AMERICAN LABOUR/ENVIRONMENT:

CHILDREN ARE NOT "PESTS":

The following story and appeal to pressure the US EPA about the use of farm pesticides near to schools and residential areas comes from the United Farm Workers.

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Help Protect Children From Toxic Pesticides:
Luis Medellin and his three little sisters, aged 5, 9 and 12, live in the middle of an orange grove in Lindsay, CA--a small farming town in the Central Valley. During the growing season, Luis and his sisters are awakened several times a week by the sickly smell of nighttime pesticide spraying. What follows is worse: searing headaches, nausea, vomiting.

The Medellin family’s story is not unique. From apple orchards in Washington to potato fields in Florida, drifting poisonous pesticides plague the people who live nearby--posing a particular risk to the young children of the nation's farm workers, many of whom live in industry housing at the field's edge.

This situation also often exists in schools in agricultural areas where it's not uncommom to have a school next to a field. According to a November 7 article in the Salinas Californian, "When schools use pesticides on campus, they post a warning a day before. But when acres of farmland next to classrooms are sprayed with industrial-grade chemicals, often no sign goes up."

Gonzales resident Aurora Valdez said she's fearful pesticides sprayed near Gonzales High School, where her kids attend classes, will harm her teenage sons. She said she often prays to the Virgin of Guadalupe to keep her sons from experiencing what she said her husband, Francisco, went through 12 years ago after being exposed to pesticides. "I worry constantly about pesticides," Valdez said.

That's why the UFW and a coalition of environmental groups petitioned the government to set safety standards protecting children who grow up near farms from the harmful effects of pesticide drift--the toxic spray or vapor that travels from treated fields. We're also asking officials to immediately adopt no-spray buffer zones around homes, schools, parks and daycare centers for the most dangerous and drift-prone pesticides.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has taken the first step in addressing this problem--opening up the petition for public comment. It's a promising sign. The agency's leadership needs to hear that you think they're on the right track. Because they'll surely be getting an earful from the pesticide industry telling them to keep the status quo. In fact, industry interests like Monsanto and CropLife have already started weighing in. If we want EPA to do the right thing and put immediate pesticide buffers in place around homes, schools, daycare centers and playgrounds, we need to push back. Please help.

In the past, the EPA has not made this issue a priority--ignoring a law Congress passed that requires the agency to protect children from all exposures to pesticide, including pesticide drift. The agency is already three years overdue in setting safety standards that protect children from drift. But there is new hope with the Obama administration. Will you please add your voice to those calling for a change?
Thank you!
http://www.ufwaction.org/campaign/drift

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THE LETTER:

Please go to the link above to send the following letter to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

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We appreciate the opportunity to submit comments on the Petition to Protect Children From Pesticide Drift and the Draft Guidance for Pesticide Registrants on Pesticide Drift Labeling.
After years of delay under the previous administration, I am heartened to see the first step toward making sure all of our nation's children are protected from exposure to pesticides.

In 1996, Congress required the EPA to set standards by 2006 to protect children from pesticides. This deadline passed 3 years ago and the job is only partially complete. It?s great that the EPA has made some progress banning the use of some pesticides in the home and on lawns.

However, you also must protect children from these same pesticides when they drift from treated fields into nearby yards, homes, schools, parks and daycare centers. The threat to children is real and these risks must be fully evaluated.

The EPA must adopt immediate protective buffers. Without these protective buffers, children face the risk of drift exposure to such dangerous pesticides. This is simply unacceptable and must be stopped now.

Finally, the proposed general label warnings, while welcome, are not adequate alone to protect children from pesticide drift. Please adopt immediate protective buffers for the most dangerous pesticides. It may be many years before this process is complete--and children are being threatened by exposure to pesticide drift right now.

Thank you for the opportunity to submit these comments. I urge you not to let another growing season go by without taking action. The children who live, play, and go to school near our nation's fields and orchards are counting on you to protect them.

CANADIAN POLITICS:

DOW VERSUS DEMOCRACY:

The following story is the Embassy Online site via the Harper Index. It seems that Dow Chemical, having failed in previous court challenges to various chemical bans, both provincial and municipal, across Canada is trying a new tack. Dow has launched a NAFTA appeal against a Quebec ban on lawn pesticides, claiming that this ban "amounted to an unfair expropriation" of its business, illegal under NAFTA. This sort of challenge adds credence to critics of NAFTA who say that such international trade deals restrict democracy in the interests of powerful business. While not wishing to get into the ins and outs of the effects of pesticides Molly has to say that she agrees with this claim. It is, in fact, obvious, and this case is only one of many that demonstrate this fact. If Canada is be a truly democratic country, or at least more democratic than it is now, then it will have to withdraw from pacts such as NAFTA as a preliminary.

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Dow suit puts NAFTA Chapter 11 to the test:
Dow Chemical claims pit rights of communities to ban pesticides vs rights of companies to sell them.
Let's get one thing straight. The recently-launched NAFTA arbitration by Dow Chemicals against the Government of Canada is about much more than $2 million.

As was first reported in these pages last autumn, Dow claims that a Quebec ban on lawn pesticides has amounted to an unfair expropriation of Dow's Canadian pesticide business.

On March 31, the company filed for formal arbitration under NAFTA's Chapter 11, seeking at least $2 million in compensation from Canadian taxpayers.

However, $2 million won't even cover Dow's legal fees. So, what gives?

Quite simply, foreign investors are not obliged to tally up potential losses at the outset of these NAFTA arbitrations, which is why the Dow claim looks so modest, at least for now. In the months (or even years) to come, you can be sure that Dow will up the ante.

Indeed, Dow may expand its claim to challenge pesticide bans in other parts of Canada. With other municipalities and provinces looking at cracking down on such chemicals — an Ontario-wide ban comes into effect later this month — the $2 million figure may be the tip of the iceberg.

The wider ramifications of this dispute have spurred environmental groups to mobilize for battle. Some hint of the coming fireworks could be glimpsed on Parliament Hill late last month.

In hearings of the Standing Committee on International Trade, environmental groups signalled their plans to intervene in any forthcoming NAFTA arbitration proceeding.

These groups insist that governments should be permitted to act on a precautionary basis to shield vulnerable groups such as children — even when the scientific evidence is uncertain as to the long-term health impacts of certain substances. They plan to present their own views to the arbitration panel presiding over the NAFTA case.

However, the groups complain that the NAFTA Chapter 11 arbitration process is less than welcoming when it comes to hearing from concerned citizens and other interests.

In testimony to Parliament last month, environmental advocates observed that the NAFTA — unlike more recent trade pacts — allows foreign investors to sue a NAFTA government behind closed doors.

Will Amos, an Ottawa-based lawyer representing the David Suzuki Foundation and the Quebec group Equiterre, notes that his clients can submit written arguments to a NAFTA arbitration panel, but they may be blocked from showing up and watching or participating in these high-stakes arbitration proceedings.

"There is no guarantee that the investor won't request confidential proceedings," Mr. Amos said, "which would further limit our ability to understand what case they're bringing, and there will be no opportunity for us to make oral representations before the tribunal.

"This is totally unlike the Supreme Court of Canada," he adds.

Indeed, it's unfortunate that the arbitration proceedings could be conducted in private. Otherwise, some of Canada's Supreme Court justices might benefit from sitting in on the arbitration hearings, and gaining a better appreciation of this NAFTA process. If permitted into the hearing room, the justices might be taken aback by the extent to which NAFTA tribunals can now review the actions of governments.

Indeed, one of the things that has incensed many members of the environmental community — and which might also bemuse members of the Supreme Court — is that pesticide bans in other parts of Canada have already been upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada.

In 2005, the court dismissed an effort by a pesticide industry association to challenge a ban introduced by the City of Toronto. Environmentalists assumed that this ruling affirmed the right of governments to act proactively so as to minimize potential health risks. However, it now appears that the Supreme Court was merely engaged in a dress rehearsal.

Sure, pesticide bans in different parts of Canada have been declared constitutional by the highest court in the land, but in the 21st century, constitutions are not the only law of the land.

Rather, it will fall to three arbitrators — one appointed by Dow, one by Canada, and the third by mutual assent — to determine whether our North American constitution — the NAFTA — sanctions the actions of the Quebec government.

The Dow arbitration promises to be of seminal importance.

Dow protests that Quebec lawmakers failed to take heed of several risk assessments, including one by Canada's federal government, which showed that the pesticide ingredient 2,4-D "does not entail an unacceptable risk of harm to human health or the environment."

Of course, others, including some governments, have questioned whether risk assessments should be the final word on such matters. Environmental and medical groups like the Canadian Cancer Society have long argued that no amount of risk is worth taking when it comes to "unnecessary" chemicals, such as lawn pesticides, which are used for purely cosmetic purposes.

However, where governments wish to drive certain risks closer to zero, it will fall to a panel of NAFTA arbitrators to decide who shall pay the price for doing so: the chemicals industry or the Canadian taxpayer.

Luke Eric Peterson is an Embassy columnist and editor of Investment Arbitration Reporter, an online news service tracking NAFTA-style investor-state arbitrations.
Links and sources Embassy Magazine Online

AMERICAN LABOUR:

PROTECTION FROM PESTICIDE MISUSE:

As any regular reader of this blog knows Molly is the furthest thing from a "health food nut". Quite frankly I think that the touchingly naive belief in magic words such as "organic" or "natural" reminds me of nothing more than the article of faith of a good Catholic that after magic words being said over unleavened bread and diluted wine that it is really "the body and blood of Christ". Perhaps transubstantiation may have even more logic to it. Yet...without supervision agricultural companies are more than willing to misuse chemicals to the extent that their residues actually are toxic. Because of the profit motive they are even more willing to expose their workers to obviously toxic concentrations of certain chemicals.



The following appeal for solidarity from the American United Farm Workers is about this issue, about the exposure of consumers and, especially, workers to toxic amounts of certain pesticides.
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Agricultural company wreaks havoc. Tell new EPA chief to protect us from pesticide abusers.:
N.J. fines Florida-based tomato grower one million dollars for misuse of pesticides
Calling the violations "the most serious...ever uncovered," the state Department of Environmental Protection fined a Florida tomato growing company nearly $1 million for improperly using pesticides on 17 fields it operates in New Jersey, putting workers and consumers alike in jeopardy.





Ag-Mart Produce Inc., which has an office in Cedarville, Cumberland County, is already facing fines and charges of pesticide misuse in North Carolina, where female employees claim their babies were born with serious defects...
--The Star Ledger, 1/29/08





According to news reports, New Jersey’s state Department of Environmental Protection cited Ag-Mart for hundreds of violations, claiming Ag-Mart denied state investigators access to facilities, applied pesticides to tomatoes more frequently than permitted and on 17 occasions harvested and shipped pesticide-sprayed tomatoes before they were safe for public consumption.





The state also charged Ag-Mart with careless record-keeping, failing to properly ventilate areas during pesticide use, failing to post pesticide-safety information for workers, using forbidden mixtures of pesticides and losing track of a 2.5-gallon container of toxic insecticide. The fines linked to the violations total $931,250.





In a statement put out by the NJ Department of Pesticides, Commissioner Mark N. Mauriello said, "Ag-Mart has repeatedly shown a stunning disregard of laws and regulations intended to protect the workers who harvest their tomatoes, the people who consume them and New Jersey's environment. Ag-Mart's pesticide violations are the most serious DEP inspectors have ever uncovered. We have imposed a record-high penalty not only to hold Ag-Mart accountable for their failure, but to make sure it doesn't happen again."





It’s great that New Jersey took action. But more needs to be done on a national level. We need the federal EPA to protect us from big companies like Ag-Mart who deal on a national scale and have repeat violations.





President Obama has just appointed a new head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lisa Jackson, who also hails from New Jersey. In a January 23 memo to her new EPA staff, Jackson said, “It is clear that we are not doing an adequate job of assessing and managing the risks of chemicals in consumer products, the workplace and the environment. It is now time to revise and strengthen EPA's chemicals management and risk assessment programs.”





This is an admirable goal. Please e-mail EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and tell her we look forward to seeing it put into action. The time for change is now. Her office carries the huge task of protecting the American people—consumers and farm workers alike—and we need the EPA to ensure situations such as happened with Ag-Mart do not occur again.
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THE LETTER:
Please go to THIS LINK to send the following letter to the new head of the EPA.
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Congratulations on your appointment as the new head of the Environmental
Protection Agency. It is exciting to have someone in office who can live up to
the ideals of the new Obama administration.





The American people--both consumers and farm
workers alike--need you to make one of your first priorities to protect us from
pesticides.





For example, according to The Star Ledger, on
January 29, New Jersey fined Florida-based tomato grower Ag-Mart one million
dollars for misuse of pesticides calling the violations, "the most
serious...ever uncovered." Florida based Ag-Mart Produce Inc. is already facing
fines and charges of pesticide abuse in North Carolina, where female employees
claim their babies were born with serious defects including a little boy born
without arms and legs.





The American people need the federal EPA to
shield us from big companies like Ag-Mart who deal on a national scale and or
have repeat violations.





In a January 23 memo to your new EPA staff,
you said, "It is clear that we are not doing an adequate job of assessing and
managing the risks of chemicals in consumer products, the workplace and the
environment. It is now time to revise and strengthen EPA's chemicals management
and risk assessment programs."





The United Farm Workers believes this is an
admirable goal. I look forward to seeing it put into action. Your office carries
the huge task of protecting us and we need the EPA to ensure situations such as
happened with Ag-Mart do not occur again.





Please write to tell me how you are going to
respond to these worst offenders and how you are going to ensure the present
laws are fully enforced.

UNITED FARM WORKERS ASKS:

TELL EPA TO PROTECT WORKERS FROM TOXIC PESTICIDES:

Presently the US Environmental Protection Agency is reviewing several dangerous agricultural pesticides for reregistration. These include methyl bromide, chloropicrin, metam sodium, dazomet and telone. These fumigants are amongst the most toxic pesticides in use today, causing birth defects, cancer, Parkinson's Disease and acute poisonings. Farm workers are, of course, the population most exposed to and poisoned by these chemicals, but residents near farms where they have been used have been affected as well due to drift away from the target field. The EPA is asking for comments on the use of these pesticides, and the UFW is asking people to sign their petition asking for a phase out of the use of these pesticides and measures to mitigate their effects while they are being phased out. To read more and to sign the petition go to http://www.ufwaction.org/campaign/epafumigants/5uuwwur13b5585? . The deadline for comments is September 1st.

TWO APPEALS FROM THE UFW:
The United Farm Workers (UFW) of the USA have issued two new appeals for internet solidarity. The first is in regards to the recent cold weather in the south-western USA. The California government has responded to the appeals of the farm workers by waiving the waiting period for unemployment benefits and opening help centres, but the federal government of the USA has done nothing to date. At this time growers can apply for relief under emergency declarations, but the up to 28,000 farm workers and their families have no recourse. The UFW are asking that you petition the federal government of the USA to declare California as a "federal disaster area" which would mean the releasing of resources to the affected workers, as was done in 1998 and 1999. This would allow more provisions in food banks for the people affected and also possibly rent, mortgage and utility support. To sign up for this campaign go to:
http://www.ufwaction.org/campaign/freeze_bush
The UFW has also asked for support in their efforts to have the pesticide azinphos-methyl (commonly known as AZM) banned now rather than later. AZM is a potent neurotoxin to which farm workers are often exposed at high concentrations. Last November the EPA of the USA ruled that AZM "posed unreasonable adverse effects and must be banned", but it also allowed a six year "phase out" period in which the pesticide would continue to be used. An interesting sidebar to this ruling is that the EPA had previously ruled in 2001 that this pesticide should be phased out over the course of four years. The deadline came and went. To join the UFW in demanding that this chemical be eliminated now go to:
http://www.ufwaction.org/campaign/epa207
Molly