On November 3, 2022, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) announced that it had reached a settlement agreement with Amazon.com Services, LLC (Amazon) regarding the illegal sale of pesticides in California. According to the DPR, Amazon’s review uncovered multiple violations. Among these were selling unregistered pesticides in California, failing to report and pay the required factory assessment fees in connection with the sale of California-registered pesticides, and valid pesticide broker licenses. This includes not holding
Under the terms of the contract, Amazon will pay DPR a total of $4.97 million. Of this amount, $3.69 million will be paid in unpaid pesticide sales assessment fees and related late fines, and $1.28 million in civil penalties related to the retail sale of unregistered pesticides to California. The DPR says Amazon has registered as a pesticide broker and has agreed to report and pay factory valuation fees associated with all future retail sales of registered pesticides to California.
Under California law, EPA-registered pesticides must also be registered by the state before they can be used, owned, or sold in California. Based on the DPR’s assessment of a product’s potential human health and environmental risks and efficacy, the DPR may impose state-specific requirements, such as additional data requirements and label usage restrictions.
California also has its own state requirements for plant evaluations, which are fees paid for the sale of pesticides registered with the DPR and sold into California. Specifically, factory assessments are charged at the first point of sale for California pesticides. Generally, registrants are responsible for reporting sales and paying factory valuations if they know at the time of sale that pesticides are being sold in California. If the registrant does not have the knowledge at the time of sale, the party that originally sold the pesticide in California is responsible for reporting and paying for the factory appraisal. If a non-registered party sells pesticides in California or for the first time in California, this first seller party will obtain a pesticide broker or exterminator license (whichever is appropriate) from the DPR. is needed.
Additional information about the DPR program is available here.
