×
European Union stop manufacturing and exporting toxic pesticides banned in the EU
Violet M.
started this petition to
European Union Commission
Petition
to European States to Stop this Act of Genocide Against Kenyans and other
Africans!
We, members of the
Errant Natives Movement, note with grave concern that companies in your country
have continued to export to Kenya highly hazardous agrochemicals that have been
killing thousands of people in the country. We note with much consternation
that your governments have continued to approve the exportation of pesticides
and herbicides which they have banned for use at home and in the entire
European Union. Why, we ask, do your governments allow this to happen?
We need not say that this practice creates
double standards, it also speaks of a clear act of racism and genocide.
A Racist Act,
In its widest sense, racism denotes discrimination or prejudice based on race, color,
descent, or origin, leading to unequal treatment, exclusion, or disadvantage,
often embedded in systems that, among other things, make such decisions. What your governments have been practicing is institutional racism, in that they have deliberately allowed
very harmful products to be sold to “lesser” societies away from Europe. This
is racism in its true colours because it talks of a deliberate and overt organizational effort to deny Kenyans and other nationals in
the Global South equal enjoyment of life, health and a good environment. In
this regard, we note that your countries and the United Kingdom approved the exportation of a total
of 140,908 tonnes of pesticides in 2018-2019 knowing so well that they are
banned from being applied in European farms or fields because of unacceptable
health and environmental risks.
Furthermore, we note that European corporations like the German
companies, Bayer and BASF sell pesticide products locally in Kenya and other
countries with active ingredients banned in the EU.
The five largest pesticide companies –including Bayer, BASF, and Syngenta – already generate more than one-third of their pesticide sales from active ingredients classified by the Pesticide Action Network (PAN) as highly hazardous. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) present particularly high levels of acute or chronic hazards to humans and the environment. For this reason, many of these pesticides are no longer authorized for use in the European Union.
An Act of Genocide We condemn, in the strongest terms possible, this act of genocide. Exporting banned pesticides to Kenya and elsewhere in the Global South, has led to deaths of tens of thousands of people and externalizes the health problems and very negative environmental impacts of these hazardous substances on the most vulnerable people. This is because scientific research has confirmed the adverse effects of pesticides, proving a definitive link between exposure and human diseases or conditions and harm to the ecosystem. In this regard, we note that according to the National Cancer Institute of Kenya, more than 32,000 people die of cancer each year while new cancer cases has been over 47,000. We refer to numerous studies and systematic reviews which have established a strong correlation between exposure to highly hazardous pesticides manufactured in Europe and the increased risk of developing various types of cancer. For instance, a review of cancer studies done by the National Library of Medicine, world’s largest biomedical library, found out that most studies on non-Hodgkin lymphoma and leukemia showed positive associations with pesticide exposure. Some showed dose-response relationships, and a few were able to identify specific pesticides. In addition, children’s and pregnant women’s exposure to pesticides was positively associated with the cancers studied in some studies, as was parents’ exposure to pesticides at work. Further, many studies showed positive associations between pesticide exposure and solid tumours while the most consistent associations were found for brain and prostate cancer as well as between kidney cancer in children and their parents’ exposure to pesticides at work. In this regard, the exportation of the highly hazardous pesticides manufactured in Europe has brought not only deaths of tens of thousands of people but mass suffering in the country. To the Errant Natives Movement, this is an act of genocide!
We refer to the UN Convention on Genocide which defines it as the deliberate and systematic destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. We acknowledge that whether the target is the whole African racial group or a part of it does not really matter. What matters is that the act of shipping highly hazardous agrochemicals here is carried out with the clear intent to kill Kenyans and other Africans. Genocide, we note, does not merely encompass acts such as killing, inflicting grievous bodily or mental harm, but also imposing life-threatening conditions or preventing births. We are convinced that the deliberate shipping these dangerous chemicals here meets the level of proof required to define it as an act of genocide.
In this regard, we note that European Countries allowed the manufacturing and deliberately exportation to Kenya and other countries in the Global South, 122,000 tons of extremely lethal chemicals they have already banned at home precisely because they are known to cause death. This raises profoundly disturbing questions. It is a conscious act of genocide. When your countries knowingly produce substances they refuse to expose their own populations to, and ship them instead to Kenya and the rest of Africa with full awareness of their deadly effects, the connection to genocide becomes impossible to ignore. Indeed, under the 1948 Genocide Convention, an act qualifies as genocide when there is a demonstrable intention to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. This intent cannot be explained away as negligence or recklessness. It emerges from a profit-driven, meticulously organized system that treats African lives as expendable. If harmful chemicals are manufactured, exported, and allowed to spread across African soil and water with full knowledge of their lethal consequences, this is the very definition of genocide. That knowledge, that intent, and that selective targeting is what makes the question of genocide not just plausible, but urgent. And this is not the first time Europeans have targeted Africans for total elimination. It has historical precedence in the form of mass enslavement of Africans and genocides that punctuated European colonialisation of the continent. We cannot forget how European states deliberately infected, and spread diseases such as smallpox into the continent.
A Human Rights Issue The exposure, companies in Europe have been subjecting Kenyans to by shipping into the country highly hazardous pesticides prevents the people from the enjoyment of human rights in the country. We note this in particular regard to the right to safe and adequate food, as well as the right to health. The right to food obligates countries and governments across the world to implement protective measures and food safety requirements and to ensure that food is safe, free from pesticides and is qualitatively adequate. We submit that this obligation extends to European jurisdictions because the relevant European countries are parties to the Basel Convention that prohibits the exportation of hazardous substances. So, they have a legal obligation to prevent the exportation of pesticides they have banned to Kenya and other countries in the Global South. Furthermore, according to the 2017 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, human rights standards require States to protect vulnerable groups, such as farm workers and agricultural communities, children and pregnant women from the impacts of pesticides
Our Demands
In this regard, we demand the following:
1. A legal ban that will permanently outlaw the exportation of pesticides not approved in the EU to Kenya.
2. Compensation to families that have lost some of their members to diseases proved to have been caused by the highly hazardous chemicals and other people who are sick because of exposure to these chemicals.
3. That the European Union sets up a fund to facilitate the following
a) A grand mopping up of all these chemicals from distribution centers, wholesale and retail outlets across the country:
b) The cleaning up of surface water courses (I.e. rivers and lakes) and soils destroyed by these chemicals
4. That the European Union adheres to the Basel Convention by prohibiting the exportation of hazardous substances to Kenya and that it adheres to the legal obligation to do so.
5. That the European Union and the United Kingdom commit in writing in a national newspaper and mainstream TV and Radio Stations, the steps it has taken, and is in the process of taking in the next 90 days failure to which we will institute other courses of action.
The five largest pesticide companies –including Bayer, BASF, and Syngenta – already generate more than one-third of their pesticide sales from active ingredients classified by the Pesticide Action Network (PAN) as highly hazardous. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) present particularly high levels of acute or chronic hazards to humans and the environment. For this reason, many of these pesticides are no longer authorized for use in the European Union.
An Act of Genocide We condemn, in the strongest terms possible, this act of genocide. Exporting banned pesticides to Kenya and elsewhere in the Global South, has led to deaths of tens of thousands of people and externalizes the health problems and very negative environmental impacts of these hazardous substances on the most vulnerable people. This is because scientific research has confirmed the adverse effects of pesticides, proving a definitive link between exposure and human diseases or conditions and harm to the ecosystem. In this regard, we note that according to the National Cancer Institute of Kenya, more than 32,000 people die of cancer each year while new cancer cases has been over 47,000. We refer to numerous studies and systematic reviews which have established a strong correlation between exposure to highly hazardous pesticides manufactured in Europe and the increased risk of developing various types of cancer. For instance, a review of cancer studies done by the National Library of Medicine, world’s largest biomedical library, found out that most studies on non-Hodgkin lymphoma and leukemia showed positive associations with pesticide exposure. Some showed dose-response relationships, and a few were able to identify specific pesticides. In addition, children’s and pregnant women’s exposure to pesticides was positively associated with the cancers studied in some studies, as was parents’ exposure to pesticides at work. Further, many studies showed positive associations between pesticide exposure and solid tumours while the most consistent associations were found for brain and prostate cancer as well as between kidney cancer in children and their parents’ exposure to pesticides at work. In this regard, the exportation of the highly hazardous pesticides manufactured in Europe has brought not only deaths of tens of thousands of people but mass suffering in the country. To the Errant Natives Movement, this is an act of genocide!
We refer to the UN Convention on Genocide which defines it as the deliberate and systematic destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. We acknowledge that whether the target is the whole African racial group or a part of it does not really matter. What matters is that the act of shipping highly hazardous agrochemicals here is carried out with the clear intent to kill Kenyans and other Africans. Genocide, we note, does not merely encompass acts such as killing, inflicting grievous bodily or mental harm, but also imposing life-threatening conditions or preventing births. We are convinced that the deliberate shipping these dangerous chemicals here meets the level of proof required to define it as an act of genocide.
In this regard, we note that European Countries allowed the manufacturing and deliberately exportation to Kenya and other countries in the Global South, 122,000 tons of extremely lethal chemicals they have already banned at home precisely because they are known to cause death. This raises profoundly disturbing questions. It is a conscious act of genocide. When your countries knowingly produce substances they refuse to expose their own populations to, and ship them instead to Kenya and the rest of Africa with full awareness of their deadly effects, the connection to genocide becomes impossible to ignore. Indeed, under the 1948 Genocide Convention, an act qualifies as genocide when there is a demonstrable intention to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. This intent cannot be explained away as negligence or recklessness. It emerges from a profit-driven, meticulously organized system that treats African lives as expendable. If harmful chemicals are manufactured, exported, and allowed to spread across African soil and water with full knowledge of their lethal consequences, this is the very definition of genocide. That knowledge, that intent, and that selective targeting is what makes the question of genocide not just plausible, but urgent. And this is not the first time Europeans have targeted Africans for total elimination. It has historical precedence in the form of mass enslavement of Africans and genocides that punctuated European colonialisation of the continent. We cannot forget how European states deliberately infected, and spread diseases such as smallpox into the continent.
A Human Rights Issue The exposure, companies in Europe have been subjecting Kenyans to by shipping into the country highly hazardous pesticides prevents the people from the enjoyment of human rights in the country. We note this in particular regard to the right to safe and adequate food, as well as the right to health. The right to food obligates countries and governments across the world to implement protective measures and food safety requirements and to ensure that food is safe, free from pesticides and is qualitatively adequate. We submit that this obligation extends to European jurisdictions because the relevant European countries are parties to the Basel Convention that prohibits the exportation of hazardous substances. So, they have a legal obligation to prevent the exportation of pesticides they have banned to Kenya and other countries in the Global South. Furthermore, according to the 2017 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, human rights standards require States to protect vulnerable groups, such as farm workers and agricultural communities, children and pregnant women from the impacts of pesticides
Our Demands
In this regard, we demand the following:
1. A legal ban that will permanently outlaw the exportation of pesticides not approved in the EU to Kenya.
2. Compensation to families that have lost some of their members to diseases proved to have been caused by the highly hazardous chemicals and other people who are sick because of exposure to these chemicals.
3. That the European Union sets up a fund to facilitate the following
a) A grand mopping up of all these chemicals from distribution centers, wholesale and retail outlets across the country:
b) The cleaning up of surface water courses (I.e. rivers and lakes) and soils destroyed by these chemicals
4. That the European Union adheres to the Basel Convention by prohibiting the exportation of hazardous substances to Kenya and that it adheres to the legal obligation to do so.
5. That the European Union and the United Kingdom commit in writing in a national newspaper and mainstream TV and Radio Stations, the steps it has taken, and is in the process of taking in the next 90 days failure to which we will institute other courses of action.
Posted
(Updated )
Report this as inappropriate
There was an error when submitting your files and/or report.