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US Congressman Renews Attempts to Ban Controversial Herbicide Atrazine
A member of Congress is seeking to ban one of the nation's most widely-used herbicides, which has turned up in drinking water in some states. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) is for the second time proposing legislation that would outlaw any use or trade of atrazine.
Atrazine is most commonly sprayed on cornfields, and can run off
into rivers and streams that supply drinking water. As the Huffington
Post Investigative Fund reported in a series of articles last fall,
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency failed to warn the public that
the weed-killer had been found at levels above federal safety limits in
drinking water in at least four states. A coalition of Midwestern
communities -- along with the nation's largest private water utility --
is suing atrazine's manufacturer, Syngenta, seeking to have it pay to filter the chemical from public water.
Steven Goldman, spokesman for Syngenta, did not comment specifically on the proposed bill or on the prospect of a nationwide ban.
"What we can say is that three government agencies in Rep. Ellison's home state of Minnesota determined in January of this year that 'atrazine regulations protect human health and the environment in Minnesota,'" he said.
The herbicide has long been controversial. The European Union in 2004 outlawed its use, citing insufficient information to prove its safety. In a reversal of Bush administration policy, the EPA announced last October that it would re-evaluate the risk of cancer or birth defects from exposure to the herbicide, as well as its potential to disrupt the hormone and reproductive systems of humans and amphibians.
The EPA's Scientific Advisory Panel is scheduled to meet next week to discuss the human health effects of atrazine in drinking water.
"No one should ever have to worry if the water they drink is making them sick or preventing fertility," said Ellison said in his announcement. "Forty years of good, hard environmental work has not eliminated our need to be vigilant in removing toxins like atrazine from our waterways."
This is not the first time Ellison has tried to outlaw atrazine. He introduced legislation in 2007 seeking to bar the use, production, sale, or trade of any pesticide containing atrazine. It died in a health subcommittee in September 2008.
Impact on farming would be minimal, Ellison said, citing U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that "an atrazine ban would result in crop losses of only 1.19 percent."
Syngenta's Goldsmith disagreed, citing figures from an 2003 EPA study. "The total negative impact on corn, sorghum and sugarcane growers in the US would exceed $2 billion if atrazine were not available," he said.
"This is just one economic analysis, not a prediction. And note that this work is seven years old now," EPA spokesman Dale Kemery said. "Clearly we evaluate many scenarios on potential impacts to make sure we have robust info to support our decisions."
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14 Comments so far
Show AllSyngenta's claim (from a 7 year old study) that the loss of atrazine would lead to a 2 billion dollar economic hit seems rather high. There are lots of other chemicals that are less long-lived in the environment and much less likely to leach into the water. I only used atrazine every year for a few decades. I have done without now for 2 years and I'm very happy with the results. By the way, the tractor in the picture looks like my best tractor (1983 International 5088).
Thank God you quit using a toxic poison 2 years out of the past 22. I lived in the midwest and swam in a pond used by the local farmers. The last time I swam in the pond the "water" burnt my skin. Get a grip, GO ORGANIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"The total negative impact on corn, sorghum and sugarcane growers in the US would exceed $2 billion if atrazine were not available"
As it is said in the movie "Food Inc." we do not think of the total cost of our farming policies to society. We give subsidies to all kinds of non-nutritious crappy monocrops (monocrap agriculture?) at the expense of diversified food based farms. Family and small farms could use a little help to sustain themselves and adopt more labor intensive and organic methods, which many of them would do if they could afford it.
These are some of the hidden costs. By considering only the short term, industrial farming drives useful traditional farming out of business. We suffer with obesity and poor nutrition. We have defiled our precious water sources, causing countless maladies. Specifically with atrazine, there are the social, medical and emotional costs of endocrine disorders increasing genital malformation of human and animal infants to be factored in. Atrazine is already banned in Europe.
Joe
We have about one acre of gardens that rarely get any herbicides. It is a lot of work for my wife and I. There is a rather limited number of people who wish to do this kind of work on more than a very small scale.
I would like the government to give people like you a subsidy so you could hire a helper. Are there any organizations of small farmers who band together to take some of that farm subsidy money away from the monocrap industry?
Joe
Representative Elison is doing the nation a fine service in persisting in trying to ban atrazine country-wide. It is a very ominous chemical that has been banned in many countries. We hope he will NOT give up!
As far as I know, my fellow Minnesotan, Keith Ellison, is an above average politician and human.
A real EPA would want to err on the side of safety instead of the on the side of the chemical companies. Unfortunately too many industry insiders have made their way into our regulatory agencies.
I think we should make them personally responsible for any preventable illness or death that occurs on their watch.
We must remember that money is more important than health.
If the Atrazeen poison manufacturer were forced to fund cleanup of drinking water, then DAS KAPITALIST central planners in Chicago would pass the expense onto the public through higher food prices, with nary a wimper from the "tough-guy" USan public. The social security is for... DAS KAPITAL!!!
What a bunch of imbeciles these people from chemical companies are. Don't they also eat the same poisoned food that they expect us to eat? Do they have a special arrangement with god not to be affected by the poisons they sell?
They can easily take the money they make by selling poisoned food and buy organic product.
I have no statistics for this, but I would bet that the executives are more prone to eat organic product than their rank and file workers. It might be interesting to see whether their chemists eat organic more than the execs.
The nuclear engineers who tell us that nuclear plants are safe commute farther to the plants, when they work there at all, than the rank and file.
If you assume that a lot of people willingly damage other people, whatever good intentions they may harbor somewhere deep inside, the mystery goes out of a lot of corporate endeavor.
The European Union (EU) as bureaucratic as it is, as opposed to being democratic, wouldn't have banned this poison unless it were a severe threat to public health. It took the EU a long time to ban Mad Cow's disease infected British beef even though it clearly was a threat to the public health. Any ban has to first go through the European Commission, all appointed and the Council of Europe, also appointed before it even gets referred over to the representatives of the people in the European Parliament. Once legislation such as this goes through, it's a sure bet that this ban should have gone through.
AD
So, what's the CEO of SINgenta make? Do the employees have health insurance...peasant insurance?
If Ellison, the man from the land of"10,000 Lakes," says it's bad for water, then I'd believe him. If the EU voted against it, as one poster pointed out, that is a good sign that we should too.
Sadly. I am still BUYING bottled water, because I don't believe that either NASA, or JPL really got all of their jet fuel contaminants out of the water table.
Aren't the citizens supposed to own the natural resources of the nation, or are the corporations making them "UNnatural resources" so that they can then patent them?
Perhaps it's time to trade in the eagle as the national symbol, amd opt for ther zebra mussel; they seem to be impossible to kill.