April 26, 2008

The 2008 Indicators for a Sustainable San Mateo County report, which was released earlier this month by Sustainable San Mateo County, helped uncover a huge data error on pesticide usage, which is routinely monitored by the government. As first reported in The Examiner, SSMC’s annual Indicators Report showed that 105,000 pounds of the chemical Oryzalin, a weed killer, was used in San Mateo County in 2006, a startling increase from 1,900 pounds in 2005. “The reason for this growth is unclear,” the Indicators Report says. County officials were baffled at the discrepancy.

In reaction to The Examiner’s story, the state Department of Pesticide Regulation revealed that it had mis-characterized the chemical’s usage in San Mateo County. In a follow-up article in The Examiner, Veda Federighi, DPR assistant director for external affairs, said, “Many errors result when a decimal point is misplaced, or when the use is reported in gallons of product used when it actually was ounces….The latter occurred in this instance.”

The mix-up in the data was the main reason the Indicators Report showed that total use in pesticide usage shot up from 275,000 pounds in 2005 to 365,000 in 2006. After DPR officials checked its data, revised numbers showed that the amount of Oryzalin used in 2006 was actually 1,507 pounds, according to The Examiner article.

May 6, UPDATE: SSMC staff has revised page 39 of the initial report to reflect the correct data on the pesticides indicator. CLICK HERE to download it.

Pesticide usage is one of 33 indicators that comprise the annual report. To download the 80-page report, CLICK HERE.