Ontario’s “Cosmetic” Pesticide Ban, and What It Means for Agriculture

Collateral damage- any unintended effects suffered by an innocent party as a result of actions aimed at a third party by an antagonist

-the effect of the unintended action
These definitions speak volumes when applied to the farmers of Ontario as the provincial government moves to ban “Cosmetic Pesticides”. The double whammy may come when the legislation is effected and still does not do what many intended it to do. That may be soon after the new regulations are passed- widely expected to be on Earth Day, April 22, 2009.

The new legislation has arisen from an orchestrated groundswell of mostly urbanized folks who have become disenchanted with what they perceive as improper use, over-use, and maybe abuse of pesticides. No matter that the pesticides in and of themselves are deemed of acceptable risk by Health Canada- if used according to the label. Therein lies the rub! The legislation keys in on pesticides- both by active ingredients and by actual products. It does NOT change anything for the actual user. This is akin to blaming the steering wheel and not the driver when a car goes in a ditch!

I would suggest that everyone is in favour of banning all improper use, all overuse, and all abuse of the use of pesticides. Farmers took this to heart when they embraced Integrated Pest Management, mandatory training and re-certification for purchase and use of pesticides, and this is shown by their record of reductions in use, and virtually clean record of performance in the field.

Compare this to the urban environment! Domestic users do not have to show they can read a label in English or French, yet the majority of the population of Toronto does not have either as their first language, or maybe not the second! They do not have to show competence to calibrate a sprayer. They do not keep records of use. They receive no instruction on safe storage or disposal of the products. Is it any wonder there are incidents!

The licensed applicators are not immune either! They are spraying on land they do not own, nor have any vested interest. They get tested once, and then get re-licensed without any further testing-ever! Some of the older licensees actually got grandfathered in without a test at all! They can go out and hire anyone 16 years of age, with no training, by ‘enrolling them in a course’ but with no actual requirement to ever attend, pass a test, or ever receive training of any type. They get to start work immediately, under the supervision of a technician- who is also non-licensed! Is it any wonder that issues have arisen in the urban areas? It beggars me to understand why NO changes have been made to pesticide use in the urban environment, other than to banish a long list (almost 300 products), and 80+ active ingredients from availability.

The result is predictable. The few products that will be available are less effective in the most part, than those eliminated. If the tendency to over-use was present in the past, it is more likely when things don’t work as well or as fast. Furthermore, these products will be more costly without real market competition. Unscrupulous agents will sell their ‘new’ programs, at much higher cost. Lawns that may have survived the droughts of summer watering bans but become full of weeds that germinate with the first rain of fall, will need annual re-seeding or re-sodding. Then there are the lawns that get cinch bugs, white grubs, or sod web-worm; those are the ones that attract starlings and skunks who eat the larva like jelly beans and tear up the lawn to get them. There will be no effective controls available, so a new lawn will be needed. I have read with interest about how just fertilizer and over-seeding will do the job, but they forget that water is the key ingredient in the mix, and tends to be unavailable most of the summer as our urban infrastructure cannot handle the demand. There will be outrage by summer’s end!

Let us not forget the many garden clubs, and the fall fair competitions for fruits, vegetables, and flowers. It will be a miracle (or surreptitious applications) to keep the quality at the levels expected in these events. Isn’t it odd that while we have no problem discarding an old drug for a ‘better’ one, we are discarding better pest control for poorer? Isn’t it also ironic that while it is Health Canada that approves both drugs and pesticides, using the same kinds of criteria and reviews for the human health effects, and while pesticides receive much greater reviews as all the possible environment effects are examined too, that some so-called learned people who somehow know better, have decided to ban the use of effective and approved-for-use products?

Farmers and on-farm use of pesticides have been ‘exempted’ from the legislation, at least on the surface. However, they sit on tenterhooks waiting for the next penny to drop. If such inane legislation is possible, then anything else is equally possible! The most immediately damning effect is the loss of public confidence in our regulatory system. If our politicians can override sound science, then how can anyone be sure of anything? In all the public campaigns for ‘Eat Local’ or ‘Eat Fresh’, will there have to be a rider that farmers may have used pesticides in the production system? Will there be any commitment, from those same politicos, that calms the public with assurance of food safety, explains the testing and certification schemes, that touts the records showing the extremely high safety record of our food producers? To date there has been NONE, and none is planned that we know of to date! Many politicians like to create a problem (at least in their minds) go about trying to solve it (again in their minds) and giving NO thought to those caught in the cross-fire as collateral damage. Ontario farmers WILL suffer repercussions as a result of this legislation. As the Admiral of The Fleet for the British Navy said, “It takes three years to build a ship, but it takes three hundred years to build a tradition”. He was referring to the need to fight on even against impossible odds, even if it means losing a ship, rather than turn tail which was NOT in the traditions of the navy. Tradition gets things done: turning tail leaves neither respect nor any self-respect. Our government is undermining the excellent record of our farmers with this legislation, and it will take forever to re-gain public confidence.

That would be bad enough, if the legislation was good enough to solve the ‘problem’ it was intended to resolve. It will NOT, as it has missed the real issues entirely!

It is my fervent hope that sanity will be restored before it is too late. I won’t be holding my breath though! Farmers will need to be extremely pro-active, immediately, to counter-act the down-sides of this poor legislation.

Craig L. Hunter
Ontario Fruit and Vegetable Growers’ Association
355 Elmira Road N., Unit 105,
Guelph, Ontario N1K 1S5
519 763 6160 ext 119