You can contact me with your questions or suggestions by sending an e-mail message.
My business is:
This index page is arranged in sections: Permanent and Transitory items.
Look for the
and
flags to find recent updates or additions.
EPA-OPP. Pesticides Home Page
EPA's new format, as of 2003. For a detailed list of links go to the A-Z
Index page.
Regulatory, Registration, and Industry News
Here is a list, with links, to useful Web sites
Label Review Manual,3rd Edition. And Q&A About Labels
EPA's instructions to its reviewers of pesticide labels. 19 Chapters.
View/Download as HTML (chapter-by-chapter) or PDF (entire manual).
In addition, link to, among others, Questions to EPA-OPP and the
Agency's responses.
Confidential Statement of Formula (CSF):
Preparation Hints
EPA help site about Biochemicals, but many hints for avoiding problems
are applicable to all pesticide products.
Electronic Submission of Labels and Studies for Pesticide Registation
How-to, hints, formatting, etc., etc.
Updated by EPA June 2008. Now includes forms, instructions on converting other
formats to PDF, etc.
Just in case.
Australia's APVMA documents for electronic submissions.
Pesticide Models
EPA site with links to individual sites for models.
EPA/USDA/FDA Test Methods And Related
EPA Dockets
Information about regulatory actions.
EPA's Risk Assessment Portal
Agency site with collection of Guidance documents, models, etc.
EPA-OECD Harmonized Test Guidelines
Link to the index page for
access to all OPPTS Guidelines. Links to various OPPTS sites.
EPA's GLP and SOP Guidelines
EPA
Compliance And Enforcement
Starting point for actions and
documents.
Child-Resistant Packaging For Pesticides
EPA-OPP Web site which has all the Who, What, When, Where, and Why.
Plant Incorporated Protectants: Current EUPs
U.S. EPA's consolidated list of currently active PIP EUPs.
CDPR.
Toxicology Review Summaries On-Line
California provides a succinct
summary of tox studies for pesticidal active ingredients. Saves rummaging Federal
Register pesticide petition notices, etc. Updated on a regular basis.
EPA Guidance/Interpretive Documents
Select by any of several
criteria (e.g., OPPTS) and get back a list of non-binding guidance documents
issued by EPA since Jan. 1, 1999.
Check it out
Pesticide Product Labels And MSDSs
Links to free-of-charge sites on the WWW.
EPA's Pesticide
Label Site
Eventually every label for every product ever registered
and every significant label change will appear on the EPA site. Be certain to
read about limitations of the collection.
State Registrations
NPIRS (National Pesticide Information Retrieval System) at
Purdue University has a free-of-charge site which offers searching for
pesticide products registered by individual States. Very useful.
ISO Approved Common Names
Alan Wood publishes an invaluable site, "Compendium of Pesticide
Common Names". Much more than just names. Updated often, and you can
receive e-mail notices. Make use of. Go to:
Compendium.
ISO has published a revised version,
ISO 257:2004, of its rules
and procedures for "Pesticides and other agrochemicals - Principles for
the selection of common names"
Linked List Of Common Names
Alan Wood has generously provided an HTML file which lists all names as
of 16 February 2006. This file, iso_name.htm, is
arranged alphabetically; clicking on a name will take you to the relevant
page on Alan's site.
I have extracted common names from the above HTML file. This delimited
text file, iso_name.txt, can be Opened/Imported by
spreadsheet/database and then searched.
Chemical Activity and EPA PC Codes
Delimited text file, isoactv1.txt, has the
1506 primary chemical names and all associatted activity
(sub)classifications.
Delimited text file, isoactv2.txt, has
counts of chemicals for each activity (sub)classification.
Delimited text file, isocode.txt, has
chemical name and where that name is an EXACT match for a name in
EPA-OPP's PPIS files, EPA-OPP's PC code number.
Crop And Non-Crop Chemical Companies On The WWW
Links to (some) pesticide product company sites.
International Sites On The WWW
A selected, but I trust useful, list of sites for information on pesticides
and agriculture outside the United States. Updated and revised irregularly, so
you'll just have to look.
International Maximum Residue Limits
Link to USDA's
Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) site with a searchable database of
MRLs. Also check out the FAS Home Page for potentially other
interesting stuff.
Registration/Regulatory Affairs Consultants
Information, supplied by the principals, about individuals and companies
conducting registration and regulatory affairs consulting services on a contract
basis.
Pesticide
Formulation Devlopment Labs & Consultants
Information about
individuals and facilities offering their services for development and/or
evaluation of pesticide product formulations (added: Focus Formulation and
Consulting).
Pesticide Process Chemistry/Engineering.
Consultants
Need help with pesticide AI production, or related?
Here are consultants I've found. Know of others(?), send them my way for a free
listing.
Pesticide Chemical Usage and Crop Statistics
Links to federal and state sites containing reports about amounts
of pesticides used in the United States, and about other crop statistics.
Pesticide Contract Formulators/Packagers On The
WWW
Companies I've found with Internet sites.
Federally Registered Pesticides. PAN
Database
PANNA (Pesticide Action Network North America) offers an
excellent on-line database for identifying products using multiple criteria. In
addition PANNA provides toxicology and environmental information for active
ingredients.
Anti-Pesticide Action Groups
Every company involved with pesticide products should be aware of what is
being said and done outside the industry. Plus, they often have the first scoop
on what's new in the industry. Here are several source links.
Resistance Action Committees
RACs do more than track developing
resistance to insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides. One of their services is
classification of pesticidal actives by chemical type and mode of action. {In
the event you're worried: RACs are sponsored and promoted by major pesticide
registrants.}
Pesticide
Product Inert Ingredients
NCAP (Northwest Coalitionfor
Alternatives to Pesticides) site. Inerts in products, obtained via FOIA
requests. Arranged by product active ingredient.
California's Pesticide Registrations: Annotated Access Tutorial
CDPR's set of data files about registered pesticide products are formatted as
Fixed-width text files, the same as for EPA-OPP's PPIS data files.
This 9 page/screen Acrobat file, cdprprod.pdf,
takes you from CDPR's home page for registrations through making an Access
database table of Currently Active Registrations...(August 27)
Access Visual Tutorial: Find And Count Nufarm's Registrations. Short
Files below were created with the freeware program Wink.
5 screens version as Shockwave Flash, ppiscnt2.swf.
5 screens version as PDF, ppiscnt2,pdf.
See next entry about this, that, and the other. Use above to see one of the rapid
ways to get an answer, tediously shown and described below...(August 13)
Access Visual Tutorial: Find And Count Nufarm's Registrations
Files below were created with the freeware program Wink.
This Shockwave Flash file, ppiscnt1.swf, shows cursor
movements as I go through an Access database. Alas, rendering makes the text
unreadable (at least with what I have).
This Acrobat file, ppiscnt1.pdf, has readable text
(increase magnification to 100% or more if not clear), but only the Next screen
button works, and alas the Button jumps over some screen shots. Use Acrobat's
Previous and/or Next buttons to move between screen shots.
Wait for files to load. Most screens have explanatory text about what I'm
doing. Simple idea (soon to be posted is the efficient short version): Use
EPA-OPP's PPIS data files, once in an Access database, to ask: What are Nufarm's
current registrations and, once having found out Nufarm uses 10 EPA Co. No., how
many registrations to each Company Number...(August 13)
US Registrations/Registrants/AIs: Ready-to-Search
Access database below is my day-to-day, Version 2. You ought be able to tell
your Version to "Open" the "Convert" to your Version, then do more than I've set
up.
Zip file, ppis_tut.zip (2.6MB) when extracted will
return the Access 2 database ppis_tut.mdb (6.8MB).
Database has four of the 30 data tables I regularly use. Data is from EPA-OPP's
July update to Web-posted PPIS data files. Table formats are those I use, regardless
of EPA-OPP's arrangement.
Tables are:
Current/Former Registrants/Subregistrants (30,859)
Current approved registrations (17,085)
Actives in approved registrations (all on one line) (17,080)
All Transferred registrations (15,073)
Database has ten Ready-to-Run queries which make Table of Results:
(Sub)Registrants named "Nufarm"
(Sub)Registrants in Missouri
Count Registrations-per-Registrant, sort by Total
Count Registrations-per-Registrant, sort by Registrant Name
Get Transfers in Year 2008
Get approved registrations where AI information not yet in PPIS files
Get Percentage AI for Metsulfuron-methyl as Sole Active Ingredient
Get total Percentage AIs where Metsulfuron-methyl is in a Combination product
Get all TGAI (Tech Grade Active Ingredients)
Get all registrations 1st approved in Years 2007 and 2008
Problems with your Version of Access? Question(s) about asking other questions
with EPA-OPP's PPIS data files? Send me a message...(July 30)
Back to the beginning, then moving forward. Acrobat PDF files. On-screen annotations. Check here for additions. NB: I use Access version 2. Other versions have the same standard functions but Microsoft changes names, locations, and button pictures. Comments/suggestions are welcomed.
PPIS: Introduction. What is in EPA's PPIS (Pesticide Product Information
System) data files? What are Fixed-Width files? What help does EPA provide for
understanding and using the monthly updated files? In this lesson,
accs_001.pdf, a few screen shots from the PPIS Web
site ought provide insight.
FORMULA.TXT: Examining In Detail a PPIS data file. This file,
accs_002.pdf: Registration Number, PC Code Number,
and Percentage Active Ingredient. Open the file with Word. Look at EPA's
description of what is on each line and where to find it. Put in some spaces
in Word to easily see the pieces.
Formula.txt: Interlude. Open in Excel 97. In case you though PPIS
Fixed-width text (*.txt) files are something special, even though Word is happy to
Open. How about telling Excel 97 to go get the text file. No annotations as the
operations/how-to are just the usual clicks in Excel. Take a look at
accs_003.pdf, for about 6 screen shots.
Formula.txt. REG_NR #1. REG_NR (product registration number) is SO
IMPORTANT I look at it separately for a while. Create an Access database file then
Design (make) a Table to hold REG_NR to be extracted from formula.txt. NB: Do Design
, etc. tedious stuff in Access ONCE, Save as a Template, then COPY | Rename ever
after (I've being using the same PPIS database template every month since May 2003
when EPA revised formats of PPIS data text files).
accs_004.pdf.
Formula.txt. REG_NR #1a. Have a Table to hold the REG_NR. Since PPIS
is Fixed-Width formatted I need to create an Import Specification. Specs just tell
Access "Go grab this piece and stuff it here".
accs_005.pdf
REG_NR #2: Separate Pieces. Stuffing REG_NR into a single Field (above)
results is not most useful. Better is one of several options: Import Company
Number and Product Number parts into separate Fields. Here, Design a Table, write
an Import Specification, then import the separate parts, using formula.txt file.
accs_006.pdf
REG_NR #2a. Have Company and Product numbers in separate Fields. Useful
for some Queries about PPIS data. Also convenient is a Field with the complete
product registration number. Here, add a Field to the Table used in #2 above. It
will be EPA Reg. No. in product label format (e.g., 279-3275). Will use the
VERY IMPORTANT/INVALUABLE/CAN'T-LIVE-WITHOUT Access function: Build. LEARN TO
USE BUILD!!!! Once over the initial "looks scary", you'll see just how simple
are Builds (little more than point and click).
accs_007.pdf
FORMULA.TXT: Import/Get All. Now, from PPIS formula. txt: Company
Number; Product Number; PC_Code Number; Percentage Active. Then, using Build (yes,
you really do use it over and over), convert Percentage Active from the PPIS
file version (0420035) to a more understandable decimal version (42.0035).
accs_008.pdf
My Access Database For PPIS. 7 screen shots (annotated), showing Tables,
Queries, and Reports I use every day for my own use, and use every month to tell
people "New Registration Approvals". accs_009.pdf
Access: Everything Else. Whether for PPIS or PPLS or CDPR or ..., there are
only these tasks: Design Tables, write Import Specifications (if Fixed-width
data files; no need for Delimted text files), construct Queries.
Yah-de-yah, the same tasks/operations over and over and over. Drag-and-drop,
double-click, etc., etc.
Advanced Access? REG_NR Not As A Number. Because EPA says REG_NR is a
Number doesn't mean you have to use/believe. Here I: Design a Table where REG_NR
is Imported as Text (all 11 digits); have Co_Nr, Prod_Nr, and EPA Reg Nr in the
Table. Import REG_NR as Text, then in 1 Query extract Co_Nr and Prod_Nr. Finally,
to show Table Design is not immutable, switch REG_NR's Data Type from Text to
Number. 10 screens. accs_010.pdf
PPIS. Storing/Using Old as Access. Even though your company wants to
know "What is anyone/everyone doing now", there are reasons to keep old PPIS file
sets in Access, or any other database. What to keep? Up to you. Here are two screens
, annotated, which show (1) my Access Directory file folders and, (2) the old PPIS
file databases I keep, and use. accs_011.pdf
PPIS. Why 18 Files and So Convoluted?. Why can't/won't EPA just put
everything about products in one file which you could use with Excel? Same reason
everyone else in the world uses a relational database. Simple example. Which would
you rather do: Update a name on one line of one file, or Update the name on
376,903 lines of one file. A real world PPIS example. As of January 2000, PPIS
company.txt file has the entry: Co. No. 100 is named NOVARTIS CROP PROTECTION.
In the Janaury 2000 PPIS separate files, Novartis had: 179 active registrations;
205 Active Ingredient-Reg_NR; 5152 Pest-on-Label-Reg_Nr; 371,367 Site-on-Label-
Reg_Nr. A few years on the company decided SYNGENTA was a much niftier name. So,
everything, including Company Name, in one file? Set data entry clerks to work,
changing Company Name in 376,903 entries for ONLY currently active registrations
(oh, and a few thousand more for the registration support studies in PDMS, and
tolerances, and data compensation files, and...). OR, in the company.txt file at
Co. No. 100, change Novartis to Syngenta, and be done with it in a few seconds.
Pesticide Products. How Does NPIRS Do That? NPIRS is familiar to many (
either via fee or free Web searching). If you ask the simple question of NPIRS
"What about FMC's current Registrations for Permethin", NPIRS cranks up its Oracle
(super heavy duty, industrial strength relational database program). Even though
I've never seen the data files NPIRS gets from EPA I can guess what they ought look
like, since they ought be Fixed-width text files as are posted on EPA's Web site.
Here is how I'd answer the question with Access 2, accs_012.pdf
. Only 3 screen shots.
PPIS. Import Specifications For Access. 8 screen shots, annotated.
My Access Template Database file, reused/renamed each month for new EPA posted
files. Show the database begins with empty Tables. How-to-Import (Get External Data)
? 3 of my Import Specifications (which you could of course Copy and Use). Every
other PPIS text (*.txt) is done in the same manner. As in Excel I expect, do the
same over and over and over. accs_013.pdf
PDMS, NOT PPIS, But Access. Access is useful for only PPIS, or PPLS? No.
pdms_001.pdf, is 3 screens from yet another Access
database: U.S. Pending Registration Applications. I.e., extract information about
new registration applications to U.S. EPA-OPP, then track, via PPIS, whether or not
Approved. PDF file is, as of 1 August 2008: 1st Application in Y2008, Not Yet
Approved, By Whom, When. 313 applications lurking.
NPIRS Shows the Same For Pending? Crank Up Access. Pending Applications
for What? No problem. Just another Access Query, which uses an Attached Table from
another database file. Temporary Attachment? No problem, I use regularly.
pdms_002.pdf
Excel, Access, Google, Amazon, etc: All Questions Use The Same...
Should you find Access difficult, recall: The 1st time you used Excel or Word.
Perhaps helpful or heartening is: Every program where you can ask a Question uses
a few Rules devised more than 100 Years Ago: Is Exactly, And, Or, Not.
The only additions, admittedly important, are convoluted, and secret, Rules in
such as Google searches for "is like or close to". Access has its own: Begins With,
Contains, Ends With. These are the Access versions of "is like, is close to".
Elsewise, every program which
allows you to a Search uses and relies on the same four ideas. All (!!) you
have to do is figure out how the program you are using makes you ask the Question.
{For any who are interested: The 100+ year old rules are the work of George
Boole, a mathematician who worked on formalizing the ways in which Logical questions
can be described. Essentially, formalizing the dialogues of Aristotle and Socrates,
and Plato, and everyone else in the past 2000+ years.}
Selecting An AI Name: NPIRS. The NPIRS free-of-charge Web site (http://
ceris.purdue.edu) allows you to search for registered products. NPIRS says the site
uses PPIS data files. So, no Access database needed. Ask about Pyriproxyfen.
accs_014.pdf
PPIS: What Name For PC Code 109701? I say "Permethrin", NPIRS says
"Permethrin, mixed cis and trans". Regardless, using Access and PPIS here is more or
less how I began my Tbl_AI_Common Name, to convert EPA PC Code number to a singular,
preferred name in my reports and posted Excel files. 8 screen shots.
accs_015.pdf.
For further information, or to discuss a specific project, contact Bruce
McKay:
e-mail your request to bmckay@ix.netcom.com
(that's bmckay@ix.netcom.com).
All original materials are copyright © 1996 - 2008 by Bruce M. McKay, and all rights are reserved.
The URL for this page is http://www.bmckay.com