P A N A L E R T - Pesticide Action Network Alert
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P A N A L E R T - Pesticide Action Network Alert
Date:
Tue, 13 Aug 2002 08:38:50 -400
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
P A N A L E R T - Pesticide Action Network Alert
In this Issue:
*ACTION: An Invitation from Diane Wilson to join her fight for the victims of Bhopal on August 15 (India's Independence Day).
*NEWS UPDATE: New web site on Chemical Body Burden is now available, please visit: http://www.chemicalbodyburden.org
*NEWS UPDATE: Paraquat and other pesticides banned from fairly traded products
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* ACTION: An Invitation from Diane Wilson to join her fight for the victims
of Bhopal on August 15 (India's Independence Day).
Diane Wilson is a 4th generation shrimp boat captain from Texas who with her hunger strikes stopped Formosa and Alcoa from dumping their toxic chemicals off the Texas coast. She has fought the chemical companies that pollute San Antonio Bay for twenty years. She is on her 21st day of a hunger strike outside Dow Chemical's factory in Seadrift, Texas in solidarity with the Bhopal survivors. Please join her on August 15 (Indian Independence Day) for a global set of actions targeting Dow Chemical/Union Carbide for evading its liability in Bhopal, and the Indian government, for being complicit in this corporate violence and lack of responsibility.
A Call to Action from Diane Wilson:
Seadrift, Texas
5 August 2002
At midnight on December 2, 1984, deadly toxins leaked from a badly run Union Carbide (now wholly owned by Dow Chemical) plant in Bhopal, engulfing half a million of India's poor in the world's worst ever industrial disaster. In hours, a historic city became a gas chamber. As dawn broke, some 8,000 dead were strewn across the city's streets in postures of agony.
That was 18 years ago. You'd think that by now the survivors would have received proper medical care, that they'd have been adequately compensated for their loss and their suffering, that somebody would have had to answer in court for what was done to them.
On all counts, you'd be wrong.
Dow-Carbide, one of the world's largest corporations, forced a "settlement" with the Indian government that gave the survivors “compensation" of a maximum of $500 each--many received less--not even enough to cover the cost of simple medicines.
Thirty people still die every month from the effects of the gas. Meanwhile, Bhopal's drinking water is being poisoned by chemicals from the derelict factory and dumped in the open by the company up to 10 years after the accident.
On July 17, the Indian government applied to reduce charges against Warren Anderson, the Union Carbide CEO at the time of the disaster--the same man who has been refusing to answer the court's summons for 11 years. The court's judgment will be given on August 27. If the charges are diluted it will reduce the deaths of 20,000 people and the 18 years' suffering of the survivors to the status of a car accident and virtually end hopes of ever getting just compensation for the victims. The victims began a hunger strike in India, which I joined July 17th to force Dow Chemicals to accept its liabilities for the Bhopal disaster. Hundreds around the world have joined me.
Here are things you can do to join us:
1. Join me outside Dow Chemicals, Seadrift, Texas, on August 15 at 1PM to demand Dow clean up its mess in Bhopal and Seadrift; bring your own broom. Contact kinnu@subvertisement.org for details and all press inquires.
2. On the morning of August 14 hold a vigil and protest outside your nearest Indian embassy or consulate.
3. Call Dow headquarters in Michigan at 800/232-2436 demanding that Dow accept its liabilities and clean up its mess in Bhopal.
4. Demonstrate outside your nearest Dow facility.
5. Join me in the worldwide hunger strike; details at http://www.bhopal.net/worldwide-action.
6. Sign the electronic petition addressed to the Indian government at http://www.corpwatchindia.org, or raise your own and send to your nearest Indian embassy, listed at http://www.thokalath.com/embassy/index.php.
7. Alert your local media and pass this message on to your friends.
8. Contribute to fund the worldwide relay hunger strikes and ongoing action. In India contact admin@del3.vsnl.net.in for details of how to do this. In the U.S. contact Jodie at thebadbabes@aol.com.
9. Let us know what you are doing and if you are interested in joining any of the international actions contact thebadbabes@aol.com.
For more information, flyers, banners, and answers to your questions go to http://www.bhopal.net.
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* NEWS UPDATE: New web site on Chemical Body Burden is now available, please
visit
http://www.chemicalbodyburden.org
A new web site on Chemical Body Burden issues is now up and available! PANNA's POPs program chaired the Coming Clean working group that developed this site. Coming Clean is a coalition of groups across the U.S. working together to raise awareness about toxic chemicals and the companies that produce them.
The website, http://www.chemicalbodyburden.org, answers common questions about the chemical load we all carry in our bodies from birth. How does this chemical body burden affect your health? What are the pathways of exposure? What can be done?
The site provides links to recent studies on chemical body burdens, information on specific chemicals and their health effects, and ideas for addressing the problem--including current action alerts.
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* NEWS UPDATE: Parquat and other pesticides banned from fairly traded
products
The April 2002 Fairtrade Standards of the Fairtrade Label Organization included the following article about pesticides:
"3.1.1.2 Pesticides in World Health Organization Class Ia and Ib, pesticides in the Pesticide Action Network's "Dirty Dozen" list and pesticides in FAO/UNEP's Prior Informed Consent Procedure list cannot be used."
That means that all fairly traded bananas, coffee beans, etc. must be produced without paraquat and many other dangerous pesticides!
For more information about the Fairtrade Standards, visit their web site at http://www.fairtrade.net.
For more information about the pesticides forbidden under this new standard, visit the PAN Pesticide Database, available through the PANNA website at http://www.pesticide.info.org. To find out what pesticides are included in the World Health Organization (WHO) Class Ia and Ib categories of "extremely" and "highly" hazardous pesticides and pesticides on the FAO/UNEP Prior Informed Consent (PIC) list, click on the "Chemicals" section and select "Chemical Category" search; select these categories from the menu under the "Chemical Regulatory Categories" button. To see PAN's list of "Dirty Dozen" pesticides, click on the "Chemicals" section and do a "Chemical Category" search as above, but click on the "Chemical Toxicity Categories" button.
For more information about the ongoing international campaign to ban paraquat, visit the Berne Declaration website at http://www.evb.ch/. (It comes up in German, but you can click on the English version, and go to the food and agriculture section for current information on the paraquat campaign).
If you would like to be included in our mailing list for continuing information on pesticides, please email us at list@safe2use.com.