Jammu, Apr 03 (KNS): B D Chowdhary Field Officer (Technical) of “We The Human”, a public trust, Tuesday informed that excessive use of toxic chemical pesticides, insecticides, fungicides, herbicides, fertilizers in few areas of Jammu like Arnia, Vijaypur, Top, Phalla Mandal, Dattryal, Badyal Brahmna by farmers hailing from outside J&K should be immediately stopped and all such vegetables produced using heavy sprays of toxic chemicals should be got checked by field officers of Agriculture Department and Food Safety Organization.
According to the statement issued to KNS, in case of positive tests, all such vegetables with toxic chemical residues, above permissible levels, should be destroyed before reaching the local markets.
“This also becomes prime duty of all Food Safety Organization officers to check vegetables and fruits arriving in various markets and destroy them in case of toxicity found, before these are consumed by the public, which may cause cancer or serious diseases involving vital organs like stomach, kidney, lever, lungs. Consumption of adulterated food, fruits and vegetables laden with pesticides, environmental pollution are the major risk factor for cancers,” he said.
Chowdhary further informed that due to high biological activity and, in certain cases, long persistence in our environment, pesticides cause undesirable effects to human health and to environment. “Farmers are also exposed to high levels of pesticides, usually much greater than those of consumers,” he said.
He said that farmers who perform manual labor in areas treated with pesticides face major exposure from direct spray, drift from neighboring fields, or by contact with pesticide residues on the crop or soil. This kind of exposure is often underestimated and is main reason for upsurge in cancer cases in J&K during last one decade, especially among vegetables producing farmers and apple orchards workers.
Earlier, a team of experts from ‘We The Human’ and Mapple Orgtech (I) Ltd.Click Here To Follow Our WhatsApp Channelfrom Ludhiana, as part of its campaign “Clean Environment Green Environment”, gave a number of live demonstrations for conversion of kitchen/ garden and other bio degradable wastes using EM (Effective Micro Organism Japanese Technology).
Manoj Goutam and B D Chowdhary along with other members of the trust demonstrated technique for source segregation of the daily waste into bio degradable and non bio degradable wastes.
Non biodegradable wastes usually comprising of plastic, metallic goods, glass items, polythene etc. should be sent to local junks traders for recycling purpose and biodegradable wastes comprising of all kitchen wastes, raw/ cooked food, peels of fruits & vegetables, garden wastes should be put to conversion into organic manure (black gold) by using EM (Effective Micro Organism Japanese Technology). Live demonstrations were given by the experts in campus of 14th Bn. of J&K Armed Police, IRP 19th Bn., Rajender Park Canal Road Jammu and J&K Government Seed Farm at village Chakrohi in R S Pura, biodegradable wastes were got converted into organic manure.
Prem Singh, a veteran social activist and founder member of the trust made an appeal to Chief Minister of the state to declare an effective incentive policy for all agriculturists/ orchardists of the state who either have shifted or aspire to shift to traditional systems of agricultural farming or zero budget farming.
Special incentives should be declared for entrepreneurs and traders who wish to manufacture or open up sales outlets for organic agricultural inputs and microbial composting culture.
The government should also immediately take concrete measures for either complete ban of sale as well as manufacturing of plastic/ polythene bags or should set up a pulverization plant for recycling of the polythene/ plastic waste, which is a great threat not only to our environment, but also to stray cows or other animals. (KNS)