Late last year, an obscure committee meeting in The Hague took a decision which seems out of step with what is happening to organophosphate pesticides in countries such as the US, the UK and Australia.
In one of its busy annual sessions, the Codex Committee on Pesticide Residues (CCPR) apparently agreed to relax existing maximum residue levels (MRLs) for two organophosphates (OPs) in fruits. The two OPs were chlorpyrifos and methidathion. Chlorpyrifos, in particular, is regularly described as a potent toxin.
All the other bureaucratic consequences of the CCPR proposal clicked into place. The committee is a meeting of officials from different countries who reach agreement between governments on MRLs for pesticides residues in food and feed commodities moving in international trade.
MRL proposals sent
Proposals for MRLs are sent to CCPR by the Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR), and become part of an eight-step procedure which gives governments and other interested organisations a chance to comment. JMPR is supposed to run independent evaluations on pesticides. The CCPR then recommends MRLs to the biennial meeting of the Codex, the ultimate rubber stamp, which adopts and publishes them. Codex MRLs do not have any force in international law, but are seen as a benchmark for trade.
Both the proposals on chlorpyrifos and methidathion were at step eight in the Codex procedure last summer, and have now been adopted as final MRLs. Even in the arcane world of Codex, this decision has crept out and raised eyebrows among people who have watched these procedures for years.
In Australia, Dick Copeman is a GP who co-ordinates the consumer food network which is part of the Consumers Federation of Australia. He heard about the JMPR proposal from Consumers International, and wrote an article in his newsletter which was seen by Tim Lang, professor of food policy at Thames Valley University, London. Professor Lang is a Codex-watcher, and in a section on Codex from his forthcoming book, he writes: ‘Particularly sensitive is the issue of scientific judgement. The GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) stipulated that disputes would be arbitrated on grounds of ‘sound science,’ yet consumer groups argue that science is not the only salient feature, nor indeed is science quite the straightforward arbiter it is assumed to be. Whose is the research? Who funded it? Is it publicly available? What questions framed the analysis?
‘With extensive agrochemical company participation … who could have confidence in Codex’s decision in July 1999, for instance, to relax MRLs for chlorpyrifos and methidathion, both
organophosphates?’(1) One person who could answer all those questions is Dr John Herrman, one of two secretaries to the JMPR. From his office at the World Health Organisation in Geneva, Dr Herrman said he didn’t know how JMPR had made its proposal to relax the MRLs, but the whole discussion was recorded on the Food and Agriculture Organisation website – not the Codex one. It is possible to find the discussion by knowing exactly where to go on the website and then downloading 300 pages of text. But if you are not a scientist, JMPR reports are not easy
reading(2).
As JMPR is made up from between 30 and 35 scientists who are drawn from the 160 countries which are members of Codex, they are an obvious source of information. At least one comes from the UK, but the agency which handles the UK’s arrangements on Codex, the Pesticides Safety Directorate, is not allowed to discuss them directly. Instead, questions must be channelled through the Ministry of Agriculture press office.
Old habits die hard
While the officials who run Codex protest that it is growing up and learning to live comfortably with a public which wants to know more about how and why decisions were taken on dangerous chemicals, the outcome for chlorpyrifos shows that some old habits persist. ‘We do not know how JMPR handles the precautionary principle or how it deals with scientific uncertainty,’ said Ronald Luigk, senior project officer in the food, health and environment section at the Dutch Consumers Association. ‘There is no observer status for NGOs, and so we think JMPR should be much more open. Scientific knowledge about endocrine disrupters and the vulnerability of children to toxic chemicals should be on the agenda. But at the last JMPR meeting, they decided that the test results they obtain for specific compounds are enough to ensure the safety of everyone, including children. We are not happy with that.’
John Herrman says that JMPR is an independent group of scientists who evaluate chemical substances. ‘Traditionally, we have not had observers on JMPR.’ Although Dr Herrman held out the possibility that JMPR might change in the future, this attitude infuriates Consumers International (CI). In a letter to Dr Herrman in September, Julian Edwards, CI’s director general, echoed Ronald Luigk’s comments about children, and added: ‘We also suggest that JMPR consider, as an alternative to dealing with this issue in a JMPR meeting, convening a special consultation, open to a broad range of experts and
participants.(3)
OP levels up in citrus fruits
In a paper sent to the most recent Codex meeting last summer – where what were then proposals for MRLs were considered – CI said the proposed MRL for chlorpyrifos in citrus fruits would be 2 mg/kg – up from the previous MRL of 0.3 mg/kg. ‘Consumers International absolutely opposes increasing the MRL for this potent neurotoxin, and believes this MRL poses unacceptable risks for children … Using the acute reference dose established by the US Environmental Protection Agency of 0.001 mg/kg, this would mean that a child weighing 20 kg eating a 100-gram orange at the Codex MRL of 2 mg/kg would exceed the acute reference dose by a ten-fold factor.’
These calculations, says CI, do not consider what other OPs may be in the fruit or daily diet of a child, nor the other OPs which a child might be exposed to.
Similar arguments were put forward on methidathion. ‘We have been banging the drum about the need to protect infants and children,’ said Lisa Lefferts, head of the CI delegation to the Codex Committee on Pesticide Residues. ‘But the JMPR concluded that there is no basis for setting stricter pesticides limits to protect infants and children, and that is absolutely outrageous. They are wrong in my view – and in the view of the US National Academy of Sciences and the Food Quality Protection Act.’
Conclusions
PAN UK is concerned that the warnings sounded at the international meeting hosted by PSD in 1998 about the effects of OPs on children (see PN43 p.7) are going unheeded.
References
1. Professor Tim Lang and Dr Michael Heasman, Food Wars, to be published soon by Earthscan.
2. For more information, contact the WHO in Geneva , Tel +41 22 791 2111.
3. Letter to Dr J.L. Herrman, WHO Joint Secretary to JMPR, from Julian Edwards, Director General, Consumers International, 9 June 1999.
[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 47, March 2000, page 11]