Navdanya International joins Citizens for Science in Pesticide Regulation, the coalition of over 110 Civil Society Organisations calling for a more rigorous implementation of EU standards in pesticides regulation.
The new coalition is calling for a reform of the current pesticide risk assessment and risk management system, the application of the ‘precautionary principle’ to ensure that decision makers rely on data that is complete, public, up to date and free from industrial bias. It has launched a manifesto which calls upon European regulators to urgently reform the current pesticide risk assessment and risk management system, and suggests practical solutions to the major failings. These fall under three sections and can be summarised as follows:
- Prioritise public health, the environment and sustainable agriculture – pesticides must be used only as a last resort when all other non-chemical alternatives have been applied and failed.
- Ensure that decision makers rely on data that is complete, public, up to date and free from industrial bias – safety testing must not be carried out by the pesticide industry itself and data requirements for pesticides should be updated according to the most recent scientific findings to address human developmental diseases and impact on ecosystems.
- Enable decision makers, civil society and the scientific community to scrutinise the integrity and effectiveness of European pesticide policy – results and data of all pesticide safety tests shall be published on the internet in a consistent and searchable format.
Read the joint Press Release
The full details of the manifesto with all 15 points can be found here
Also read:
Poison Free Food and Farming
Navdanya International Campaign
Join the Network for Poison-free Food and Farming
