FOOD AND WATERNGO
Nigerians are dying every day with every meal we consume. Are you shocked? I was as shocked as you are right now when I found this out recently. We have a major problem right before us and it seems like no one is talking about it so, here I am, writing about the increasing dangers we face due to the proliferation of Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) in Nigeria.
Do you know that over 60 per cent of food produced in Nigeria are made by peasant farmers and over 90% of them use chemical pesticides? most of these chemical pesticides are HHPs that have severe health and environmental impacts when proper application and safety is not within reach.
Traces of pesticides can be found everywhere
Chemical pesticides use leaves residues in the food we eat. Leaving us exposed to their associated risk. Traces of pesticides can be found everywhere from our fruits to our water, vegetables, in the air and even in the bees which are very important in the farming ecosystem. Its dangerous effects are long-lasting and devastating. The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that 385 Million people fall ill every year globally from pesticide poisoning. Developing countries in the Global South (Africa, Nigeria inclusive) experience 99% of pesticide-related deaths, even though they comparatively produce very little pesticide. A lot of pesticide-related deaths are either unreported or attributed to unnatural causes yet pesticide imports into African countries especially Nigeria are increasing, a lot of these pesticides fall into the highly hazardous category.
Studies have revealed how pesticides contaminate rivers, lakes and groundwater causing too many adverse consequences. These pesticides don’t just endanger our rights to food; they also endanger our right to good health and a safe environment. Even the United Nations considers these HHPs a Global Human Rights concern.
One of the major pesticide tragic cases in Nigeria happened in Benue State in 2020 where over 270 people died from an initially diagnosed ‘mystery ailment’. It was later discovered that they had been poisoned by a banned highly hazardous pesticide used by farmers in nearby farmlands that had seeped into the local river.
In 2013, 23 school students in Bihar, India, died within minutes after eating a meal of rice and potato curry as part of a lunch programme against malnutrition. The investigation found that the meal had been prepared with cooking oil that contained the pesticide monocrotophos. This is why the increasing rate of food poisoning recently in Nigeria has been a serious source of concern for me.
Available data from 2015 to 2019 from NAFDAC’s Green Book product database, lists 682 synthetic chemical pesticide products (excluding chemical repellents) registered. More than half of these products include active ingredients that are not approved in the European market. NAFDAC Pesticide Registration Regulation 2021 section 12(1) states that registered pesticides are only for a period of 5 years. So by Implication many of the registered pesticide products within the space 2015 and 2019 would have been deregistered and phased out by now- hopefully? One would have to access more data on registered products from NAFDAC to clear the unsettled discomfort suggested by the data within the period.
We are not just suffering from the impacts of using HHPs health-wise, we are also losing economically. In 2015, the European Union banned the import of dried beans and other agricultural products from Nigeria because they contained levels of pesticide residues considered dangerous to human health. Nigeria loses about $ 362.5 million yearly in foreign exchange to the ban on the exportation of just beans in the last 8 years. Several of Nigeria’s home-grown crops have continually been rejected when exported. These are huge economic losses to Nigeria.
One of the key demands every Nigerian should be making is for the government to create regulations and laws that ban these highly hazardous substances from being imported. In fact, Nigeria needs to join countries like Tunisia, Mexico and Palestine, which have laws banning the import of pesticides that have been banned in the Exporting or manufacturing counties. Delegates of Nigeria that represent us in international conventions need to take a strong stand against accepting and trade of Highly Hazardous Pesticides, especially those banned in more advanced countries that even have better facilities to ensure safety and a more advanced health care system to address the health hazards when it occurs.
However, an import ban on these highly toxic substances can only do so much. There have to be thorough registration processes for pesticides in general. Effective pesticide control, aggressive sensitisation on the dangers of pesticides especially for the local farmers who oftentimes are unaware of the adverse effects of the methods they employ in their farming and the application of other safer methods of farming.
Research and real-life practices here in Nigeria have shown that there are alternate farming methods that work like the agroecology farm I experienced when I visited the Be The Help Foundation agroforestry project located at Damokosa village in Kwali LGA in the FCT, Abuja. Farmers here have embraced agroecology, a branch of agriculture that promotes farming practices like the growing of crops naturally without the use of fertilizers. Interestingly, most traditional farm practices do not use chemical farm inputs, and our fathers and ancestors thrived as nature-based farmers.
Sustainable farming and environmental management practices need to be promoted in Nigeria. An ecological future is possible, and Nigeria can be the organic capital of the world. Until then, we live with a ticking time bomb. Every meal we consume daily is slowly killing us, our environment is under grave threat and it’s never been more imperative to act as it is right now. Let us enlighten ourselves, do the same for others, then speak out and let our voice be heard to safeguard our health and our future.
