Jump to navigation

Pesticides row adds to toxic relations

African parliamentarians have accused European Union economies of exporting carcinogenic pesticides to their countries, adding to mounting tensions over trading rules and migration

Speakers at the joint parliament assembly between the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific in Brussels, on 2 March accused EU countries of double standards by exporting to Africa products containing toxic pesticides which are banned in the EU.

'Our argument is that, if the European Union and Britain are allowing cancer causing pesticides to be manufactured in their own countries, exclusively to be exported to African countries, that's not an act of good faith,' said Gladys Boss Shollei, the Deputy Speaker of Kenya's National Assembly

She said the EU has a trade agreement that protects its people from harmful pesticides but 'has laws that allow the banned chemicals to come into Africa'.

EU rules require that any firm wishing to export chemicals which are banned across the EU-27 needs to produce an 'export notification' detailing the reasons the product is banned, its intended uses and the amount the company intends to ship. National and EU regulators check the documents and issue them to authorities in the destination countries.

This latest row follows rumbling disputes between the organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific states (APC) and the EU over the delay to the ratification of the post-Cotonou treaty between the two blocs. Hungary is threatening to veto the ratification on the grounds that the treaty's provisions on the repatriation of migrants are too weak (AC Vol 64 No 2, Grand ambitions, little money).

'With one EU member state still refusing to accept the new Agreement, we call on the EU Council and the Swedish Council Presidency to not spare any efforts to quickly sign the new agreement,' said the two co-presidents of the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly, Portuguese socialist Carlos Zorrinho and Mozambique lawmaker, Ana Rita Sithole in a joint statement on Friday (3 March).

'The Cotonou Agreement has been extended multiple times. The latest extension will expire at the end of June 2023, leading to a legal gap that would mean that the JPA meetings could no longer take place. Time is running out,' they added.

However, there is no sign of Hungary of dropping its veto. The delay embarrasses EU officials who can see that the failure to ratify the treaty is taken as a sign of bad faith and holds back progress in other areas.



Related Articles

Grand ambitions, little money

After the summits in Brussels and Washington, their big promises will be tested on debt, trade and investment this year

For many of the delegates who travelled to Washington DC for the United States-African leaders' summit on 13-15 December, the first such gathering in eight years, it was...


Big plans for 2014

Despite recent missteps, South Korea's engagement with Africa will increase this year and move beyond natural resources to embrace information technology, communications and markets

New efforts by the Seoul government and by South Korea's private companies aim to widen cooperation with its African partners this year. These new initiatives follow a series...


Big Tech's ethical mining rules thrown into chaos

A row over a scheme to outlaw minerals produced by companies using child labour or financing wars in Central Africa will hit global supply chains

The world's biggest tech companies – including Alphabet, Apple, Samsung and Tesla – buying tin, tungsten and coltan from Central Africa face a supply chain crisis after evidence...


The pandemic's collateral damage

The focus on the coronavirus, coupled with logistical problems, is drawing resources from the fight against Africa’s other serious diseases

Covid-19 is serious enough, but in Africa the unintended consequences of diverting health service resources may be even worse. 'The knock-on effects of Covid-19 on the fight against...


A dangerous wave

There are over 750,000 coronavirus cases in Africa and numbers continue to rise amid concerns that South Africa could prove a harbinger

As the World Health Organization warns of rapidly rising Covid-19 caseloads in Africa, its top official for the continent says that poor and crowded urban areas in South...