I was recently provided a report from a major university that greatly embarrassed me for the sake of our industry. It was a standard efficacy report that included 2 standard front pages (title and confidentiality) and then 2 pages of an actual report. Two pages should be unacceptable to both your company and to the EPA.
Full disclosure should include all details about the stage of the insect, the containment method, the sex, PRECISE mixing details (‘We mixed 0.05% product’ does NOT confirm anything about HOW you did it. 90% of all mistakes are made during the mixing.), hold times, exposure times, photos of the actual test in action, raw data copies (unless clearly too large to scan), and I could go on and on.
But all too often reports include a page of background and introduction that has no relevance to the test. Efficacy tests should not have background preamble just to fill up space so people can cookie cutter from their last 4 reports with a series of references from the 1970’s. Just because a well-known researcher did your report does not mean you don’t have the right to expect a quality report that will help EPA evaluate the data properly.
I am shocked how often new clients spend much of their time making sure we include photos in our report for them… as if that is some type of ‘above and beyond’ expectation. Yes, you (and EPA) have a right to expect full disclosure in all details in your final report. Anyone should be able to repeat the same test in the same way… that doesn’t mean you will get the same results (biological systems such as insects are nowhere near that repeatable). But that is a topic for a different day.
