While the Ministry of Health studied the toxicity of the pesticide, a cable opera reveals how the U.S. embassy on Agriculture and the Chaco.
The Embassy of the United States defended the use of the controversial pesticide glyphosate with SENASA officials, the agency responsible for ensuring and certifying the health and quality of agricultural production. According to a diplomatic cable leaked July 2009 by Wikileaks, which was seen Página/12, the embassy decided to present my study to the regulator that it had authorized pesticide use after this newspaper revealed a scientific study warning of the possible toxicity of the product.
The U.S. lobbying for the pesticide manufacturer, the multinational Monsanto, took place six months after President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner ordered the Ministry of Health to initiate an official investigation into the possible harmful effects of pesticide . The study, which is still in progress, will serve to limit and eventually ban the use of glyphosate, it is shown that actually affects the health of the population, as suggested by the work questioned by the embassy. What did the toxicologist Andres Carrasco with chicken embryos.
According to the cable to the embassy, \u200b\u200bCarrasco is a researcher at the "prestigious" CONICET and the "highly respected" Universidad de Buenos Aires. But his study would not be "scientifically credible" because he had been endorsed by such institutions or included in a scientific journal.
"Within the scientific community and regulatory agencies responsible for approving the use of glyphosate in Argentina, it is accepted that the case study has no scientific credibility. The results have been submitted for analysis methodologies procedures and / or conclusions, "says the cable.
Like Coca
To counter what he called a "campaign of the pro-government press, the U.S. embassy provided information to Senasa favorable to the use of glyphosate, according to the office.
"In response to the controversy, the Ministry of Agriculture of Argentina (SENASA through) was gathering information to support approval of the use of glyphosate in Argentina. The Agriculture section of the embassy provided the study information Senasa glyphosate, which is commonly used United States and is also used in the coca eradication program Plan Colombia. "
Cable also explains the interest of defending the embassy in pesticide use:" Glyphosate is the active ingredient of Roundup pesticide popular. Monsanto is the main slice of glyphosate market in Argentina, with forty percent, and therefore is the most prominent victim circumstantial and more vulnerable to attack. "
However, the cable does not refer to studies previously conducted on the toxicity of glyphosate from the University of Caen and the National Research Centre Roscoff, both France, University of Pittsburgh (USA), National University of Rosario and Universidad Nacional del Litoral, although these studies were cited in the article the journalist Página/12 Dario Aranda on the work of Carrasco. The cable does not say anything about the various studies of health authorities within the country warning of high rates of cancer and malformations in sprayed areas.
For the validation study of Carrasco, was published in August last year in the journal Chemical Research in Toxicology in an array of ten pages, which includes all data needed to be reviewed the scientific community. In this environment, a study published in a recognized scientific journal is considered an acceptance of their seriousness. Wikileaks cables written to cover only firms early last year, so do not indicate whether the embassy publication realized and corrected their initial perception on the work of Argentinean researcher.
Fumigation
With respect to the use of glyphosate United States does, it is not a situation analogous to that of other countries because the concentration of pesticides, other toxic substances which are mixed and the application form are not the same, warn scientists. "So the security concepts for the environment and health, issued from the characterization and risk assessment calculated for 'normal conditions of use recommended' in the United States have no scientific basis in our environment," says engineer agronomic, biological and chemical Elsa Nivia Colombian biodiversidadla.org site.
"In Colombia, glyphosate is being applied on illicit crops and everything that surrounds it, and in a concentration up to 26 times higher, with the aggravating factor that is adding the surfactant Cosmo-Flux 411F, which can even quadruple the biological action of Roundup. This unfortunate situation adds more perverse: there are reports of several passes of the aircraft when sprayed on rural areas, four, six and twelve times sprayed the same field, "says the researcher.
Ecuadorian government protests led Colombia to suspend the spraying of glyphosate along the border with that country.
"serious allegations"
In January 2009, in a speech where he announced new measures for the field, the President of Argentina reported on the opening of the official investigation on Toxicity of glyphosate. "We have also taken note of these days, it has been widely published by many means, including measurement is a Justice of Cordova, for spraying the chemicals used by certain prohibitions in terms of not doing around villages so this means health impact of the population, "said Cristina Kirchner. "While this is the sole responsibility of municipalities and provinces, I have asked the Minister of Health of the Nation to conduct an investigation because I think it is very important facts make the health of all Argentines and that one can not powers into question and jurisdictions, must make available all the elements because they are very serious allegations and because they have taken action to their own provincial justices cases of pollution, carcinogens, etc., "he said, and vowed to continue the theme of" close " .
The Leonesa
Of the various reports which referred to the President, perhaps the most serious came from the province of Chaco. Last year a provincial judge suspended the spraying of rice for ninety days in the town of Leon and The province ordered a study on the effects of glyphosate in this population. The Provincial Water Contaminants Research published a report in August 2010. Warns that in the last ten years tripled the Leonesa cancer cases in children under 15 in the town and that fourfold cases of birth defects and that this coincided with the rise of rice farm in the area Bermejo Department.
scientists and environmentalists repeatedly denounced the lack of provincial government responses to health threats. Carrasco himself was attacked by local officials when he visited the Leon in 2009 to give a talk on hazards of glyphosate, as denounced by Amnesty International. One possible explanation for the alleged passivity of the government to these facts Chaco appears in another cable Wikileaks published by this newspaper last week, which accounts for the visit of then President of Monsanto Argentina, Juan Ferreyra, the U.S. embassy in August 2008.
"Ferreyra said Monsanto was having good conversations with cotton farmers to expand the use of Bt cotton (Bt cotton) in the province of Chaco, in northern Argentina, and cooperation there," says the cable. "On August 12, Monsanto signed a cooperation agreement with Governor of Chaco. The ambassador was able to support this initiative with a note on the editorial page of the main newspaper of the Chaco and conversations with the governor that day. Capitanich Governor was very enthusiastic in working with Monsanto to improve and expand local production of cotton. "
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