Press releases
Food Authority EFSA published this week its pesticide residue monitoring report (data for 2016) on the level of contamination of vegetables and fruit in European food outlets[1]. The percentage of multiple residues in consumed European vegetables and fruit increased again to the extreme high rate of 30,1 % as the graph below shows. Almost 1 in 3 of all fruit/vegetable-products sold in Europe contain more than one pesticide contaminant.
The Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Europe, Nature et Progrès Belgique, WeMove.EU and SumofUs today officially applied before the Court of Justice of the European Union for joining the legal challenge initiated by the Brussels Region against the European Commission over the decision to renew the authorisation licence for glyphosate, the world’s most-selling herbicide.
Europeans and the environment will continue to be exposed to pesticides that cause endocrine-related diseases to humans, animals and wildlife, according to this week’s Commission’s proposal. The proposal is an amendment to the regulation of Endocrine Disrupting (ED) pesticides (1107/2009, Annex II 3.6.5. and 3.8.2) to introduce the unrealistic and dangerous concept of ‘negligible risk’ and increase the presence of these harmful substances in our food by hundreds or thousand times.
Yesterday, EU Member States were asked for the second time to vote on the ban of malathion, diquat, thiram and pymetrozine in an appeal committee. The European Commission was obliged to have this second round of votes as too many Member States were opposing a ban on these highly toxic substances despite the negative opinions provided by the European Food Safety Authority. A second ‘no-opinion’ vote was obtained.
Working with nature and “many little hammers”: PAN Europe today has published an updated edition of its report on alternative to glyphosate as a contribution to the ongoing discussions among some Member States, led by France, on phasing out glyphosate and promoting alternatives.
This year’s Bee Week in the European Parliament has been the occasion for the agroindustry to make sure the real solutions needed to support the beekeeping sector have not been discussed.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has today published a number of reports looking at whether the granting of ‘emergency’ use derogations for neonicotinoids by some EU Member States to their farmers in 2017 was justified. The reports have been published in the run up to Bee Week, an event co-organised by EFSA aimed at designing a better future for bees and pollinators.
In today’s meeting from the EU agricultural ministers, Slovenia will be triggering a discussion on how to step up the protection of EU bees and other pollinators.
The European Commission has published today its legislative proposals and its impact assessment on CAP reform. Within the hundreds of pages of documents, pesticide use reduction is not mentioned once!
Today, the European Parliament has adopted an own initiative report "The Future of Food and Farming" (Rapporteur DORFMANN, EPP) as a contribution to the forthcoming reform of the European Common Agricultural Policy, meant to be released Friday.
PAN Europe welcomes the EP’s emphasis on pesticide use reduction, which was conspicuously absent in version of the CAP legislative proposals seen so far.
