HEAL Toxics (Health and Environmental Alliance Against Toxics) today urged DA (Department of Agriculture) and FPA (Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority) officials to immediately enforce a ban of Paraquat, the most highly toxic yet widely used herbicide in the Third World.

“It is about time the DA and FPA fulfill its task of ensuring that people and environment are free from extensive harm caused by agro-chemicals banned in more developed countries,” said Dr. Romeo Quijano, President of HEAL Toxics and a known toxicologist from University of the Philippines Manila.

“The government has done virtually nothing to stop the onset of dangerous pesticides, and has in fact acted as conduits for which agro-chemical TNCs (transnational corporations) dump these poisons into our lands to the suffering of millions of farmers, farmworkers and rural folk,” Dr. Quijano added.

Dr. Quijano challenged all FPA officials to revoke a memorandum issued this year by recently resigned FPA executive director Jose Maria Perez, which lifted 13-year restrictions on Paraquat.

A graft case filed by the Concerned Fertilizer and Pesticide Handlers against Perez is pending with the Office of the Ombudsman for allegedly colluding with Syngenta, the TNC producing Paraquat, for the baseless passage of the said memorandum.

By virtue of Memorandum Circular No. 1 Series of 2003 dated January 8, over-the-counter sales of Paraquat were effectively legalized. The deadly chemical was “restricted for institutional use” by the FPA since 1989 due to health and environmental hazards.

Dr. Quijano further demanded DA secretary Luis Lorenzo Jr. to drop Paraquat use in his own banana plantations under LADECO (Lapanday Agricultural Development Corporation).

Paraquat was one of the pesticides discovered by several fact-finding missions to have poisoned villagers in Kamukhaan, Davao del Sur victimized by pesticide use in LADECO. Dr. Quijano, who first published an expose on Kamukhaan, is currently the subject of a civil case filed by LADECO but has garnered national and international support for his anti-pesticides campaign.

Highly Toxic

Paraquat is an extremely hazardous substance: it has been known to damage the lungs, heart, kidneys, adrenal glands, central nervous system, liver, muscles and spleen, causing multi-organ failure. The herbicide causes severe acute and long-term health problems such as severe dermatitis, second degree burns, nosebleeds, rapid heart rate, kidney failure, and respiratory failure. Some chronic effects have also been identified: an association with developmental and reproductive effects, as well as links to skin cancer and there is mounting evidence linking it to Parkinson’s disease. The high toxicity and lack of antidote leads to serious ill health, and even death, from exposure.

Studies have also indicated that Paraquat has lethal effects on hares and birds, and is embryotoxic and teratogenic to frogs. It poses a risk to non-target terrestrial and aquatic plants, and readily binds to soil particles and hence accumulates in soils.

Global sales of Paraquat are estimated to be about 25,000 tons, as much as 70 % of this amount being used in developing countries. Paraquat has been heavily criticized for the adverse impacts on workers and farmers since the 1960s. Conditions of use and realities in developing countries of the South—high temperature and humidity, lack of protective clothing, leaking knapsacks, illiteracy, lack of facilities for washing, or medical treatment, and repeated exposure—compounds the concern that safe use of Paraquat is not possible in these countries, in spite of ‘safety’ claims by the industry.

Stop Paraquat!

Paraquat is part of the Dirty Dozen List. PAN (Pesticide Action Network) International launched the Dirty Dozen campaign in 1985 to target a list of extremely hazardous pesticides for banning or stricter controls, and to advocate their replacement with safer and more sustainable pest control methods. In order to accelerate the phase-out of Paraquat, several NGOs from Asia, North and South America, and Europe launched the “Stop Paraquat” campaign in 2002.

Paraquat is already banned in seven countries including Austria (1993), Denmark (1995), Finland (1986), Kuwait (1985), Slovenia (1997) and Sweden (1983). The most recent ban was put into action in Malaysia (2002), as the first Asian country to do so. Chiquita, the world’s largest producer of bananas, has also decided to ban Paraquat from all its plantations.

Paraquat is also severely restricted in 7 other countries, that is Chile (2001), Germany (1993), Hungary (1991), Indonesia (1990), South Korea (1991), Togo (1999) and the United States of America (1997).

HEAL Toxics member-organizations will launch several forums on issues concerning pesticides, as part of its campaign for Global No Pesticides Use Day.

December 3 has been declared as Global No Pesticides Use Day in commemoration of the world’s worst chemical disaster-- the 1984 explosion of a pesticide factory in India that caused the death and injury of hundreds of thousands. In the anniversary of the Bhopal Gas tragedy, campaigns are initiated in many countries to remind of the hazardous effects of pesticides on human health and environment.

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