As the state prepares to close its landmark pesticide case against tomato grower Ag-Mart, Gov. Mike Easley announced Wednesday a new task force on preventing pesticide exposure among farm workers.

"We are bringing our top experts together to address this issue, and their recommendations will make North Carolina a national leader in this area," Easley said in a news release.

Easley spokeswoman Renee Hoffman said the Ag-Mart case prompted the governor to call for more scrutiny of the state's regulation of pesticide use on farms.

The state Agriculture Department has accused the Florida company of 369 violations of state pesticide law, contending that the company regularly allowed workers to harvest tomatoes in fields freshly sprayed with dangerous chemicals. The state cited the company after three Ag-Mart workers gave birth to babies with deformities.

It cannot be determined whether the birth defects were caused by pesticides, but one of the mothers is suing the company.

The state's case against Ag-Mart has gone on for more than two years and is not yet closed, but it has largely crumbled.

Two judges who reviewed it recommended dropping all but 17 of the state's charges, because there were no precise records of when pesticides were sprayed or which fields employees were working. Without those records, the judges said, the state was unable to prove violations. The judges recommended reducing the fine to $6,000.

The nine-member task force, composed of representatives of government agencies that help regulate pesticides, will examine current regulations, look at the policies in other states and make recommendations by May, said State Health Director Leah Devlin, who will lead the group. It will meet for the first time on Feb. 14.

Devlin said the group will consider new regulations and training initiatives.

She said she would like to remedy a problem that plagued state officials in the Ag-Mart case. Companies are not required to keep precise records about when and where chemicals are applied. Without those documents, she said, it was impossible to know whether pesticide exposure caused health problems in Ag-Mart workers.

Advocates say the Ag-Mart case pointed up major weaknesses in state laws designed to protect farm workers from pesticide exposure. Fawn Pattison, head of the Agricultural Resources Center, which opposes pesticide use, said she hopes the task force's work will make farm workers less vulnerable.

"This is a population that's very easy to just ignore," Pattison said. "This case has, hopefully, stirred up some empathy and compassion for the people who harvest our food."