Pesticide sparks NAFTA fight / Steve Tvedten interviewed on pesticides
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Date:
Tue, 9 Jul 2002
From: Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Paul Helliker <phelliker@cdpr.ca.gov>
Director, State
of California, Department of Pesticide Regulation
cc: Christine Whitman whitman.christine@epa.gov
Dear Mr. Helliker,
I thought you might like to read an article dated: Friday July 5, 2002
from The Montreal Gazette, Nation, Page A12 entitled: Pesticide sparks NAFTA
fight by Kevin Dougherty Gazette Quebec Bureau.
QUEBEC - The companies that make 2,4-D, one of the pesticides Quebec is committed to banning, will challenge the provincial regulation under Chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement - if the government goes ahead with the ban.
Donald Page, executive director of the Industry Task Force II on 2,4-D Research, said yesterday that the manufacturers will wage a costly battle against Quebec under the NAFTA provision that has allowed private U.S. corporations to successfully sue the Mexican and Canadian governments and win hefty settlements.
Page, whose task force is funded by the four North American makers of the weed-killer 2,4-D Dow Agro-Sciences, BASF, Nufarm Inc. and Agro-Gor SA - predicted Quebec will lose the Chapter 11 case.
"They (Quebec) are going to have to stand up in court and prove it (that 2,4-D causes cancer) and they can't. "There is no herbicide used in Canada that is a carcinogen," Page said.
"Unfortunately, the Quebec government is dominated by activists."
STUDIES COST $30 MILLION
Page said that the role of his task force is to manage the re-evaluation of 2,4-D that has been ordered by governments, using sophisticated testing technology; it's spending $30 million
U. S. to conduct new studies at independent, certified laboratories. The testing has been completed in Europe, he noted, and the European Union has attested that 2,4-D is not a carcinogen. He added that of the 140 studies done on 2,4-D "several have suggested links, but the great preponderance does not."
To say that 2,4-D causes cancer based on the minority of studies "is not sound science," Page said.
Epidemiological studies of 20,000 chemical-plant employees making 2,4- D showed no association with cancer; in fact, the studies showed 2,4-D plant workers lived longer, he said. Like the ban on DDT, after Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring suggested that DDT was killing off the peregrine falcon, a ban on 2,4-D would be harmful to society, he said.
"Rachel Carson has killed millions of people," Page said, arguing that DDT controlled mosquitoes carrying the malaria virus and, since its ban, there has been a resurgence of malaria in the developing world.
'IT IS POISON'
But Steven Tvedten, a Michigan man who spent 35 years in the pest-control business using 2,4-D, cholordane and other products but now preaches natural pest control, questioned Page's defence of DDT, pointing out that mosquitoes are now immune to DDT. "I was in the pest-control business. I used to tell people it was safe enough to drink," Tvedten said, adding he would think: "The government would not allow it to be out there if it was poison."
Then, his child was stillborn and Tvedten became an anti-pesticide activist. "It is poison," he said. , Tvedten said that while industry-sponsored studies show that 2,4-D itself is not a carcinogen, the chemical soup of commercial herbicides, which include dioxins and other products, can be more toxic than 2,4-D itself, and can interact with other chemicals.
Tvedten said his pest-management company uses organic products as simple as chicken-manure compost to eliminate schoolyard pests, and decried the organophosphates still widely used.
"This is not better living through chemistry," he said. "This is madness."
Kevin Dougherty's E-mail address is kdougherty@thegazette.southam.ca
National Editor: Victor Dabby(514) 987-2578Well Mr. Helliker,
It seems very clear to me, that the people in any democracy or free
country have the right to choose to be free from your "registered"
POISONS and/or that the majority rules.
The "Corporations" apparently do not believe in these
freedoms of ours and have decided to ram their POISONS down "our
throats" whether we want them or not!
Who do you think will win? A
jury of free people will always choose to remain free.
Over 90% of the people in
North America want to be free from your dangerous "registered"
pesticide POISONS!
The
"Corporations" want their profits - what do you want?
I stand for the SAFEST way to control pest problems.
Where do you stand?
Respectfully,
Stephen L. Tvedten
P.S. On July 7, 2002 The Brantford Expositor had an article entitled: City Tries Sweet Solution To Weeds By STEPHANIE HARRINGTON, Expositor Staff.
The city is experimenting with organic fertilizers as part of its integrated pest management program, which focuses on healthy lawns instead of pesticide treatment.
"Our belief is that pesticides should be a last resort. You should have a healthy lawn, respect it and, as a last resort, spot spray" a weedy area with pesticides, said Dennis Wale, foreman of horticulture and turf maintenance at the parks and recreation department.
The city hopes that by maintaining healthy lawns, through organic fertilization and aeration techniques for example, there will be fewer weeds to treat.
The organic fertilizer is being used on St. Andrew's Park on Brant Avenue and a section of Wood Street Park. The areas were treated twice, last week and in mid-June. The product is made of molasses, soybean oil and sugar beet extract and is applied in liquid form.
The Organics Plus Fertilizer is expensive, costing four to five times as much -- about $500 an acre -- than other fertilizers. But if this year's applications have positive results, then the city may expand the program, said Wale.
The product is not licensed to kill weeds in Canada, although it has been approved to do so in the U.S. It's made from food-grade organic materials and poses no health risks. It could stain the clothes of children who roll in the freshly-treated grass, but the areas were well-posted.
Currently, the city's parks and recreation department treats 18 per cent of the public property in Brantford with lawn products. The city only treats areas that have weed problems. Some parks have not been treated in six or seven years, while other sports fields are treated every two***, Wale said.
This experiment with organic fertilization follows the city's pesticide review committee's focus on public education about environmentally-friendly lawn care and reducing pesticide use.
"We want to encourage people to use the integrated pest management program," said Wale. Brantford has focused on public education instead of a pesticide ban, which is a route that some municipalities have taken recently.
The public can view the progress of a test plot in Spring Gardens Park, which uses four different lawn care treatment methods. Or, a brochure called Healthy Lawns is available at the parks and recreation department on Sherwood Drive.
© Copyright 2002 The Expositor http://www.canada.com/search/site/story.asp?id=88E2CCB0-856B-49BB-98E1-281A9FD9AE3E
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