[03/August/2009]

By: Mahmoud Assamiee

SANA'A, August 03 (Saba)- Qat tree is behind importing tons of illegal pesticides yearly to the country, said General Manager of Agricultural Guidance Department Dr. Mansour al-Aqel.

He made it clear that Qat consumes 80 percent of imported pesticides while the other 20 percent are used for agricultural crops topped by cucumber. But he affirmed that other agricultural crops (like wheat) do not contain pesticides.

"Yemen uses the less quantities of pesticides (comparing to other countries) and if the country could get rid of Qat tree, pesticides will be finished," said al-Aqel, who shoulders importers and Ministry of Agriculture the responsibility of importing pesticides.

He said that Yemen suffers from illegal accumulated pesticides in stores in some governorates. Despite that the country has spent a lot of money to finish the problem, it is still unsolved and needs cooperation from all concerned bodies.

Pesticides are needed for more production

However, General Manager of Plant Protection Abdullah Al-Sayani said that pesticides are one of important factors of agricultural production. No country can do without them, even the United States, despite its very high techniques used in agricultural sector.

He said the exiting quantities of pesticides are 500 tons and the country yearly needs of pesticides are 1000-1500 tons. "We have faced criticism of importing pesticides and criticism if we imported few quantities because restricting import will lead to import more pesticides illegally."


Illegal pesticides are dangerous problem

"We counted 51 tons of illegal pesticides inside stores in several governorates," said Chairman of Corplife Yemen Organization Dr. Ahmad el-Aghil.

He added that there are even greater quantities have been released legally and illegally, warning that accumulating these pesticides in stores is great and terrible problem and that the new laws issued by the government to ban re-exporting stored and expired pesticides via the country's outlets are making this problem more awful because these laws oppose process of getting rid of these pesticides.

In a workshop organized last Tuesday by CropLife Yemen, in cooperation with Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, el-Aghil made it clear that there are only 17 percent of original pesticides in Yemen and the other types are 46 percent are fake and 37 percent are illegal.

Two weeks ago a team of experts from Corplife organization paid field visits to several stores of pesticides in governorates of Taiz, Amran and Sana'a to evaluate these pesticides and count them. But they could not reach areas which have more stores like Sa'ada for security reasons.

These pesticides are coming to the country via Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Djibouti. Dhamar, Taiz and Dhale'a are the greatest areas contain illegal pesticides because controlling and inspection process are absent in these areas.

Pesticides' stores in populated areas

According to eyewitness who was accompanying CorpLife team in their field visits, there is a store in Taiz containing large quantities of expired pesticides and there is a very bad smell emanating from it. This store is located in populated area where people began suffering chest problems like difficulty of aspiration and some of them are in-patients in nearby hospitals.

This problem is not only found in Taiz, sorrowfully there are many stores in Sho'ub, heavy populated area in the center of the Capital Sana'a. "We have addressed this issue with Mayor of the Capital and governors to distance these stores outside cities," said al-Aqel.

There are also stores of pesticides closed by concerned bodies over accusations of containing illegal pesticides. Some of these stores contain expired pesticides causing very bad smell and health problem in these areas.

"We suggest using these pesticides under sponsorship of the ministry to save the country millions of Rials to import pesticide," said Al-Sayani.

Empty bottles another problem

Because of absence of enlightenment on dealing with empty bottles of pesticides or refills in Yemen, el-Aghil said there are more than 15 million empty bottles counted yearly in the country and there means for getting rid of them are absent.

Observers say that empty bottles pose dangerous effects on the long run, saying that due to backwardness and absence of enlightenment, people in rural areas use these bottles as tools for home use. They use them for carrying water or as containers to house things.

We have suggested distributing burners to farmers, said el-Aghil." We aimed to distribute 500 burners to farmers to get rid of empty bottles. Every farmer can install a burner in his farm and collect these bottles and burn them (inside special barrel assigned to this purpose)."

While experts say these burners are not enough to get rid of effects of these pesticides, el-Aghil said the best way is having great burners with high technology like those existing in industrial countries like France or to be collected and then sent to these countries to be burned.

Dangerous diseases because of pesticides

A recent scientific study on pesticides made by Aden University says that there are more than 118 types of pesticides entering Yemen. All these types are used by Qat farmers for more production.

According to medical tests made by ministry of health, cancer centers and Charitable Society for Cancer Patients, these pesticides are responsible on 70 percent of cancer cases in the country, said the study, indicating that mouth cancer is widely spread in Yemen in contradiction to world statistics.

The study says 92.5 percent of farmers use these and other dangerous pesticides, noting that more than 470 poisonous cases of men and women have been registered in three governorates because of exposing to pesticides wastes in period ranging from one day to several.

The study concluded that pesticides have dangerous effects on the long rang on those who deal with them daily. They cause chronic diseases like cancer, psychological and genetic changes, liver and kidney diseases, in addition to polluting the soil which leads to water pollutions.

Efforts for getting rid of pesticides

After field visits, this workshop was held to discus the problem of storing pesticides and accumulating illegal pesticides in these stores. The workshop gathered all concerned parities dealing with pesticides; importers, officials of Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, security officials, judiciary and officials of Custom Authority to discuss the problem and find solutions to get rid of them.

The ministry is currently implementing many measures to limit pesticides smuggling, said al-Sayani. Smuggling during the recent two years has increased because of monopolizing importing by few companies. Now the door is open for importing pesticides under the ministry's supervision. This helps reduce importation of illegal pesticides.

Meanwhile, el-Aghil argued the government to coordinate efforts with neighboring countries to get rid of these pesticides. He also demanded establishing a court for quick cases to settle the great issues associated with pesticides. There are stores closed by the government because they have illegal pesticides so that having specialized courts will help the country get rid of them.

Concerning the 20 tons of expired pesticides stored in some stores of merchants across the country, he said there is coordination between the organization, the merchants and ministry of agriculture and irrigation to make solutions to this issue, saying there is future program with the ministry to stopped accumulating them. He said that CropLife has closed 400 pesticides factories in China.

However, he stated that Yemen is less country importing pesticides. But the problem is that the farmers use pesticides more on some plants like Qat while pesticides are not used on crops like wheat that is why Yemen's production of such crops still limited.

There are 57 tons of illegal pesticides are stopped by the ministry in Yemeni borders with Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. They must be returned directly to get rid of them, said al-Aqle

He said the Yemeni-Saudi Joint Technical Ministerial Committee approved in its recent meeting they will not allow any pesticides crossing the borders without permission from the ministry.

CropLife International is a global federation representing the plant science industry and a network of regional and national associations in 91 countries.

CropLife Yemen has been established in 2004. It works on educating people on save use of pesticides.