Senegal – poisons and alternatives

Although fewer pesticides are used in Africa than in other continents, highly toxic products are applied in inappropriate conditions by women and men with no training or product information. Some initiatives are helping farmers eliminate pesticides but deaths and poisonings continue.

Participants in PAN Africa’s Farmer Field School identify the insects they are collecting from their vegetables. Photo Barbara Dinham

Three non-governmental organisations, PAN Africa in Senegal, Organisation Beninoise pour la Promotion de l’Agriculture Biologique (OBEPAB), and the Ghana Organic Agriculture Network (GOAN) – with PAN UK – have established documentation centres and an outreach programme to work with farmers, agricultural research and extension, the health services and decision makers to raise awareness of pesticide hazards and promote alternatives. 
    The first commitment is to help reduce farmers’ exposure to hazards in their daily lives, provide affordable alternatives to the spiralling cost of chemical inputs, and prevent adverse environmental impacts. Through Farmer Field Schools (FFS) with poor farmers in areas of high pesticide use the project helps farmers use locally available inputs, such as neem, to control pests and develop agro-ecological strategies. 
PAN Africa’s FFS with a women’s vegetable group in Deni Malick trains the farmers to collect and recognise pests and predators and calculate population densities in the field. The 25 women in the group are now promising entomologists and committed to organic production!
    The resource centres are establishing data bases on pesticide poisoning incidents, and following up cases that come to their attention. Disturbing reports of deaths in the Region of Kolda, likely to be attributable to pesticide exposure prompted PAN Africa to investigate. Sixteen victims are known and medical authorities believe there may be more unreported deaths. All farmers have been in contact with Granox a formulation consisting of 10% carbofuran, 15% thiram and 7% benomyl, formulated by Senchim in Dakar. Those who died were mainly men (14 of the 16 victims), and all presented the same clinical signs: oedema in the face and limbs, swelling of the abdomen, cardiac pains and respiratory difficulties. All died within three days.
    The government sent a team of epidemiologists and toxicologists to investigate. The PAN Africa mission in September 2000 interviewed villagers, officials in the local crop protection department, medical authorities and managers in the companies distributing seeds and pesticides.
    Interviews with farmers in the area revealed that they are poorly prepared to use these hazardous pesticides. Only one told PAN Africa that he protected his hands by binding them with a piece of cloth. No protective equipment is available. It is common practice to eat after having applied pesticides by hand without washing, to eat or smoke while applying pesticides, and to store pesticides in the home. 
    Although the government has not yet reported on its investigations, PAN Africa’s mission indicates a strong probability that the deaths are linked to exposure to Granox. (BD)

Full details on poisonings in Pesticides & Alternatives, PAN Africa, No 12, December 2000.

[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No.51, March 2001, p5]