55

Dealing With the Dangers of Agrarian Pesticides "March 2006"

Agrarian pesticides are chemicals used to fight plant diseases, insects, rodents, weeds and other harmful thing to plants, in addition to fighting bugs and parasite harmful to animals.
The Egyptian agricultural law has organized the use and circulation of thee pesticides by forming a committee concerned with pesticides and agrarian blights in the ministry of agriculture. This committee is specialized in proposing the best and safest pesticides that can be used and circulated by defining its' specifications, registration procedures and conditions of circulation.
According to the suggestions made by this committee, the minister of agriculture issues the following decisions:
• The types of agrarian pesticides that can be imported and circulated, in addition to defining its' specifications and conditions of importing and circulation.
• The conditions and procedures of licensing to import pesticides and trade in them.
• The procedures of registering pesticides, renewing this registration and specifying the tolls for this process which do not exceed 10 pounds.
• Taking samples from these pesticides and analyzing them, defining the ways to challenge the results of this analysis and the specifying the necessary tolls that must be paid which do not exceed 5 pounds, in addition to the procedures that must be followed to follow up this challenge and how it will be judged.
• Forbidding the transfer of some types of pesticides from one place to another. The law states that pesticides are not allowed to be manufactured, prepared, sold, offered for sale, imported or released fro customs without license or authorization from the ministry of agriculture.
Specialized officials and supervisors have the right to take samples from pesticides imported from abroad or produced locally to make sure of its' validity. To do so, they have the right to enter any place where pesticides are found or suspect to be found except for homes, they have the right to take away these pesticides if they suspect their falsification. Despite all that, invalid and forbidden pesticides are still spread in the Egyptian markets.
Invalid and forbidden pesticides are pesticides that cannot be used anymore for the reason they were manufactured for, and they must be disposed of.
Banning the use of some pesticides is based on health and environmental reasons, like the decision of the minister of rations and supplies of banning he use of 80 dangerous pesticides in 1996, the decision of the people's assembly to ban the use of weed pesticides in the Nile and waterways in 1994 and many other decisions.
Pesticides are not allowed for use or circulation if they apply to the following:
• Bad storage and corruption in the different sectors that determine the validity of pesticides.
• Deteriorated and bad conditioned products and containers.
• Administrational corruption and adulteration by tradesmen and manufacturers.
• Invalid pesticides proved by analysis.
• Polluted pesticides with other substances.
• Pesticides from unknown sources.
Pesticides are considered impaired in the following cases:
• If they were subject to chemical or physical transformations that lead to poisonous effects or any dangers on crops, the environment or people's health..
• If they were subject to unacceptable loss of biological efficiency because of its' decomposition or other chemical or physical transformations because of bad storage.
Dangers related to bad pesticides:
They have bad effects on people's health especially employees and agrarian workers in storage areas, as they could lead to cancer, kidney failure and other dangerous diseases. The danger level of pesticides is defined by the following:
• The amount of pesticides, the conditions of the containers and the leakage extent.
• The activity of this pesticide in the environment "power, range and movement in the soil, dissolution in water and extent of volatilization".
• Storage location "inside or outside the storehouse", the ground material "extent of penetration".
• Location of storehouses "near or far populated areas".
The government is responsible for people's health and protection, so it must not dispose of these pesticides by burying them in lands, pouring them inside drainage systems or burning them in open air areas. There must be safe way for disposal of these pesticides the put in mind the type and amount of the disposed pesticide, as they must be chemically processed, long-term compact storage and burning in unpopulated areas.
The civil society and NGOs have a role in activating these recommendations, as hey must form local committees for supervision and observation in the villages of the different governorates on the manufacture, circulation and use of pesticides. These committees must include representatives from national associations, the people's assembly, the consultative council, local councils, pesticide professors and the ministries of health, rations and environment. These local committees must be the first step toward forming a broader national committee that supervises and observes the manufacture, circulation and use of pesticides with bigger responsibility that fit to the size of the dangers, in order to guarantee citizens rights in health care and clean food.