The high cost of unregulated pesticide use on farmers’ health and the global environment has finally reached international attention. The Pesticide Action Network (PAN), an international alliance of over 600 civil society, environment, and farmers’ organisations worldwide, is launching a 1.3 million euro project to involve farmers and victims of pesticide poisoning in the implementation of crucial international agreements designed to reduce the hazards of pesticides on humans and the environment. Funded by the European Commission, the project will run for three years.
In 2004, two international conventions came into force, banning the production of, and controlling international trade in, the most deadly pesticides. Along with extensive existing legislation and codes of conduct on chemical management, wildlife and habitat protection, labour rights and health and safety, tools now exist to stop the deaths and pollution caused by pesticides, particularly in developing countries.
‘It’s essential that African farmers know about these tools, to protect themselves and raise their working and living conditions to those enjoyed by farmers in developed countries’ says Barbara Dinham, Director of PAN
UK. The number and range of international agreements can be confusing, even for experts, so PAN are collaborating with law firm EcoSphere in Brussels to create a user-friendly, succinct guide to the different conventions. National versions of this guide and community training events will raise awareness and should lead to safer handling of pesticides.
‘But it’s a mutual relationship’ says Sarojeni Rengam, Executive Director of partner organisation PAN Asia Pacific. ‘The conventions need the farmers too, to collect specific information needed, and to monitor violations of the codes’. To take one example, the Rotterdam Convention lists pesticides banned in any part of the world for causing unacceptable health and environmental damage, an early warning to other governments considering whether or not to register that pesticide in their country. In order to get a chemical listed, a government needs to provide evidence of the damage caused. The WHO estimates that three million people experience pesticide poisoning every year – and that 200,000 of them die. But, adds Ms Rengam, ‘too often developing countries don’t have the resources to monitor these poisonings, so can’t prove that the pesticides cause them’.
PAN Asia Pacific trains farming communities and plantation workers to monitor the health impacts of pesticide spraying themselves, and will draw on that experience to train African farmers to do the same. At the same time, PAN Africa will create collaboration between government authorities and community organisations. This will ensure that the results of community health monitoring can be used at an international level to support strong action by governments and regulators in controlling dangerous pesticides.
‘These conventions are intended to help the poor farmers who suffer the most from pesticide ‘collateral damage’ says Abou Thiam, Director of PAN Africa. ‘Yet they are not involved in international activities, and often don’t know about them. This project is a fantastic opportunity for farmers and international regulators to join forces over a problem that causes them both headaches and problems’.
(ET)
[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 67, March 2005, page 19]