3.1. Implied Maximum Dose Limit

IMDL was introduced in this research to examine the pesticide maximum exposure mass loading based on national jurisdictions PSVs from all major exposure pathways. Pesticide implied dose limits (IDLs) were calculated for each exposure pathway as the following, and because only U.S. regulated pesticide air MCLs, the IDL_air calculation was omitted.

For drinking water:

For residential soil:

For agricultural commodities:

All IDLs are based on the following set of exposure scenario coefficient values.

EF – Exposure Factor (1) [18];

HW – Human Weight (70 kg) [18];

V – Volume of water intake rate (2 L/day) [18];

CF – Convert Factor (10⁶ mg/kg);

IR – Intake Rate for soil [19];

ABS_d – Absorption Factor [19];

GIABS – GastroIntestinal Absorption Factor [19];

IR_i – Intake Rate for food i (kg/day) [20].

And IMDL was derived by adding up IDLs from these possible exposures. If a nation regulated more than one PSVs in one of the major exposures, different IMDLs were calculated by combining different IDL with others.