Pesticides: What are they?
Pesticides are chemicals that are used to destroy pests. In the agricultural industry, pesticides are classified into two categories, carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic. A carcinogenic pesticide is a substance or agent producing or inciting cancer. Conversely, a non-carcinogenic pesticide is substance that does not produce or incite cancer. Most agricultural pesticides were registered in the 1950’s, with no standard regulations. The most considerable standard prior to the amendments of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) was, if a revocation of a pesticide occurred, would it have an impact on the prices or availability of food to the consumer? Today, the 208 pesticides used in the United States are regulated by the FFDCA. Bills such as, The Delaney Clause and The Food Quality Protection Act have modified and enforced pesticide regulations. Consumer concerns with the usage of pesticides in the agricultural industry, in regards to health factors, have overwhelmed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and demand they enforce pesticide regulations. With the assistance from other organizations such as the Senate Agriculture Committee (SAC), National Academy of Science (NAS), National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), and Consumers Union (CU), the EPA has made a notable progress. Throughout the years, consumers have pushed for research of the chemicals and substances that produce agricultural pesticides and what these pesticides do to our internal system. Congressman, James J. Delaney was also convinced that too many pesticide chemicals were found in foods. So in 1958, the House Select Committee investigated the use of chemicals in food products and amended section 409 of the FFDCA, in result creating The Delaney Clause.
The bill The Delaney Clause was implemented to avoid carcinogenic pesticides in the United States food supply. According to Congressional Reports, the intent of the bill was to reduce public exposure to a wide range of health effects, including nerve damage, reproductive failure, birth defects, and cancer due to hazardous pesticides. Although these health effects have not been proven in human life form, it has been proven that some pesticides are carcinogenic in lab animals. However, the bill overlooked many aspects of the agricultural i...
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... from state to state. In return the states provided estimates on cropland and not on non-cropland, such as non-commercial pesticide usage. The 1992 Census of Agriculture Report noted, “for some states there were no published surveys or expert opinions from field specialists…pesticide use profiles were assumed to be the same as an adjacent state”. The report further concluded the data was sufficient “in spite of the limitations…the data would provide a useful overview of the regional patterns of pesticide use based on distributions of crops and the associated intensity of use by compound”. With the Food Quality Protection Act, projects now have a standard for researching, testing, or approving agricultural pesticides.
Many organizations have dedicated efforts in regulating the use of pesticides. This paper has defined the term pesticide, and identified possible health effects which carcinogenic pesticides induce in the human body. This paper has differentiated the many organizations and laws that regulate pesticides. Last but not least, this paper has also introduced the many ways the EPA, and other assisting organizations efforts to preserve a strict regulation of pesticide usage.
Kroma, M. M., & Flora, C. B. (2003). Greening pesticides: A historical analysis of the social
Pesticides can be absorbed from the outside of the produce to the inside of the skin. If one does not eat completely organic, there is no way to stay completely away from consuming chemicals. Pesticides also contaminate drinking water. Run off water from farms using pesticides contaminate rivers and have the potential to infiltrate drinking water supplies ("Assessing Health Risks from Pesticides | Pesticides | US EPA"). A simple way to avoid this is to filter your water a few extra times before you consume it. Scientists know more about the effect pesticides have on people than the effects GMOs do. This evidence is due to worker exposer. People who apply pesticides such as vegetable and fruit pickers. The Environmental Protection Agency known as the EPA, evaluates exposure workers have to chemicals. The EPA only registers chemicals that are shown to be safe if used properly. There are different ways to be exposed to pesticide, inhalation exposure, dermal exposure, and oral exposure. Testing is typically preformed on animals by pesticide companies in independent laboratories. While testing pesticides the EPA looks for a wide range of side effects such as eye and skin irritation to birth defects and cancer. The Federal Government also regulates pesticides, “to ensure that they do not pose unreasonable risk to human health or the environment.” ("Assessing Health Risks from Pesticides | Pesticides | US
Agriculture is the most fundamental resource of society. Without it, humans could not live, especially in the ways we do now where people reside in cities. This means that those cities could not exist without large scale agriculture to sustain them. Since agriculture is such a necessity, people have developed methods to gain more from their land. One of the many solutions besides machinery they have developed to produce higher crop yields is through the use of pesticides. However, those pesticides which have resulted in high crop yields have come at price, and that is human health itself. This seems rather contradictory. Pesticides were designed to help people and society by increased the success of producing high crop yields, and they still do that, but at the same time, those same pesticides have caused unforeseen health risks, primarily to those have had to handle them. The average person would not consider pesticides as being a cause for depression, or in worst case scenario, suicide, but studies have found significant links. Even though California is just one place in the world, it has large agricultural areas which were, and still are, represented in many scientific studies that have found those unforeseen risks from pesticide use. Since pesticides are poisons, producers and safety activities urge several safety precautions to attempt to reduce the effect on human users. However, these precautions sometimes do not prevent long term damages in the people that live and work in such close proximity, which are the agricultural workers. Since the risk are known, policies have been put into place, but despite that, the use of pesticides remains high. Like many of the anthropological readings from this course, there are also added ...
To help keep crops from being destroyed, conventional farmers use many methods such as pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. Nearly 1 billion pounds of these chemicals are used every year (“pesticides”). Because of this excessive use, some scientists express concern that using artificial chemicals in the farming process could produce unhealthy crops. People who ate it over a long period of time could suffer from degraded health and stunted growth (“Organic Foods”). For example, in 1989, the EPA banned the use of Alar which was a chemical used to ripen apples (“Farming, Organics”). This chemical proved to be carcinogenic after causing tumors in mice after several laboratory tests (“Organic Food”). As a result of these findings there was a dramatic increase of the sales for organic food (“Organic Food”). Another study found that Atrazine (one of the most widely used herbicides in the United States) has the potential of being carcinogenic and reducing sperm counts in males (“Organic Food”). This was further proven when evidence was found that chemicals u...
Civilization began with agriculture, and agriculture continues to be an integral part of our lives. Civilization brought knowledge, knowledge brought technology, and technology brought chemicals and pesticides to “improve” our world. “The Obligation to Endure” is an excerpt from Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring,” a passionate and masterful work on the results of civilization’s efforts to control pests and insects. These effects include destruction of the environment, alteration of gene structures in plants and animals, water contamination, and an upset of nature’s delicate balance. This article is an impassioned plea to the world to understand the threat and demand the information necessary to make an informed consent on use of these deadly substances.
There are billions of pounds of pesticides that are produced annually, despite the research showing how dangerous this overuse is. In fact, “recent research has documented the fact that certain pesticides use may actually increase pest problems” (Pojman, 2017, p. 800). This further demonstrates how pesticides are generally harmful rather than helpful. There are multiple organisms which pesticides affect, including poisoning humans, domestic animals, bees, while also causing a loss in crops, reducing populations of natural enemies, and growing pesticide resistance. Specifically, in the case of bee poisonings, the overall death of these bees results in the loss of 135 million dollars each year. There is also evidence that recently there have been more bee poisonings since 1962, since highly toxic insecticides are being used, while greater amounts of insecticides are being dispensed. Pesticides are also deployed through aircraft, allowing drifting problems. Additionally, insecticides are used by many populations other than farmers, including “golf-course managers, gardeners, and other landowners” to simply deal with their daily unwanted pests that will damage their flowers and crops (Williams, 2014, p. 33). If these insecticides are sprayed near a bee’s habitat or nest site, they will be harmed either immediately or subtly in regards to their behavior. Even worse, there are certain pesticides which treat seeds and thus allow it to be present in the plant’s tissue. This means that bees are being exposed to pesticides through pollen and nectar. In a study by Guseman, the goal was to discover which combinations of compounds were causing bees the most harm, so that a solution could be found. According to the study, bees are exposed to potentially dangerous pesticides in two distinct ways, through “in-hive miticides to control parasites and through the foraging activity of adult bees who collect pollen
In 1952, India was the first country to introduce pesticides to the world. Over sixty years ago, the world population stood at approximately 2.7 billion. While today the world population stands at over 7.4 billion (worldometers, 2016). Due to the upturn in global population, pesticides play a crucial role in the ability to produce adequate food to sustain our ever growing population. Pesticides not only carry multiple benefits for public health, they also help to boost our economy. However, many argue that the potential health risks associated with residue left on produce outweighs any of the benefits pesticide usage generates. In contradiction to anti pesticide theorist, this paper will outline the stakeholders in pesticides, and the safety
Over 39 years have passed since the nationwide ban of a well-known pesticide, dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) (1), yet it still has an important role in public health as well as the environment. DDT is a persistent toxin, having a long half-life of 2 to 15 years terrestrially and 150 years aquatically (as cited in 5). It was originally used in World War II to control malaria and yellow fever then became a main staple in pesticide control for crops. Because DDT was a highly effective pesticide for malaria it is still used in areas where the disease is prevalent. There is a mass of controversy surrounding the chemical and its continued use as governments try to find a balance between public welfare and the state of the environment.
It is necessary to creat a set of standards to control the use of pesticides which is consistent all over the world. After exposure to pesticides, pests can also have some changes, such as increased resistance to pesticides and the survival of pests may be passed on to the next generation. Due to the emergence of resistance, people have to increase the amount of medication and increase the number of drugs, the consequences of the pest caused by higher resistance. It leads to reduce crop production, have high cost of disease pests, environmental pollution and harmful human health. Therefore, the country governments have the responsibility to use the appropriate standard to prescribe the number of pesticides used and the dosage.
When a person is exposed at an early age, there can be developmental delays, motor skill dysfunction, and behavioral disorders. Women who are pregnant are more susceptible to the side effects of pesticides, due to their already stressed out bodies. Pesticides can be passed from mother to child through breast milk, and through the skin when pesticides are absorbed through the skin and into the blood stream, ultimately affecting the mother as well as the fetus. Atrazine is one of the most widely used herbicide in the United States today, “Now researchers in Indiana are finding that a rare birth defect called’gastroschisis’ shows up more among babies conceived when atrazine levels are high” (Schafer, 2011,
As time has progressed, there has always been an overarching need for high amounts of crop production throughout the world. With the rapid rate of population growth, the need for crops and other sources of nutrients is only increasing. In order to meet these high demands and increase yields, farmers and other agriculturalists have started implementing the use of pesticides. These chemical mixtures are being used in order to prevent, destroy, repel or mitigate any pests from destroying growing crops. However, using pesticides on crops can create massive amounts of pollution, negatively affect an individual’s health, and can spark biodiversity loss within an ecosystem. According to Michael C.R. Alavanja, “Over 1 billion pounds of pesticides are used within the United States (US) each year and approximately 5.6 billion pounds are used worldwide”. With all this in mind, it is clear that pesticides should not be made available to farmers and agriculturalists, and should
According to P. Venkata Laxma Reddy et al., (2014), In fact, it is roughly estimated that around 500 compounds have been registered globally as pesticides or their metabolites. Thus, pesticide products are documented as amongst the most hazardous substances invented by humankind, as substance that gives exacerbating deleterious effects. Based on reported in the scientific literature, the effects of fertilizers and pesticides are to say the least variable, it became clear evidence that certain product can have significant impacts, whether the effect can be positive or negative.
There are 2.5 billion pounds of pesticides being applied to agricultural products each year in the United States. This is ten times more than was applied forty years ago. It is still unknown as to what type of exact effects these chemicals may have on individuals. Some farmers that have been using pesticides in their fields and developed leukemia are finding that the cause of their disease is from inhaling pesticides. These chemicals are still in use today and most of them have never been tested for the short or long-term effects that they may have on humans.
The registration criteria are set forth in section 3 of FIFRA. The EPA decides if a pesticide meets the requirement is based on the facts and date that has been submitted by the producers in the registration process and from the received application, EPA decides if the pesticides would have unreasonable adverse effect on the environment by considering the environmental costs, economic, social and the impact of the pesticide. This criteria is used by the EPA to measure the level of adverse effect the pesticide would have on the environment is a continuous one, which ,means at any point in time it can enact section 6 of FIFRA that prohibit, cancel and suspends the use of any pesticide that tends to pose adverse hazardous effect on the environment. All pesticides must be adequately registered and labelled by law for sale. The label on the pesticide must specify all active ingredients, limits to the usage of such pesticides, which crops the pesticides are to be used on. The congress in 1996 passed an act titled, food quality protection act(FPQA) that affected the FIFRA in two manner, firstly, it expects EPA to set a maximum tolerance residue limit on every registered pesticide and secondly it expects also that EPA produce an estrogenic substance screening program to filter all registered pesticides of their effect on human. This is to ensure that food supply in the country is
...ates have more than fourteen distinct Federal Acts control the manufacture, registration, distribution, use, consumption and disposal of pesticides, EPA or other department cannot remove all of pesticides residues from our food, air and water. Therefore, Consumers cannot risk their own life to allow farmers and manufacturers do whatever they want to. The best way to have massive reduction for using pesticide is collecting taxes from farmers and manufacturers that overuse and mixing multiple chemicals. “The direct cost of applying a pesticide is only a small fraction of the actual cost. What remains unaccounted for are human illnesses due to pesticide exposures”(disrupting). Because farmers and manufactures react to tax incentives, pesticide will have a significant decline of use and produce pesticide.