National Strategy for Agricultural & Veterinary Chemicals - a wish list with no substance

Monday, 20 July 1998 10:00

 "Australia is coming under increasing international and domestic criticism for not providing any evidence to support the claim that programs for minimising the impacts of agricultural and veterinary (agvet) chemicals are effective," said Ms Jo Immig, Toxics Campaigner with Total Environment Centre.
 
"The Strategy certainly doesn't fill us with confidence that the Government has made a serious commitment to addressing pesticide risk reduction. It's close to a 'greenwash' and will harm Australia economically when the weakness of implementation becomes quickly apparent," said Ms Immig.
 
"The claim that Australia produces 'clean-green' produce is supported by minimal data. You have to ask yourself whether the Strategy has been prepared to wave in the faces of our concerned trading partners, or whether it is a genuine commitment to the whole community to finally do something about escalating agvet chemical impacts in Australia".
 
"The Strategy appears to address many of the key issues associated with the management of agvet chemicals but doesn't provide any implementation procedures for ensuring its Vision is realised. There's been no identification of performance indicators and no allocation of resources to make it all happen."
 
"The Government's claim that the Strategy does not seek to be prescriptive is concerning. When you're dealing with reducing the serious impacts of agvet chemicals on health, environment and trade, how can you NOT be prescriptive.The goal posts need to be clearly identified so we all know what we're working towards; it's an issue of equity for all stakeholders."

"Important issues that the strategy fails to address include setting pesticide risk reduction targets; collection of base-line data on the environmental and health impacts of agvet chemicals; community right-to-know regarding pesticide formulations and extent of use throughout the country,"

"There are thousands of community members who are very concerned about the impact of agvet chemicals in Australia. We were all expecting something with a little more substance; not just another Strategy document that will be relegated to the shelves and never realised".