Special Requests

For decades now the lack of publicly accessible data on pesticide use, exposures, and risks has held back progress in identifying which pesticides, used on what crops, are driving adverse impacts on workers, public health, and/or the environment.

This is why it often takes 20 or more years for the scientific community to compile sufficient data on high-risk pesticide uses to trigger regulatory actions by the EPA or other regulators. For too many pesticides, the lag between recognition of likely significant risks and meaningful regulatory action extends beyond the useful life of a pesticide.

The goal of public health research is to recognize and prevent factors driving adverse health outcomes. Far too often this goal remains beyond the reach of the pesticide risk assessment and regulatory communities because of the absence of publicly accessible information on the most basic aspects of pesticide use, exposures, and toxicity.

HHRA is working to overcome long-standing data access issues by making available two analytical systems supporting HHRA research – the Pesticide Use Data System (PUDS) and the Dietary Risk Index (DRI).

The Pesticide Use Data System

PUDS provides scientists access to all USDA pesticide use data in a relational database and analytical system. It is the only system that provides scientists an opportunity to track changes in pesticide use over time at the state and national level, by crop, and across all registered pesticides.

PUDS supports a diversity of analytical applications that would otherwise take weeks or months to carry out given the way that the USDA now provides access to its pesticide use data.

The Dietary Risk Index System

The DRI quantifies trends in pesticide dietary exposures and risk in the US and globally. It is the only system in the world that integrates data on pesticide residues across the food supply with regulatory-set exposure thresholds.

There are tens of thousands of DRI output tables accessible via the HHRA website. More will be added over time. But many additional analytical tasks can be carried out within the DRI system. HHRA is committed to supporting scientists who will benefit from a chance to draw upon the DRI in advancing their research.

Special Requests

HHRA invites scientists interested in using these systems to contact HHRA to discuss how we can accelerate progress in their ongoing research. In most cases, we can generate and quickly share a custom-designed dataset that meets specific project needs.

Data and support from HHRA in the use of PUDS and the DRI will be provided free of charge, except in cases involving substantial programming time to extract the requested information.

Email Charles Benbrook to request access to PUDs or DRI data not otherwise accessible from the interactive tables posted on HHRA’s website.