Dive Brief:

• The U.S. Department of Agriculture is developing a "research roadmap" to address PFAS in agriculture and prevent so-called "forever chemicals" from contaminating food production.
• The department's Agricultural Research Service held a three-day workshop bringing together more than 150 interagency researchers, universities and state partners to identify key solutions to the emerging threat of per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances on farmland.
• Stakeholders intend to build on the workshop and release documents to communicate solutions to the agricultural research community. New partnerships will also help bring those solutions to life, especially in locations "where PFAS has critical impacts on agriculture," the ARS said.

Dive Insight:

Farmers have reported health problems and livestock deaths linked to PFAS contamination, and producers in some states have had to shutter operations entirely after the discovery of "forever chemicals."

PFAS enter the soil through the spreading of biosolids, a byproduct of the wastewater treatment process that has been increasingly prone to contamination from industrial manufacturing. The identification of biosolids as a potential pathway for PFAS chemicals to enter farmland has created challenges for the companies that produce the sludge and the waste entities that manage it.

Addressing PFAS in agriculture has proven difficult as researchers don't know the full extent of contamination, and limitations in current science leaves farms with little option to remediate their soil. 

“Currently, our data shows that PFAS is an environmental hazard that does not come from agriculture,” Marlen Eve, acting assistant administrator of the Natural Resources and Sustainable Agricultural Systems program, said in a statement. “But, producers need efficient, cost-effective ways to deal with the challenges when it is detected in our agricultural soils and waters.”

The ARS roadmap hopes to address some of those challenges by finding "creative and innovative ways to mitigate and remediate a rapidly growing PFAS challenge," Dr. David Knaebel, the agency's senior management advisor, said in a statement.

Suggested long-term roadmap solutions included finding new ways to detect PFAS contamination in farms and developing tools to stop the chemicals before they can do harm. Stakeholders also discussed the need for data standardization, and how to develop solutions to remove PFAS chemicals from manufacturing.

“The meeting’s focus on the gap between PFAS challenges and solutions has empowered and offered hope to ARS, its partners and sister agencies - to address and resolve agriculture-centric problems arising from the use of PFAS in our communities and everyday consumer products,” Knaebel said.