In some ways, pesticides and GM crops are two sides of the same coin, both subject to what many see as excessive and damaging regulation, particularly in the European Union, as this article from the Scientific Alliance shows.

There is a major revamp of European pesticides regulation in the pipeline, since the current directive - 91/414 - expires soon and must be replaced. However, the new draft regulation has been significantly amended by the European Parliament, and in its current form represents a significant threat to the already limited range of crop protection products available to farmers. Farmers and the industry have voiced their concerns, and now they are being backed up by scientists in a piece carried on the BBC website.

Scientists at Rothamsted Research were interviewed, and expressed their own worries about the possible loss of effective control agents. One is quoted as saying "Everybody's jaws fell to the floor once we realised the implications, which appear not to have been based on science at all." And that is the point: sound regulation, designed to assess risks on an objective scientific basis, is being dumped for a system which will control active ingredients on the basis of hazard alone.

The distinction between hazard and risk is real and significant, although the two terms are often mixed up by non-specialists. Hazard is the potential for a substance to cause harm, while risk relates to the actual probability of harm in use. To use an everyday example, household bleach is hazardous if drunk or left on the skin, but the risk in use is minimal because it is sold in distinctive, clearly labelled bottles with child-proof caps and users are warned to protect their skin. In a similar way, some common pesticides can be shown to cause problems to laboratory animals, but simple handling precautions and basic protective clothing are quite sufficient to protect users.

Environmental campaigners have, over many years, created an atmosphere in which increasingly precautionary legislation has been enacted by the EU. This builds on a generalised misunderstanding that pesticides and other synthetic chemicals are intrinsically bad. Not only are crop protection agents under threat, but the recent REACH (Registration, Evaluation and Approval of Chemicals) regulation mandates testing of a wide range of commonly-used compounds, most of which have been in use safely for many years.

But the likelihood is that, despite the very significant costs involved, any benefits to human health will be, at best, marginal. Despite reported ill-effects from bystanders and attempts to link pesticide use with a range of diseases from cancer to Parkinson's, there is no evidence that, except under conditions of blatant misuse, any harm is being caused. Indeed, farmers are the most likely people to be affected, since they are the ones most exposed to crop protection sprays, and yet their incidence of cancer is lower than for the population as a whole. As for any other substance - natural or synthetic - the dose makes the poison. Botox injections for cosmetic use are based on botulinum toxin, weight-for-weight one of the deadliest chemicals known (and it's natural). Warfarin is used both as a rat poison and (at lower dose levels) as an anti-coagulant to treat cardiovascular disease. The lethal dose of some of the more toxic pesticides used is about the same as that of caffeine.

For household chemicals, the loss of ingredients could be inconvenient, leaving a reduced choice of inferior products, but for farmers (and the general population which they supply with food) the results could be far more serious. Effective control of plant pests and diseases is essential if consistently high yields of good quality crops are to be produced. If farmers are left with little or no choice of pesticide for particular purposes, we know that continual use of those remaining will accelerate the build up of resistance in the target organism. When that happens, yields will decline. At a time when food prices have rocketed and even highly-protected European farmers should be able to compete on the open market, the Commission and Parliament, fixated on hypothetical safety issues, are about to reduce their competitiveness and make European consumers more dependent on food imports from countries where farmers have a better-equipped toolbox.

Lest this be seen as unduly pessimistic, we should see what the UK Pesticides Safety Directorate has to say:

"The [European] Commission proposals could remove up to 15% of the substances assessed, some of which are particularly important in the UK for protection of minor crops such as carrots and parsnips.

It is possible that the endocrine disruptor criteria could impact particularly on fungicide availability and might result in 20-30% yield losses in cereals.

The Parliament proposals include a single approval period for candidates for substitution of five years and could result in the loss of up to 85% of conventional chemical substances after that period.

If the full potential impact of the current Parliament proposals were realised, conventional commercial agriculture in the UK (and much of the EC) as it is currently practised would not be achievable, with major impacts on crop yield and food quality."

The very people who support this legislation and favour organic agriculture and an emphasis on local production are actually encouraging a situation where we become ever more dependent on food imports. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with that, in a world where free trade is paramount. However, by on one hand refusing to consider a major reform of the burdensome and protectionist Common Agricultural Policy and on the other deliberately reducing the competitiveness of the bloc's farmers, the EU institutions are reinforcing a vicious circle. The same attitude is shown in the inability to act on objective scientific advice and approve further GM crops.

Sad to say, at a time when major adjustments in the global economy give an opportunity for change in Europe, the EU seems bent on becoming a backwater which fails to capitalise on its natural resources and skills. The message given to businesses is that research and innovation is not rewarded, which makes it hardly surprising that, for example, large company developments in crop biotechnology in Europe are a thing of the past. Instead, there is a focus on unnecessary prestige projects such as the Galileo satellite positioning system (now paid for entirely by European taxpayers as the private sector saw no commercial future for it). The Lisbon agenda objective of making the EU the world's most competitive knowledge-based economy now seems like a rather bad joke.

Source:

Sarah Mukherjee (16.5.08). 'Effective chemicals may be lost'. BBC News (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7405606.stm)

This article by Martin Livermore is posted with his permission

<<<back