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28/08/2009 09:23:13
Soil Association shock at Government support of withdrawn pesticide
The UK Government is considering reinstating a pesticide, aminopyralid, which has caused huge amounts of damage to fruit and vegetable crops, and which was withdrawn from the market last year. says the Soil Association.
Patrick Holden, Director of the Soil Association, has written to the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), Hilary Benn urging him to reject a recommendation from the Advisory Committee on Pesticides (ACP) to reinstate the use of the hormone-based weed killer aminopyralid. This recommendation from the ACP was made following ’stewardship’ proposals from Dow Agrosciences, the company producing the pesticide, which they claim will help make use of the product safer. The pesticide is still causing a wide range of crops to fail after its last permitted use in early 2008.
When used on grassland the herbicide remains active even after the crop to which it has been applied has been eaten by a grazing animal, passed through the animal, been stored as farm yard manure and eventually reapplied to another crop. The pesticide caused the failure of a wide range of crops including beans, peas, potatoes and tomatoes, soft fruits and flowers. Aminopyralid attaches itself to organic matter and the length of time it takes to beak down completely is as yet unknown.
Patrick Holden says:
"This pesticide has not been reformulated, nor made safer in any other way. There is no evidence to show that the ’stewardship’ proposals made by the company producing the pesticide, Dow AgroSciences, will work. The proposals – which include only selling the product in large containers to make it ’too expensive for casual use’ - provide no guarantee that further damage can be prevented. Indeed, Hilary Benn already knows that this approach does not work. There were already guidelines in place to prevent the use of manure from land treated with aminopyralid from being used for vegetable growing, which did not stop serious contamination incidents from occurring."
Defra recently published documents as part of a consultation on food security which discussed the importance of the general public growing their own food. The contamination of crops in gardens and allotments by aminopyralid has caused high levels of disillusionment and anxiety amongst people growing their own, which may discourage them from doing so in the future.
Patrick Holden, Director of the Soil Association, has written to the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), Hilary Benn urging him to reject a recommendation from the Advisory Committee on Pesticides (ACP) to reinstate the use of the hormone-based weed killer aminopyralid. This recommendation from the ACP was made following ’stewardship’ proposals from Dow Agrosciences, the company producing the pesticide, which they claim will help make use of the product safer. The pesticide is still causing a wide range of crops to fail after its last permitted use in early 2008.
When used on grassland the herbicide remains active even after the crop to which it has been applied has been eaten by a grazing animal, passed through the animal, been stored as farm yard manure and eventually reapplied to another crop. The pesticide caused the failure of a wide range of crops including beans, peas, potatoes and tomatoes, soft fruits and flowers. Aminopyralid attaches itself to organic matter and the length of time it takes to beak down completely is as yet unknown.
Patrick Holden says:
"This pesticide has not been reformulated, nor made safer in any other way. There is no evidence to show that the ’stewardship’ proposals made by the company producing the pesticide, Dow AgroSciences, will work. The proposals – which include only selling the product in large containers to make it ’too expensive for casual use’ - provide no guarantee that further damage can be prevented. Indeed, Hilary Benn already knows that this approach does not work. There were already guidelines in place to prevent the use of manure from land treated with aminopyralid from being used for vegetable growing, which did not stop serious contamination incidents from occurring."
Defra recently published documents as part of a consultation on food security which discussed the importance of the general public growing their own food. The contamination of crops in gardens and allotments by aminopyralid has caused high levels of disillusionment and anxiety amongst people growing their own, which may discourage them from doing so in the future.
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How to kill pests without killing yourself or the earth......
Posted By Anonymous At 28/08/2009 13:47:02Americans rank their fear of pest infestations third - only after their fear of fire and natural disaster - on the list of threats to their homes that they worry about most. This is why the buSINess of pest control is so lucrative and effects so many of us.
There are about 50 to 60 million insect species on earth - we have named only about 1 million and there are only about 1 thousand pest species - already over 50% of these thousand pests are already resistant to our volatile, dangerous, synthetic pesticide POISONS. We accidentally lose about 25,000 to 100,000 species of insects, plants and animals every year due to "man's footprint". But, after poisoning the entire world and contaminating every living thing for over 60 years with these dangerous and ineffective pesticide POISONS we have not even controlled much less eliminated even one pest species and every year we use/misuse more and more pesticide POISONS to try to "keep up"! Even with all of this expensive and unnecessary pollution - we lose more and more crops and lives to these thousand pests every year.
We are losing the war against these thousand pests mainly because we insist on using only synthetic pesticide POISONS and fertilizers There has been a severe "knowledge drought" - a worldwide decline in agricultural R&D, especially in production research and safe, more effective pest control since the advent of synthetic pesticide POISONS and fertilizers. Today we are like lemmings running to the sea insisting that is the "right way". The greatest challenge facing humanity this century is the necessity for us to double our global food production with less land, less water, less nutrients, less science, frequent droughts, more and more contamination and ever-increasing pest damage.
National Poison Prevention Week, March 18-24,2007 was created to highlight the dangers of poisoning and how to prevent it. One study shows that about 70,000 children in the USA were involved in common household pesticide-related (acute) poisonings or exposures in 2004. At least two peer-reviewed studies have described associations between autism rates and pesticides (D'Amelio et al 2005; Roberts EM et al 2007 in EHP). It is estimated that 300,000 farm workers suffer acute pesticide poisoning each year just in the United States - No one is checking chronic contamination.
In order to try to help "stem the tide", I have just finished re-writing my IPM encyclopedia entitled: THE BEST CONTROL II, that contains over 2,800 safe and far more effective alternatives to pesticide POISONS. This latest copyrighted work is about 1,900 pages in length and is now being updated at my new website at http://www.thebestcontrol2.com .
This new website at http://www.thebestcontrol2.com has been basically updated; all we have left to update is Chapter 39 and to renumber the pages. All of these copyrighted items are free for you to read and/or download. There is simply no need to POISON yourself or your family or to have any pest problems.
Stephen L. Tvedten
2530 Hayes Street
Marne, Michigan 49435
1-616-677-1261
http://www.theidealpesticide.com
When a man who is honestly mistaken hears the truth, he will either quit being mistaken or cease to be honest.