In its largest enforcement action ever in a pesticides case, the U.S. EPA is seeking $3.7 million in penalties from a Memphis, Tenn.-based pesticide manufacturer for using chemicals from unapproved foreign manufacturers. The agency says that the Micro Flo Company imported thousands of drums of insecticide ingredients from 1996 to 1999 under the pretense that they were from an approved manufacturer in India, when the chemicals were actually from elsewhere. The EPA’s Marlene Tucker said there was no evidence that the chemicals had hurt anyone, but "the whole point of the statute is not that the harm occurred but that the risk of harm is there." The approved manufacturer in India, United Phosphorous, is suing Micro Flo and its parent company BASF for $57 million.
