What is the IR-4 Project?

Since 1963, the IR-4 Project has been the primary entity in the United States to facilitate registrations of conventional pesticides and biopesticides on specialty food crops (fruits, vegetables, nuts, herbs, spices) and non-food environmental horticulture crops.  IR-4 is sponsored by a grant from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

IR-4 Project California

The three IR-4 field research centers in California are hosted by University of California, with locations in Davis, Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center, and Riverside.  The research centers conduct residue trials as well as efficacy and crop safety trials to support new pesticide registrations.

Through the years, California stakeholders have requested more than 2500 new food uses on specialty crops.  Over 1100 of these have been registered and are available for farmers to use on crops ranging from nuts, citrus, tree fruit, berries, melons, grapes and olives to brassicas, field and root vegetables, grains and oil crops, and herbs and greenhouse crops.  These are only part of the thousands of new registrations IR-4 has secured for California growers and others in the west.  Many new registrations and uses have also resulted from IR-4 projects on environmental horticulture crops.

Examples of pesticide registration expansions resulting from recent California requests