Safe Use – not so safe 

The Global Safe Use Project was launched in 1991 with funds from the pesticide industry’s association to train pesticide operators in developing countries. Douglas Murray and Peter Leigh Taylor report on one of the projects, the Guatemalan pilot scheme, and examines how the campaign has not lived up to its original billing.

The Global Safe Use Pilot Projects were launched following criticism of the pesticide industry and concerns raised by interest groups and campaigners regarding the effects of pesticide use on human health and the environment. After the failure of attempts to portray the pesticide use campaigners as ‘latter day luddites’(1) who threatened attempts to tackle world hunger(2), the pesticide industry organisation CropLife International (then called the Global Crop Protection Federation) decided to look at how pesticides were being promoted and used. However, Safe Use approaches suffer from many contradictions and problems in analysis. 

The Guatemala safe use project
Safe Use in Guatemala began with the distribution of safety equipment and training around human and environmental protection, prevention and treatment of pesticide poisoning, disposal of containers and regulation. It then looked to test and distribute better safety equipment and deal with waste disposal for pesticides. 
    The Safe Use programme in Guatemala recently became self-sufficient with the Guatemalan pesticide association, AGREQUIMA, imposing a levy on imported pesticide ingredients and products and using the funds for training activities(3). 
    The first phase trained 800 government extension agents, who then went on to train a further 226,000 farmers and housewives, 2,800 schoolteachers and 67,000 schoolchildren, 700 pesticide distributor employees, 330 technical and sales people and 2,000 physicians and health personnel(4). Studies claimed to find that increased knowledge regarding the safe use of pesticides led to changed behaviour, citing for example that 88% of children interviewed for an audit said they did not re-use empty agri-chemical containers, while 84% of trained farmers reported reading labels on products against 56% of untrained farmers. However, this may indicate distortion in the selection of trainees, as in Guatemala 32% of the population speak no Spanish, and nearly 36% cannot read or write(5). 
    AGREQUIMA has claimed that the Safe Use campaign has led to a significant decline in reported pesticide poisonings, a claim that has been echoed by the Guatemalan press(6). Pesticide industry literature implies that the Safe Use programme has contributed to very profound changes in pesticide use in Guatemala, part of a ‘silent revolution’ in improved pesticide use that is sweeping the developing world(7). Parallel activities have also been set up based on the assumption of the programme’s success, such as the USAID initiative, Pesticide Management Activity (PMA)(8). 
    IPM approaches were promoted as part of the campaign, although these have been criticized by some as attempting to capture this alternative strategy for industry purposes, and not going far enough to promote alternatives to pesticide use. Others have welcomed this new approach. 

Ecological fallacy 
However, the industry’s claims involve an ‘ecological fallacy’, in which population or group level data are used to draw conclusions about individuals. The reports of dramatic declines in pesticide poisonings in Guatemala are suspect because of chronic underreporting in Central America, exacerbated in Guatemala by the effects of civil war and a drastic decline in public sector activities, worsened by recession and structural adjustment policies(9).
    Most notably, one department in Guatemala, Escuintia, stopped reporting altogether during the period for which these successes are claimed, despite being the area with traditionally some of the highest reports of poisonings(10). This seriously calls into question the notion that the reduction in poisonings is due to the Safe Use programme. Meanwhile, recent studies suggest that acute pesticide illness remains very high in Guatemala(11).

Confusion about safe use
Industry claims about the success of Safe Use also confuse outputs (numbers trained) with outcomes (actual adoption of safer pesticide practices). Documenting the number of people receiving training is not an adequate presentation of an impact on pesticide hazards in the Guatemalan countryside. It is unclear whether the numbers of trainees reported by the industry refer to persons actually reached directly with pesticide-related information, or whether the numbers are based on estimates of success of its ‘trainee becomes trainer’ approach. The industry has so far failed to clarify this. 
    The Safe Use programme training model used in Guatemala assumed that training automatically leads to changes in behaviour. However, past research(12) suggests such changes may be temporary. The Safe Use programme also assumes that pesticide problems are linked to poor use practice rather than their properties, and thus that common sense and facts can solve these problems(13). Unfortunately, common sense approaches are often defeated by practical constraints caused by poverty or other pressures(14). 
For example, 15 young workers in Honduras were poisoned after taking their lunch without washing their hands, as taking the time to do so may have cost them their jobs. Safety equipment was not available(15). The Safe Use approach fails to adequately take into account the many factors shaping how pesticides are used: credit systems, government policies promoting intensive farming, marketing, information on alternative pest control methods, farmers’ lack of education, and particularly poverty. This highlights the need to better integrate pesticide end users into the decision-making process and the design of training programmes. 
    According to the International Food Workers Union (IUF), training may be carried out by pesticide salespeople, with a clear conflict of interest(16), and training sessions may be talks rather than teacher based instruction. Finally, agricultural workers change jobs frequently, undermining workplace training efforts. 

Hazardous conditions
The pesticide industry believes that pesticide use is beneficial to all and that population increases will require agricultural intensification. In this scenario the problems lies with the farmers who misuse the pesticides. 
    The Safe Use strategy has contradictory definitions: that the pesticide problem is one of public perception is based on a serious health and environmental hazard. A clear message about numbers reached may convince regulators and consumers in northern markets that the industry behaves responsibly. 
    If, however the problem is defined as a real and serious set of hazardous conditions, the industry’s objective should be focused on altering hazardous behaviour and conditions, rather than consumer and regulator perceptions. The industry remains divided on this issue, yet it is clearly important that sooner rather than later it decides whether there is a real or a public-relations problem. If it is defined as being a real problem with hazardous outcomes, then the industry needs to set a series of deeper and more elaborate measures for its Safe Use programme. 

Regulation 
The pesticide industry in Central America has been pursuing a harmonized list of pesticides in Central America. This initiative calls for each country to register a pesticide if that product is registered in any of the countries in the region. This ignores the problem of pesticides already banned in a country but registered in a neighbouring one. The approach favoured by health ministries is to regulate up to a higher standard of safety by prohibiting products regionally where they have been banned in a single country. 
    The outcome of this may highlight a continued resistance by the pesticide industry to recognize the problems. As long as the Pesticide Industry insists on the efficacy of, and near-exclusive reliance on, the Safe Use paradigm, and ignores the need for prior and higher level interventions, the ability to significantly alter the nature of the pesticide problem in the developing world will remain in question. 

Combat strategies
Pesticide problem-solving initiatives must first recognize that Safe Use training and related efforts will never bring the pesticide problem under control. Claims to the contrary only delay the adoption of the measures that hold out hope for an end to widespread poisoning and environmental contamination from pesticides. 
    The Safe Use campaign may consume scarce public resources, such as the revenues from the tax that the Guatemalan government returns to the pesticide industry for Safe Use activities, which could be applied to more effective pesticide hazard reduction strategies. 
    While continuing, the Safe Use programme should be complemented by an industrial hygiene approach. This would replace the current Safe Use message of ‘use pesticides safely, but by all means use pesticides’(17) with one that recognises that many of the pesticides currently in use may need to be eliminated. This approach is needed to mitigate the impact of the large number of unknowns in pesticides such as long-term health impacts or environmental impacts. The industrial hygiene approach as used in Europe contains a mix of government and voluntary industrial action. Intervention begins at the top and works downwards to those areas that have the least impact. The move goes from engineering controls to administrative controls including training and finally to personal protective equipment. The recommendations following from this approach include: 

• Eliminating the hazard is a priority. Most serious hazards result from a few products only, and these are usually World Health Organisation products classified as extremely and highly hazardous (Class I). The most dramatic fall in reported incidents in Guatemala occurred when cotton production (which accounted for 80% of Class I pesticide use) collapsed. These products should be replaced with safer ones. As these are often more expensive, they should be used within IPM systems, to keep overall input costs the same. 
• Training emphasis should be on those least likely to move jobs, and those who organise pesticide application. Training should also move away from lecture type approaches, and mix farmers with other groups involved such as administrative staff. All training should be externally monitored, to ensure they are yielding improvements and also that they are legitimate and credible. 
• Personal protective equipment is a problem in developing countries, where it is either not available or not designed for the climate. It can also induce a false sense of safety. 

Conclusion
Safe Use campaigns can contribute to resolving pesticide problems, but they must make accurate reports of results. This means resolving once and for all the nature of the problem: is it one of public perception and farmer misuse, or are pesticides hazardous. The conflict between these two approaches is at the root of the credibility of the campaign as the conclusions reached about the training programme’s success are not based on an accurate reading of the data. The industry has to redefine the pesticide problem as real, which will then lead it to act on improving pesticide use and practice. 

1. DL Murray and PL Taylor, ‘Claim No Easy Victories: Evaluating the Pesticide Industry’s Global Safe Use Campaign.’ World Development 2000, 28, 10, 1735- 1749.
2. T Barry, Roots of Rebellion: Land and Hunger in Central America, Boston, Mass., South End, 1998.
3. P Hurst, The Global Pesticides Industry’s ‘Safe Use and Handling’ Training Project in Guatemala, International Labour Organization, 1999.
4. GIFAP Protección de Cultivos: Proyectos de Uso y Manejo Seguro en America Latina. Guatemala City, Grupo Internacional de Asociaciones Nacionales de Fabricantes de Productos Agroquímicos, n.d.
5. M de Campos and J Finkelman, Situación Actual del Uso y Manejo de Plaguicidas en Guatemala, Guatemala City, OPS/OMS, 1998.
6. L Grimaldi, Disminuyen accidentes por uso de plaguicidas, Prensa Libre, Guatemala City, 1998, 18-19.
7. Op. cit. 4.
8. Evaluations of this project were mixed. RJ Tobin, Pesticides, the environment and US foreign policy International Environmental Affairs 1996, 8, 3, 244-266.
9. J Spence et. al., Promise and Reality: Implementation of the Guatemalan Peace Accords, Cambridge, Mass., Hemisphere Initiatives, 1998.
10. Op. cit. 5.
11. Op. cit. 5.
12. C Perrow, Complex Organizations: a Critical Essay, New York, Random House, 1986.
13. AA Renán, and AC Felipe, ‘El sentido común y los plaguicidas’, Tierra Fertil, 1998, 2.
14. DL Murray, Cultivating Crisis: The Human Cost of Pesticides in Latin America, Austin, Texas, University of Texas Press, 1994.
15. Ibid.
16. Op. cit. 3.
17. Op. cit. 14.

This article is based on two other articles by the same authors: 
DL Murray and PL Taylor. 2000. ‘Claim No Easy Victories: Evaluating the Pesticide Industry’s Global Safe Use Campaign.’ World Development 28 (10):1735- 1749. 
DL Murray and PL Taylor 2002 (forthcoming), Gatekeeper series number 103, IIED: London. 

[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 54, December 2001, pages 6-7]