PAN International calls for investment in agroecology

Press release.

April 30, 2018. On May 2, experts from around the world will gather in Rome for a global symposium on soil pollution. The event, organised jointly by several UN agencies, offers an important opportunity to highlight the urgent need to invest in soil health, according to the leaders of Pesticide Action Network (PAN) International.

PAN leaders from all of the network’s regional centers participated in the recent UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Symposium on Agroecology, and note the important connections between the two events. Specifically, PAN applauds the concept note for the Soil Pollution symposium, which highlights pesticide use as an important cause of soil pollution: “The three major pathways responsible for the introduction of diffuse pollutants into soil are (i) atmospheric deposition, (ii) agricultural inputs, and (iii) flood events. Causes of pollution tend to be dominated by the transport of pollutants by erosion processes (wind and water erosion and sedimentation), and excessive nutrient and pesticide applications, heavy metals, POPs and inorganic pollutants.” (FAO and ITPS, 2015a).

The Global Symposium on Soil Pollution is being organised by FAO’s Global Soil Partnership, along with the Intergovernmental Technical Panel on Soils (ITPS), the Secretariats of the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions, the UN Environment Program and the World Health Organization.

It aims to provide scientific evidence to support action to prevent and reduce soil pollution for increased food safety, food security and nutrition and ecosystem services. It also calls for the restoration of polluted sites, with the first step being implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines for Sustainable Soil Management.

PAN International welcomes the joint initiative, and urges participants to fully recognize the damaging effects of Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs), and calls on those developing the voluntary soil guidelines to include an overall objective of phasing out HHPs and reducing dependency on agricultural pesticides.

“This month marks the 10-year anniversary of release of the UN and World Bank-sponsored International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge Science & Technology for Development report,” notes Henriette Christensen of PAN Europe. “This pathbreaking report was approved by all participating European, Asian, African and Latin American countries, and called for increased investment in agro-ecological approaches to pest management and action to reduce pesticide dependence.”

“Since the 2015 international year of soils, public awareness has grown about the fundamental importance of healthy soil,” says Dr. Margaret Reeves, senior scientist at PAN North America. “Vibrant, diverse soil biology is a critical driver of soil function — ensuring plant access to nutrients, air and water, and resistance to pests and diseases. There’s a growing body of scientific evidence showing the harmful impacts of petroleum-derived pesticides and fertilizers on this critical soil biology.” (1)

“FAO is working with countries to phase out HHPs, which are defined according to a set of criteria established by the Joint Meeting on Pesticide Management,” adds Sarojeni Rengam of PAN Asia and the Pacific. “In 2015, the 4th International Conference on Chemicals Management recommended that in taking action on HHPs, emphasis should be on promoting agroecologically based approaches. There should therefore be close collaboration between these two areas of work.”

“We must see coordination among international agreements to avoid the continuous contamination of soils with pesticides and other chemicals, and proceed rapidly with the soil remediation,” agrees Javier Souza, the Regional Coordinator for PAN Latin America. “The science of agroecology reminds us that healthy soils are integral to resilient and sustainable agroecosystems — which in turn enable the feeding and development of healthy people.”

Ndéye Maïmouna Diene, PAN Africa’s director, highlights the particular importance of effective decontamination of polluted sites. “Africa is a continent that faces pollution problems due mainly to ongoing use and abuse of extremely dangerous pesticides,” says Diene. “We call for the establishment of policies that preserve the health of our people, our soil and the environment. We are convinced that agroecology is the safest way to fight pollution in the continent.”

“Healthy soils underpin all agricultural production,” adds Keith Tyrell, director of PAN-UK. “Excessive use of agrochemicals is damaging soil quality and undermining our ability to feed ourselves in the long term. We need to switch to more sustainable, agroecological farming systems that conserve and improve soil quality, now.”

PAN leaders also note that actions under three existing global instruments focused on chemicals have significant potential to address soil pollution:

• The Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International Trade;
• The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs); and
• The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal.

In addition, the Third Session of the United Nations Environmental Assembly adopted a resolution in 2017 calling for accelerated collaboration to address and manage soil pollution, The declaration aims to work towards a pollution- free world.’

Note (1):  For instance does a recent EU wide study show that glyphosate persists

For more information:

PAN Africa, Ndéye Maïmouna DIENE, maimounadiene@pan-afrique.org, 221775449689

PAN Asia Pacific, Sarojeni Rengam, sarojeni.rengam@panap.net

PAN Latin America, Javier Souza Casadinho, javierrapal@yahoo.com.ar, 11 15 3617 1782

PAN North America, Kristin Schafer, kristins@panna.org, 10119165883100

PAN Germany, Susan Haffmans, susan.haffmans@pan-germany.org, 49(0)40-3991910-25

PAN United Kingdom, Keith Tyrell, keithtyrell@pan-uk.org, 447588706224

PAN Europe, Henriette Christensen, henriette@pan-europe.info, +3223186255

Pesticide Action Network (PAN) International is a network of over 600 participating nongovernmental organizations, institutions and individuals in over 90 countries working to replace the use of hazardous pesticides with ecologically sound and socially just alternatives. PAN was founded in 1982 and has five independent, collaborating Regional Centers that implement its projects and campaigns.

PAN International Press Release

Stockholm, March 15, 2018
Pesticide Action Network (PAN) International released an updated version of its List of Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) to coincide with a key meeting in Stockholm of the Strategic Approach for International Chemicals Management (SAICM) process. The expanded list now includes 306 chemicals.

These hazardous pesticides (HHPs) threaten people and the environment around the world. The global community must act to stop the continuing exposure of people and the planet to these HHPs. PAN calls on the global community for an internationally binding treaty on pesticides.

Among the nine newly listed pesticides in the updated version of the HHP list are carbetamide for being classified as a presumed human reproductive toxicant according to the EU, cyanamide for its hormone disrupting properties and emamectin benzoate for its threat to the environment and bees.

Following the addition of a new criterion, the list now includes pesticides which are recognised by the UN Rotterdam Convention as meeting the Convention’s criteria for global trade restrictions. These pesticides have however not yet been officially listed in the Rotterdam Convention for political reasons.

Pesticides are the only toxic chemicals that are intentionally released into the environment. Today pesticides contaminate every environmental medium even in locations remote from their use. Susan Haffmans of PAN Germany says „These pesticides are having a devastating effect on biodiversity, including on beneficial insects. They are undermining the sustainability of food production systems and harm an unknown number of farmers, workers, children and animals every year.“

„We are deeply concerned about the negative impact of hazardous pesticides on the health of children around the world, especially from rural and farming communities. There is a critical need for global action to curtail the use of the worst pesticides to protect the wellbeing of children.“ says Kristin Schafer of PAN North America.

Keith Tyrell from PAN UK adds „Though pesticides have been recognized as a global threat to health, development and the environment, and despite a variety of pesticide Conventions and agreements, global governance of pesticides is weak, leaving large gaps in overall management.“

In the Global South there is daily proof of the devasting effects of pesticides on families and their livelihoods. Maimouna Diene of PAN Africa says „If SAICM wants to fulfill its goal of achieving sound management of chemicals throughout their whole lifecycle and to protect human health and ecosystems, it has to intensify its actions on HHPs and provide trainings to farmers, including women farmers, on agroecological practices. The past few years have shown that the global pesticides problem cannot be tackled adequately with voluntary agreements.“

PAN Asia Pacific’s Sarojeni Rengam says „The Sustainable Development Goals, in particular to end hunger, achieve food security and promote sustainable agriculture; to ensure healthy lives and to halt and reverse land degradation and biodiversity loss cannot be achieved until the widespread use of HHPs is replaced by agroecological practices“.

From the experience of longstanding work in Latin America on agroecological practices, Javier Souza of PAN Latin America says „It is time for undertaking concerted efforts to phase out HHPs and replace their use with agroecology. In Argentina we have shown that by replacing HHPs with agroecology we can decrease costs of inputs, improve incomes and community health, bolster food security and climate resilience, improve gender equity, enhance biodiversity, and reduce pollution.“

The PAN HHP list includes pesticides with high levels of acute or chronic hazards to health or environment according to internationally accepted classification systems. With the HHP list, PAN provides authorities, cultivation organisations, advisers, farmers and other interested parties with a tool to identify highly dangerous pesticides and then to replace them with safer and more sustainable alternatives.

For the PAN HHP list, visit http://www.pan-germany.org/download/PAN_HHP_List.pdf

For more about PAN International and the 500+ organizations in more than 100 countries that have joined the global call to ban highly hazardous pesticides and replace them with agroecological alternatives, visit http://pan-international.org/.

 

Available for interview:

Maimouna Diene, PAN Africa, maimounadiene@pan-afrique.org; +223 64898163
Sarojeni Rengam, PAN Asia Pacific, sarojeni.rengam@panap.net
Susan Haffmans, PAN Germany, susan.haffmans@pan-germany.org , +49(0)40-3991910-25
Javier Souza Casadinho, PAN Latin America, javierrapal@yahoo.com.ar ,+11 15 3617 1782
Kristin Schafer, PAN North America, kristins@panna.org , +10119165883100
Keith Tyrell, PAN United Kingdom, keith@pan-uk.org , +447588706224