Gateway on Pesticide Hazards and Safe Pest Management
How To Find Ingredients in Pesticide Products
Beyond Pesticides offers resources below to evaluate the health and ecological effects of specific chemical exposure from ACTIVE INGREDIENTS in pesticide products, as well as regulatory information and supporting scientific documents. Because various pesticide products can contain more than one active ingredient, it is important to READ the LABEL to determine chemical components.
With 192 different active ingredients and counting, it is essential to establish the connection between the use of these chemicals and their respective hazards.
View the step-by-step guide on how to search for the active ingredient(s) in pesticide products below:
- Go to U.S. EPA's Pesticide Product and Label System and enter the product name. The generic product name may vary.
- After searching, click on the chemical ingredients tab or the link for the most recent label to find Active Ingredients.
Chemical List Label List
If one selects the chemical ingredients tab, skip to Step 4 . If not, proceed to step number 3 - To find the active ingredient(s) on the label, search for the page in the document containing the date of registration. Usually, the active ingredients section occurs within the first few pages of the label document.
- Return to the Beyond Pesticides Gateway and search for the active ingredient name in the yellow box to the right or from the list below.
2,4-D
General Information
- Fact Sheet: 2-4-D.pdf
- Product Names:
- Chemical Class: Phenoxy herbicide
- Uses: Registered for field, fruit, and vegetable crops, turf, lawns, rights-of-way, aquatic sites, forestry applications, post-emergence broadleaf weeds, plant growth regulator in citrus
- Alternatives: Organic agriculture, Organic Lawn care
- Beyond Pesticides rating: Toxic
Health and Environmental Effects
- Cancer: Yes (4)
- Endocrine Disruption: Probable (5)
- Reproductive Effects: Yes (6)
- Neurotoxicity: Yes (7)
- Kidney/Liver Damage: Yes (7)
- Sensitizer/ Irritant: Yes (4)
- Birth/Developmental: Yes (4)
- Detected in Groundwater: Yes (4)
- Potential Leacher: Yes (7)
- Toxic to Birds: Yes (4)
- Toxic to Fish/Aquatic Organisms: Yes (8)
- Toxic to Bees: Yes (4)
Residential Uses as Found in the ManageSafe™ Database
Additional Information
- Regulatory Status:
- Beyond Pesticides' comments on Preliminary Ecological Risk Assessment for Registration review (7/2017)
- EPA Registration Review (2017)
- Beyond Pestides' comments on registration of Enlist Duo (12/2016)
- Registration of Enlist Duo (2014)
- EPA Reregistration Eligibility Document (RED) signed (6/2005)
- Beyond Pesticides' RED comments (8/2004)
- Supporting information:
- Daily News Blog entries (Beyond Pesticides)
- Asthma, Children and Pesticides (Beyond Pesticides)
- Children & Lawn Chemicals Don't Mix (Beyond Pesticides)
- The Safer Choice (Beyond Pesticides)
- NCAP 2,4-D Factsheet (Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides)
- PAN Pesticides Database: 2,4-D (Pesticide Action Network)
- Studies:
- IARC Monographs evaluate DDT, lindane, and 2,4-D. (2015)
- 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D)-resistant crops and the potential for evolution of 2,4-D-resistant weeds. Egan JF, Maxwell BD, Mortensen DA, et al. 2011. Proc Natl Acad Sci. 108(11): E37.
- Cancer and pesticides: an overview and some results of the Italian multicenter case-control study on hematolymphopoietic malignancies
Miligi, L., et al. 2006. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. - Breast cancer risk in Hispanic agricultural workers in California
Mills, P.K. and Yang, R. 2005. International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health. - Lymphohematopoietic cancers in the United Farm Workers of America (UFW), 1988-2001. Mills PK, Yang R, Riordan D. 2005. Cancer Causes Control.
- Herbicide exposure and the risk of transitional cell carcinoma of the urinary bladder in Scottish terriers, Glickman, et. al. 2004. Journal of the American Medical Association.
- Biomarker correlations of urinary 2,4-D levels in foresters: genomic instability and encodrine disruption. Garry, V.F., et al. 2001. Environ Health Pers.
- A Case–Control Study of Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and Exposure to Pesticides Journal of the American Cancer Society, 1999.
- Pesticides in Household Dust and Soil: Exposure Pathways for Children of Agricultural Families, Simcox, et. al. 1995.Environmental Health Perspectives.
- Pesticides and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Zahm SH and Blair A. 1992. Cancer Res.
- A case-control study of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and the herbicide 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) in eastern Nebraska.. Zahm, S., et al. 1990. Epidemiology 1(5):349-356
- A longitudinal study of atrazine and 2,4-D exposure and oxidative stress markers among iowa corn farmers.. Lerro CC, Beane Freeman LE, Portengen L, Kang D, et al. 2017. Environ Mol Mutagen. 58(1):30-38.
- Agricultural exposures and gastric cancer risk in Hispanic farm workers in California. Mills, P.K., and Yang, R.C. 2007. Environ Res 104(2):282-289.
- Agricultural herbicide use and a risk of lymphoma and soft-tissue sarcoma.. Hoar, S., et al. 1986. Journal of the American Medical Association 259(9): 1141-1147
- Biomonitoring data for 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid in the United States and Canada: interpretation in a public health risk assessment context using Biomonitoring Equivalents. Aylward LL et al. 2010. Environ Health Perspect. 118(2):177-81
- Autism: Transient in utero hypothyroxinemia related to maternal flavonoid ingestion during pregnancy and to other environmental antithyroid agents. Román, G, C. 2007. Journal of the Neurological Sciences; 262(1-2), pp 15-26
- Birth Malformations and Other Adverse Perinatal Outcomes in Four U.S. Wheat-Producing States.. Schreinemachers, D. 2003. Environmental Health Perspectives, 111(9).
- Cancer and pesticides: an overview and some results of the Italian multicenter case-control study on hematolymphopoietic malignancies. Miligi, L., et al. 2006. Ann N Y Acad Sci 1076:366-377
- Developmental Toxicity of a Commercial Herbicide Mixture in Mice: I. Effects on Embryo Implantation and Litter Size. Cavieres, M., et al. 2002. Environ Health Perspect 110:1081-1085
- Pesticides applied to crops and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis risk in the U.S. Andrew, A., Zhou, J., Gui, J., Harrison, A., Shi, X., Li, M., Guetti, B., Nathan, R., Tischbein, M., Pioro, E.P. and Stommel, E. NeuroToxicology, 87, pp.128-135.
- Association between increasing agricultural use of 2, 4-D and population biomarkers of exposure: findings from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2001–2014.. Freisthler, M.S., Robbins, C.R., Benbrook, C.M., Young, H.A., Haas, D.M., Winchester, P.D. and Perry, M.J. Environmental Health, 21(1), pp.1-11.
- Association between increasing agricultural use of 2,4-D and population biomarkers of exposure: findings from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2001–2014. Freisthler, M.S., Robbins, C.R., Benbrook, C.M., Young, H.A., Haas, D.M., Winchester, P.D. and Perry, M.J. Environmental Health, 21(1), pp.1-11.
- Amine Volatilization from Herbicide Salts: Implications for Herbicide Formulations and Atmospheric Chemistry. Sharkey, S.M., Hartig, A.M., Dang, A.J., Chatterjee, A., Williams, B.J. and Parker, K.M., 2022. Environmental Science & Technology.
- Assessment of the impact of glyphosate and 2,4-D herbicides on the kidney injury and transcriptome changes in obese mice fed a Western diet.. Romualdo, G.R., de Souza, J.L.H., Valente, L.C. and Barbisan, L.F., 2023. Toxicology Letters, 385, pp.1-11.
- Dicamba and 2,4-D in the Urine of Pregnant Women in the Midwest: Comparison of Two Cohorts (2010–2012 vs. 2020–2022). Daggy, J.K. et al. (2024) Dicamba and 2,4-D in the urine of pregnant women in the Midwest: Comparison of two cohorts (2010–2012 vs. 2020–2022), Agrochemicals. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2813-3145/3/1/5.
- A Comprehensive Review on Pesticide Residues in Human Urine. Hakme, E., Poulsen, M. and Lassen, A. (2024) A Comprehensive Review on Pesticide Residues in Human Urine, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. Available at: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.jafc.4c02705.