India should ban pesticides till the threat of global food crisis subsides

Food and fertilizer prices have soared in the wake of the war in Ukraine. Russia and Ukraine are the world’s largest and fifth largest exporters of wheat. Russia is one of the leading exporters of fertilizers and fertilizer inputs. Ukraine is a major supplier of sunflower seeds (that’s why a Ukrainian woman told a Russian soldier to carry a handful of sunflower seeds in her pocket, “so that when this war ends there will be something good”) ).

The Economist’s commodity price index for food was up 30% at the end of March, from a year earlier. Wheat prices rose 45% as shipments from the Black Sea ports used by Ukraine and Russia stopped. Palm oil prices rose on reduced sunflower supplies from Ukraine.

Sri Lanka in our neighborhood created a food crisis of its own, abruptly abandoning the use of fertilizers and pesticides in favor of organic farming.

It is in this context that the long pending review of the proposal to ban 27 pesticides comes to the fore. Many of these insecticides have been in use for 20-30 years. If their use is extended for one more year, then the sky will not fall. Given the high prices of fertilizers, fiscal pressure on the government and the window of global export opportunities for Indian farmers and the troubled Food Corporation of India (FCI), it is wise not to make agricultural production more difficult than ever. ), which holds two and a half times more grain than is legally required as a buffer. To meet the needs of African countries, the World Food Program and neighboring Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, FCI can take off its stock quite easily.

Most people love to hate the pesticide industry, marvel at the traces of DDT in mothers’ milk, the toxic residue on grapes and brinjals (eggplant), and the promise of healthy health from organic foods. Most such credible, unconvincing beliefs in the pop culture that led to the demonetisation of chemical pesticides and fertilizers often come from ignorance rather than science.

But thanks to the availability of pesticides, locusts will wipe out large parts of agricultural produce, leaving millions of people starving. In the absence of weed and insecticide chemicals, agricultural production and productivity would be disastrously low. We need insecticides and weed killers to feed a large and growing population.

The point is to use fertilizers and pesticides wisely, to get optimum benefits, and to avoid overuse. Different insecticides have different target sites and different modes of action to repel insects. are neurotoxins; are growth inhibitors; There are desiccators. Among neurotoxins, there are calcium channel blockers and sodium seekers. At different stages of the insect’s development from egg to larva and from pupa to adult, different types of insecticides work in different modes of action. Farmers should be trained on which pesticide to use at what time. Educating farmers about proper use of suitable pesticide at the right time is time consuming and difficult. It is far simpler to ban classes of insecticides, makes better headlines and ESGs matter. But the risk is that the ban could destroy agricultural production, livelihoods and in some cases even lives.

Anytime, that another country has banned a pesticide is not a good reason for India to ban it here. That country cannot grow the crop for which the pesticide in question is important. The pesticide may take longer to break down in cooler temperatures than in a country like India. Before the government decides to ban the chemicals, India-specific studies should be conducted as per India-specific testing protocols. Farmers should be consulted on the availability of viable alternatives.

To make Indian agriculture globally competitive, the pesticide industry must be forced to invest in R&D and adopt the latest technologies. The ongoing food shortage has opened up an opportunity to increase food exports from India. But this does not mean that countries with high restrictions on sanitary and phytosanitary conditions will abandon them. Indian agro-exporters have to meet those criteria, and our pesticide industry has to be wary of this hurdle. Many of the items on the 27-strong list of chemicals proposed to be banned help Indian farmers meet such criteria in importing countries.

Let the Ukraine crisis on the food front end. Let agricultural universities and the research ecosystem develop India-specific testing and standardization protocols for old and new pesticide molecules, conduct those tests and evaluate their results. Keep the ban till then.