Implement the Ban Aerial Spraying Ordinance of Davao City!

1. All pesticides are hazardous since they are made of chemicals designed to kill or inhibit the growth of an organism considered as pest by humans. They can kill humans too.
2. According to the National Research Council in the US, only 10% of pesticides in common use have been adequately assessed for hazards. We do not know the long-term effects of most of them. Pesticides are like time bombs. They can kill a lot of people. In fact according to the World Health Organization and United Nations Environment Programme, as many as 25 million people are seriously poisoned by pesticides every year.
3. The chemical identities of many of the inert ingredients, which make up 80-90% by weight of a pesticide, have not been made known to the general public because they are classified as business trade secrets. The US Environment Protection Agency (EPA) is now evaluating these inert ingredients and it has labeled 100 of them “of known or potential toxicological concern”. But until now the general public and even authorities still has no toxicity information on most inert ingredients used in pesticides.
4. The 1,820 so called inert ingredients (such as chlorinated hydrocarbon solvents) in pesticides may not kill pests but many of them may be active chemically or biologically in or on other organisms, including humans and various wildlife species.
5. Stephan Muller and Thomas Bucheli of the Swiss Federal Institute for Environmental Science showed in their research that pesticides could also evaporate and become absorbed into clouds. The highest concentrations of such pollutants are found in the first rainfall after long dry periods. There are still people who get their drinking water from rain.
6. Only 1-2% of the sprayed chemicals actually reach the target pests. And the US National Research Council characterizes the amount of aerial drift as “considerable” – from 5% under optimal-low wind conditions to 60% under more typical conditions.
7. In virtually every study available and reviewed in the Journal of Pesticide Reform (16 articles), pesticides were detected as far away from the area of application as samples were taken. “a predictable percentage of spray will transport potentially as far as 2 or more miles from the treatment site” according to a 1994 report from the US-EPA Ecological Effects Branch.
8. Drift can contaminate open/exposed bodies of water such as river, wetlands and springs where people get drinking water. Some houses within plantation areas still depend on rainwater. Spray drifts contaminate their roofs where they collect rainwater.
   
9. Some of the fungicides used by banana plantations are banned in other countries like tridemorph is banned in UK because it can cause birth defects. It is not registered in the US, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Portugal, New Zealand, Uganda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Madagascar, Gambia, Chad, Cape Verde, Cameroon and Burkina Faso. Another fungicide still used in Davao is Chlorothalonil, which Chiquita in 1988 voluntarily took off their approved list because of worker safety concerns and its toxicity to aquatic life. It is banned in Sweden and not registered in Netherlands.
10. Although mancozeb, the most commonly used fungicide during aerial spraying is not considered highly toxic in acute exposure, it is a probable human carcinogen, meaning there is sufficient documentation of the carcinogenic potential in animal studies. It is also listed as a cancer-causing chemical by California’s Office of Health Hazard Assessment under Proposition 65. Mancozeb is converted into ETU or ethylenethiourea as degradation product or metabolite. It is an acknowledged thyroid toxin, known to cause birth defects and tumors. Experimental evidence suggests mancozeb may cause mutations in chromosomes. In a reproductive toxicity test, pituitary abnormalities and thyroid and kidney problems were observed. Due to this and other evidence, mancozeb is considered endocrine disruptor and known skin sensitizers, causing allergic and contact dermatitis in humans. It is not registered in Chad, Gambia, Burkina Faso, Nigeria; restricted in Sweden and banned in Libya.
11. In California where pesticide illness reporting is more complete than in other states or in other countries like the Philippines, over 350 illnesses and injuries were reported as a result of drift in 1991.
12. A recent Comprehensive Review of Pesticide Research by the Ontario College of Family Physicians (OCFP) highlights link between pesticide exposure and serious illnesses and diseases with children as particularly vulnerable. And there are people living within the plantations where aerial spraying is practiced in Davao (Mandug, Tigatto, Tamayong, Subasta, Sirib, Dacudao, and Manuel Guianga). Thus, allowing aerial spraying is tantamount to spraying those people directly with pesticides.
13. Most fungicides are very toxic to aquatic life such as fish and some aquatic invertebrates.
14. There is no strong buffer zone in the areas where aerial spraying is carried out. Buffer zones are important to protect communities and water sources such as springs and rivers. Without a properly planted buzzer zone, people and water sources will continue to be exposed to the hazards of pesticide drifts.
15. There is still a need to collect more and better data on the ecological and health effects of a mixture of pesticides that are being sprayed by plantations. Current registration and regulation system is based on exposure to a single pesticide and scientists to date have no effective and affordable way to study the effects of multiple exposures to various pesticides.
16. Banning aerial spray would be one of the few examples of a pollution prevention or Precautionary Principle. The Precautionary Principle is still the best way to protect human health and the environment. Given the nature of pesticides, they are toxic chemicals designed to kill thus, they have inherent characteristics to harm. Therefore following the precautionary principle and taking the side of caution, it is just right to ban aerial spraying of pesticides to be safe.
17. Regulating aerial spray is not enough and hard to monitor considering that the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority has only 2 staff for the entire city.
18. It is not true that prohibiting aerial spray will kill the banana industry. A classic example is the province of Bukidnon where there are also plantations of banana and pineapple and not one company is practicing aerial spray yet they continue to earn profits as evidenced by their continued operation.
19. The call to ban aerial spraying of pesticides is a worldwide trend – in Ecuador, Alaska, Maine (USA), Victoria (Canada), New Zealand, India and some countries in Europe.
20. Aerial spraying of pesticides is already banned in some countries. Total ban exist currently in Denmark, Estonia, Slovenia, with partial bans in Italy, Cyprus, Austria and Belgium.

What is a drift?

The US EPA defines spray drift as the physical movement of a pesticide through the air at the time of application or soon thereafter, to any site other than that intended for application (often referred to as off target).

Prepared by IDIS (May 2005)