardship

7.4 Chemical Security, Risk Communication & Professional Stewardship

Quick Answer: 40 CFR 171.103(c)(10) makes professionalism a core competency in its own right, built on three duties: maintaining chemical security for restricted use pesticides, communicating about pesticide exposures and risks with customers and the public, and practicing appropriate product stewardship. North Dakota turns much of that into enforceable rule: stored and transported pesticides must be secured against children, unauthorized persons, and animals; storage areas must be marked at all entrances; bulk containers need a locking withdrawal valve or a locked area; and NDCC 4.1-33-13 makes careless operation, unsafe equipment, falsified records, spraying another person's property without permission, and selling an RUP to an uncertified buyer unlawful acts. Local governments cannot add their own pesticide rules — NDCC 4.1-33-04 preempts them, except for city zoning.

Why Professionalism Is Tested

Every other core competency asks what you know about a chemical. This one asks what kind of operator you are. EPA added it because the most damaging pesticide incidents rarely come from an applicator who misread a label; they come from product that walked off a shelf, from a neighbor who was never told, and from a rate pushed past what stewardship allows. The three sub-points map to three tested behaviors:

1. Chemical Security

What North Dakota rule actually requires

Security is not merely good practice here; several provisions of NDAC Chapter 60-03-01 make it binding:

• Storage security (60-03-01-06(2)(f)): stored pesticides must be secured in a manner that prevents children, unauthorized persons, or animals from gaining entry or access. Security is achieved when normal points of access are closed and locked while unattended and the structural integrity of the area prevents access by other than normal means.
• Marked entrances (60-03-01-06(2)(d)): storage areas containing products intended for distribution or use by commercial or public applicators and dealers must be marked at all entrances. Areas containing only hard surface disinfectants are exempt.
• Safety equipment on site (60-03-01-06(2)(e)): label-specific safety equipment for every pesticide stored must be available at the immediate storage site — not in a shop across the yard.
• Transport security (60-03-01-06(3)(c)): pesticides in an unattended transport vehicle must be secured to prevent children, unauthorized persons, or animals from gaining access.
• Bulk container security (60-03-01-11(5)): a permanent bulk storage container must have a locking withdrawal valve or be stored in a secure locked area, locked during nonbusiness hours or while unattended.
• No underground bulk containers (60-03-01-13(3)): bulk pesticide storage containers may not be placed underground, where a leak is invisible until it reaches groundwater.

Operational security practices

• Know your inventory. Maintain a dated inventory, keep a duplicate copy off site, and reconcile it. You cannot report a theft you cannot quantify, and an accurate inventory is what lets emergency responders know what is burning.
• Control keys and access. Limit keys to trained, certified personnel. Log who enters a bulk or RUP storage area.
• Never leave a loaded rig unattended in a public place. A sprayer parked at a truck stop with product in the induction cone is an open invitation.
• Report suspicious activity. Unusual purchase requests, cash purchases of RUPs by unfamiliar buyers, or attempts to buy without a certificate should be refused and reported. Remember that distributing an RUP to a person who is not properly certified is an unlawful act under NDCC 4.1-33-13(1)(o).
• Dispose of the empties. A rinsed but unpunctured jug is a container someone will reuse for water, fuel, or feed. Puncture it.

2. Risk Communication

With the customer

• Set expectations before the application: what product, what it will and will not control, when re-entry is allowed (REI), any pre-harvest interval (PHI), what to watch for, and who to call.
• Deliver the record. NDAC 60-03-01-07(2) requires a copy of the application record to the client as soon as possible and no later than thirty days, unless a signed client waiver is on file. This is a legal duty, not a courtesy.
• Answer exposure questions honestly. If someone reports symptoms, get them the product name, EPA registration number, active ingredient, and Safety Data Sheet, and get them to care. Under NDCC 4.1-33-21(5)(b), if a person alleges exposure and that person's medical provider asks the Commissioner to reveal the pesticide name, the Commissioner may disclose the name and EPA registration number.

With neighbors and the public

• Identify sensitive sites before the season, not on the headland. Map organic fields, certified seed production, apiaries, vineyards, market gardens, schools, and residences adjacent to every block you spray. Confirm whether a sensitive-site or apiary registry covers your area — FieldWatch's DriftWatch and BeeCheck registries operate in neighboring Minnesota, South Dakota, and Montana, and North Dakota applicators working across state lines should check them. For in-state work, confirm the current registry or notification tool the NDDA points to before the season begins.
• Talk to the beekeeper. Advance notice lets hives be moved or covered. Pollinator protection is also a label duty wherever a Bee Hazard box appears.
• Do not spray what is not yours. NDCC 4.1-33-13(1)(i) makes it a violation to apply pesticide to the property of another without the permission of the owner or lessee, unless the application is made under the direction of a governmental entity.
• Do not overstate or understate. NDCC 4.1-33-13(1)(a) makes it a violation to make false or fraudulent claims through any media, to misrepresent the effect of materials or methods, or to advertise a pesticide without reference to its classification.

With regulators

Cooperate with inspections. The Commissioner may enter premises at reasonable times, inspect and sample, observe applications, and access records. Knowingly making false statements during or after an inspection or investigation is itself an unlawful act (NDCC 4.1-33-13(1)(m)), as is impersonating a federal, state, county, or city inspector (subdivision (n)).

3. Product Stewardship

Stewardship is how the industry keeps its tools. Every product lost to resistance, to a court vacatur, or to a cancellation was lost because enough applicators treated the label as a suggestion.

• Right product, rate, time, and place. Apply the labeled rate — cutting rates selects for resistance, and exceeding them is a federal and state violation.
• Rotate and mix modes of action. Rotate HRAC/WSSA herbicide groups, IRAC insecticide groups, and FRAC fungicide groups, and layer residuals rather than leaning on one site of action.
• Protect the next crop. Respect rotational restrictions and plant-back intervals; carryover injury to pulses, sunflowers, or sugarbeets is a stewardship failure with a direct cost.
• Close the loop on containers. Triple rinse or pressure rinse on the day of use (NDAC 60-03-01-06(4)(b)), return the rinsate to the spray tank, puncture, and recycle. Take obsolete product to Project Safe Send.
• Steward treated seed. Treated seed must never enter food or feed channels, and surplus must be handled as the label directs.
• Keep equipment sound. NDAC 60-03-01-06(1)(g) requires all mixing, filling, and application equipment to be operationally sound and properly calibrated, and NDCC 4.1-33-13(1)(d) makes operating faulty or unsafe equipment an unlawful act.

North Dakota's Unlawful Acts as a Conduct Code (NDCC 4.1-33-13)

It is a violation of the chapter for a person to:

A certification may also be denied, removed, or suspended if the holder receives a criminal conviction under FIFRA Section 136l, is subject to a final order imposing a FIFRA civil penalty, or is subject to a concluded enforcement action for violating a state pesticide law or regulation.

One Statewide Rule: Preemption of Local Ordinances (NDCC 4.1-33-04)

A political subdivision, including a home rule city or county, may not adopt or continue in effect any ordinance, resolution, or home rule charter provision regarding the registration, labeling, distribution, sale, handling, use, application, transportation, or disposal of pesticides. The single carve-out is that the section does not apply to city zoning ordinances — a city may still zone where a chemical storage facility can be built.

Practically, that means a township or city cannot impose its own buffer, cutoff date, or notification rule for pesticide applications. It also means an applicator cannot rely on a local ordinance as a defense, and cannot be told by a city that a label restriction has been waived.

Chemigation: A Separate Chapter (NDCC 4.1-35)

Applying pesticides or fertilizers through irrigation equipment is chemigation, and North Dakota regulates it in its own chapter, NDCC Chapter 4.1-35, which sets design requirements for chemigation equipment. Two ideas carry into the core exam:

• Chemigation creates a direct hydraulic path from the chemical supply to the water source, which is why anti-pollution and backflow devices are mandatory rather than advisory, and why NDAC 60-03-01-06(1)(c) separately requires an antisiphoning device on any inlet hose drawing from surface water.
• The label controls. Many pesticide labels flatly state "do not apply this product through any type of irrigation system"; others permit chemigation only with specified safety equipment. If the label does not authorize chemigation, applying the product through irrigation equipment is a label violation.

Independent Preparation Notice

This study guide is an independent educational publication developed by OpenExamPrep. It is not affiliated with, sponsored by, endorsed by, or produced in partnership with the North Dakota Department of Agriculture, North Dakota State University Extension, or the EPA.