Ecobreves – CHILE: Anti-Pesticide Groups Take On the Government

By IPS Correspondents and - - Reprint | | Print |

SANTIAGO, Dec 8 2008 (IPS) - The Alliance for a Better Quality of Life and the Latin American Anti-Pesticide Action Network (RAP-AL) of Chile staged a protest outside the government's Agriculture and Livestock Service (SAG) headquarters about the continuation of aerial fumigation. “We are calling for a halt to aerial spraying, which in Chile is under no monitoring or regulation, and causes severe harm to the people's health and the environment,” Lucía Sepúlveda, of RAP-AL, told Tierramérica.

They also are asking Parliament to ban the use of highly toxic pesticides, for SAG to conduct regular analysis of farm-raised foods for domestic consumption and that when toxic residue is detected they immediately alert the population and penalize those responsible.

By July there were 593 poisonings from pesticides reported in Chile this year.