Half of bread contains pesticide cocktails (plus download the ‘Dirty Dozen’)

2022-11-02T09:56:57+00:00November 2nd, 2022|

Based on official figures, PAN UK has today revealed that the proportion of bread containing two or more pesticides has almost doubled in the past year to 50%. The figure marks a major increase from government testing results over the past decade when, on average, roughly a quarter of bread [...]

Call for United Nations to end partnership with pesticide industry

2022-06-09T15:34:21+01:00June 9th, 2022|

Today, 430 civil society and Indigenous peoples organisations from 69 countries around the world called on the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) to uphold human rights and end its partnership with CropLife International. CropLife is the industry association that represents the world’s largest pesticide manufacturers. Ahead of the [...]

People make mistakes – lessons learned from high-risk industries

2021-05-13T09:46:45+01:00May 13th, 2021|

by Keith Tyrell, Director, PAN UK Three decades ago, as a young graduate I embarked on a career in environmental and safety management.  One of my first jobs was working on the safety systems of highly hazardous industries like oil and gas and chemical plants to ensure that the risk [...]

Unprecedented support for the UK to drastically reduce pesticide use

2021-03-19T12:01:32+00:00March 5th, 2021|

by Sarah Haynes, Collaboration Coordinator, hosted by PAN UK Over the last few months, PAN UK and RSPB have mobilised 45 organisations and individual farmers and academics to respond collectively to the UK Government’s public consultation on the revised UK National Action Plan for the Sustainable Use of Pesticides [...]

Organisations unite to defend food standards

2021-03-19T12:05:53+00:00October 5th, 2020|

Trade deals, pesticides and why we have joined the Future British Standards Coalition by Josie Cohen, Head of Policy & Campaigns, PAN UK PAN UK is proud to have been invited to join the recently-launched Future British Standards Coalition. We will be providing expertise on pesticides to this new panel [...]

Bees, beets and obesity

2021-03-19T12:06:48+00:00September 16th, 2020|

by Nick Mole, Policy Officer, PAN UK UPDATE (26th Oct 2020): FRANCE AND NEONICOTINOIDS There are mixed messages coming from France about the continued use of neonicotinoid insecticides. On the one hand the European Court of Justice ruled that France was entirely within its rights [...]

2020: A massive year for UK pesticides

2020-02-24T22:33:23+00:00January 31st, 2020|

by Josie Cohen, Head of Policy & Campaigns, PAN UK I joined PAN UK in June 2017 to help ensure that UK pesticide standards didn’t drop as a result of Brexit. There was a flurry of activity at the time and, over the next 18 months, we were kept [...]

UK supermarkets take steps to tackle pesticides

2020-02-24T22:34:13+00:00January 20th, 2020|

But there's still a long way to go... By Hannah Conway, Assistant Campaigner, PAN UK In November 2019, we launched a campaign calling on UK supermarkets to do more to protect human health and the environment from pesticides used in their global supply chains. Our top recommendation to all supermarkets [...]

Britain’s fourth agricultural revolution: agroecology!

2019-08-06T11:20:02+01:00August 5th, 2019|

by Stephanie Williamson, Staff Scientist, PAN UK Launched in July 2019, the latest report from the convenors of the RSA’s Food, Farming & Countryside Commission, entitled Our Future in the Land, could have been yet another worthy, dull and hard to digest report of interest mainly to policy nerds and [...]

Agroecology threatens the existence of a toxic pesticide industry

2019-05-07T13:08:00+01:00May 7th, 2019|Tags: , |

by Michel Pimbert, Professor of Agroecology and Food Politics at Coventry University Pesticide companies are caught up in a fierce competition for survival. In the current context of global mergers and restructurings, transnational corporations need to continuously increase their sales of synthetic pesticides in every possible corner of the [...]

Three small robots and their quest to save the world

2019-04-24T10:56:23+01:00April 24th, 2019|Tags: , , |

by Sam Watson Jones, co-founder of Small Robot Company and fourth generation Shropshire farmer 'Harry' prototype robot with Sam Watson Jones, co-founder of Small Robot Company, Andrew Hoad, Partner & Head of the Leckford Estate, and Joe Allnutt, Head of Robot Awesomeness (credit Geoff Pugh) We’re living on [...]

Supporting sustainable vegetable farming in Ethiopia

2018-12-10T18:21:43+00:00December 10th, 2018|

Supporting healthy, sustainable and productive smallholder vegetable farming: PAN Ethiopia and PAN UK’s new joint project in the Central Rift Valley Excessive use of Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) on vegetable crops grown for the Ethiopian market in the Lake Ziway area threatens the health of farmers and consumers. It also [...]

The rise of organic agriculture in Ethiopia

2018-09-24T10:14:27+01:00September 19th, 2018|Tags: , , |

by Selam Yilma, Communications Officer, PAN Ethiopia (19th September 2018) Pesticide Action Nexus Ethiopia (PAN Ethiopia) has taken on the role of implementing the 'information and communication pillar' of the Ecological Organic Agriculture (EOA) initiative in Ethiopia. This pillar works to complement the work of other EOA partners through creating increased awareness and knowledge [...]

A day of reckoning for Roundup

2018-08-13T16:32:21+01:00August 13th, 2018|Tags: , , , , , |

by Keith Tyrell, Director, PAN UK On Friday, 10th August, a jury in California came to a momentous judgement: it agreed with a school groundsman’s claim that his rare form of cancer was caused by exposure to the herbicide known as Roundup. The case has huge implications for glyphosate – the [...]

Latest resources in agroecology

2018-08-09T16:37:16+01:00August 9th, 2018|Tags: , , , , |

by Dr Stephanie Williamson, Staff Scientist, PAN UK (9th August 2018) Agroecological approaches to farming are receiving increasing attention, both at international policy level and in some countries’ national programmes. PAN UK’s Agroecology web section gives readers a brief description of agroecology. It also provides case studies in coffee, pineapples [...]

Pesticide Regulation: Lessons learned from negotiating an EU-US trade deal

2018-05-14T17:57:10+01:00May 14th, 2018|

In 2015, the Center for International Environmental Law published a report ‘Lowest Common Denominator’ which examined how a proposed EU-US trade deal could weaken European standards of protection from toxic pesticides. The report analyses recommendations from pesticide industry lobby groups – CropLife America (CPA) and the European Crop Protection Association [...]

A win for all pollinators

2018-05-02T16:36:31+01:00April 27th, 2018|

Great result for pollinators as ban on bee-toxic pesticides made permanent Today’s news that the European Commission has extended – and made permanent – the existing ban on three bee-toxic neonicotinoids is warmly welcomed by Pesticide Action Network UK (PAN UK). After spending more than a decade warning of the [...]

PAN UK’s initial response to government consultation on farming post-Brexit

2018-05-02T16:44:30+01:00February 27th, 2018|

Today (Tuesday 27th February) DEFRA launched a consultation entitled 'Health and Harmony - The future of farming, food and the environment in a green Brexit'. The government has labelled the ten-week consultation period a once-in-a-generation opportunity for farmers, landowners and food producers  to shape the future of English farming and the environment. [...]

Glyphosate: A victory for corporate lobbying, not science

2018-05-02T16:48:54+01:00January 10th, 2018|

by Josie Cohen, Head of Policy and Campaigns (January 2018)  In November 2017, EU member States narrowly voted for a five-year reauthorisation of glyphosate, the world’s most widely used weedkiller. While this is far from the fifteen-year license the agrochemical industry was pushing for, the result was a major disappointment [...]

Glyphosate renewed for a further five years

2018-05-02T16:56:32+01:00October 24th, 2017|

Update - 27th November - Glyphosate license renewed for a further five years PAN UK is disappointed to report that the controversial weed killer, glyphosate, has been given approval for use in the EU for a further five years. What is even more disappointing is that the new approval comes [...]

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