Developing Nations Account For 99 Percent Deaths Due To Pesticides: FAO report
Food & Agriculture Organisation (the agriculture arm of the United Nations) has launched its report on 20th June titled “More People, More Food, and Worse Water?” A global review of water pollution from agriculture. It includes some very serious investigations.
Water contamination from unsustainable rural practices represents a serious hazard to human well-being and the planet's biological inhabitants, an issue frequently belittled by policymakers and farmers’. The latest report by Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO) alerts for the same.
In most of the nations, the greatest wellspring of water contamination today is not urban communities or industry, it is believed to be agribusiness. While across the globe, the most well-known concoction contaminant found in groundwater aquifers is nitrate coming from cultivating or farming, according to “More People, More Food, and Worse Water?” A global review of water pollution from agriculture, launched by FAO and the International Water Management Institute at a conference in Tajikistan on 22nd June this month.
According to the said report, modern-day agriculture has been held responsible for the large quantities of agrochemicals, organic matter, sediments and saline trading into water bodies.
The report also hints at the effect of pollution on billions of people which also generates annual costs that exceed billions of dollars.
The introductory part of the report starts with a bang on agriculture practices. Eduardo Mansur, Director of FAO's Land and Water Division, and Claudia Sadoff, International Water Management Institute (IWMI) Director-General, in their introduction to the report write-up categorically writes "Agriculture is the single largest producer of wastewater, by volume and livestock generates far more excreta than do humans. As land use has intensified, countries have greatly increased the use of synthetic pesticides, fertilizers, and other inputs." Both continued, "While these inputs have helped boost food production, they have also given rise to environmental threats, as well as to potential human health concerns."
The agro-toxins of most notable worry for human safety are pathogens from pet animals, pesticides, nitrates in groundwater, follow metallic components and rising contaminations, including anti-infection agents and anti-microbial safe qualities discharged by animals.
The new report speaks to the most far-reaching assessment of the distributed logical writing on the issue consented to date, and intends to round data holes and spread out arrangement and homestead level arrangements in one solidified reference.
The report blames post Second World War agriculture revolution based on intensive use of chemical-based pesticides and fertilisers. The report describes that since 1960 the use of mineral fertiliser in the world has grown more than 10 times. It also claims that use of pesticides also busted charts from one billion USD to 35 billion USD. The repo even targets organic farming ways and says, “Water pollution by organic matter from livestock farming is now significantly more widespread than organic pollution from urban areas."
The eye-opener report also targets the booming segment for developing aquaculture market of developing and some developed nations. It says, “Aquaculture (which has expanded twenty-fold since 1980) is now releasing ever greater amounts of fish excreta, uneaten feed, antibiotics, fungicides and anti-fouling agents into surface waters."
While the report speaks about few corrective measures it has also highlighted some quantifiable information as-
