P.M. BRIEFING : Grocers Recruits in Pesticides War

WASHINGTON — An environmental group, the National Toxics Campaign, announced today it has signed up a half-dozen grocery chains in a pledge to shift growers away from using pesticides, especially cancer-causing chemicals.

Environmentalists called the agreement a major breakthrough, although it amounted to little more than a general pledge to work toward elimination of pesticide use.

“This is the beginning of a national campaign,” said Craig Merrilees of the National Toxics Campaign, calling the pact a “first of a kind . . . dramatic breakthrough” for the environmental movement.

The participants represent fewer than 200 stores in the United States and are firms primarily in California and Arizona--Raley’s with 55 stores in the Sacramento area and Abco Supermarkets with about 60 stores in Arizona--that have broken ranks before with their industry colleagues on the pesticide issue.