Safe farming

Indiscriminate use of pesticides must be contained

The issue of banning 27 controversial, yet widely used, pesticides has been lingering for years despite examinations by expert panels and interventions by the Supreme Court. The latest scientific committee that has gone into this matter, and whose report has been presented by the government to the apex court, has cleared as many as 24 of these agro-chemicals, leaving only three to be proscribed. This committee, headed by T P Rajendran, a former assistant director-general of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, is said to have taken into consideration the findings of the safety, toxicity, and efficacy trials of these agro-chemicals and the opinion of the farmers who have been using them for decades to save their crops from pests, diseases, and weeds. An absence of cheaper, and equally effective, alternatives for these molecules has been cited among reasons for cutting short this list. Though the government has informed the apex court that no final decision has yet been taken on lifting the ban on 24 of these 27 pesticides, the delay on this count is inexplicable.

The dilemma over the use of dicey agro-chemicals persists since 2015, when the agriculture ministry discovered that 66 pesticides banned or restricted in other countries were being manufactured and sold in India. A four-member expert committee, led by a senior scientist of the New Delhi-based Indian Agricultural Research Institute, asked to review these pesticides, recommended an immediate ban on 13, a gradual phasing out of six, and a further evaluation of 27 molecules and formulations deemed potentially hazardous but needing an assessment of their toxicity. The Rajendran panel, which held the suggested reappraisal, has now shortlisted only three of them for an outright ban and cleared the rest for various specified uses. The fact that cannot be disregarded is that pesticides are intrinsically hazardous because these contain toxic chemicals that can have both acute and chronic health effects, especially if used indiscriminately. But they constitute an essential input for modern farming to shield the crops against pests, disease-causing pathogens, and other threats. Chemical formulations are being increasingly used also to control weeds because the manual or mechanical removal of these unwanted plants proves too expensive. Moreover, the harvested and stored farm produce needs to be guarded from insects and fungal infestations with the help of chemicals.

United Nations bodies, such as the Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization, have jointly evolved an “international code of conduct on pesticide management” to serve as the guide for governments, regulators, and other stakeholders, including farmers. This code should be strictly followed right from the stage of approval of pesticides for manufacture to their application to crops by farmers. Adverse health effects of agro-chemicals are usually the result of either over-exposure to them or their misuse by farmers. Such malpractices are rampant in India. Farmers often do not take the basic precautions of putting on gloves and face masks while spraying pesticides in fields. Nor do they strictly observe the instructions for safe use mentioned on the pesticides cartons. The need, therefore, is to launch a massive awareness campaign to promote the appropriate use of pesticides to mitigate agro-chemicals-related hazards. The best course would be to incentivise the production and use of harmless and environment-friendly bio-pesticides.