Pesticides are essential for successful food production, and thus farmers need them to grow safe, healthy food. Without them, they would lose a significant portion of their food crops, leading to food waste and increased costs of the available food following the decreased supply of produce to the markets.
Today, a wide range of synthetic products have been developed to give much safer, more targeted and effective control of pests and diseases. However, the inappropriate application of these pesticides is very common, causing health issues and in some cases fatalities. For instance, there is a growing worldwide concern over the toxicological hazards caused by agricultural pesticides to humans, and the environment at large in Kenya, and the developing countries at large.
The following are some of the factors that contribute to the increased the unsafe and indiscriminate of pesticides, which has led to increased human health problems;
- Illiteracy levels: This is a major cause of inappropriate usage of pesticides in most of the farming areas within the country. Farmers seek advice from neighboring farmers, who may not be agricultural experts or choose to venture into crop farming following some experience they got from another farmer. Besides, some farmers may choose to employ illiterate persons, because they provide cheap labour. For instance, the farmers may not be able to read the instructions provided on the pesticide label.
- Unhealthy and poor practices: Farmers do not follow the recommendations regarding safe usage of pesticides. For instance, some farmers think that if the recommended rate of application for a certain pesticide is doubled, the pesticide would be more effective, others mix pesticides with naked hands, and some use empty pesticide containers as utensils for other purposes in the house.
- Unsafe storage practices: Most farmers do not ensure safe storage for their pesticides on their farms. For instance, the pesticides could be left lying anywhere on the farm, instead of keeping them in separate locked stores.
- Failure to read instructions: Most farmers hardly read the instructions on the pesticide label. These include directions of application and the post-harvest intervals.
- Lack of adequate trainings on safe use of pesticides: Farmers hardly get sufficient trainings on how to safely and efficiently handle and use pesticides. Therefore, they do it in the manner that they think is right, which in most cases is not.
- Poor utilization of PPE: Most farmers hardly use personal protective equipment (PPE) like aprons, gloves, gumboots and masks. They rarely adopt precautionary measures while applying pesticides.
- Unconcerned agrochemical companies: Although their main goal is to sell their products, they also play a crucial role in the provision of agricultural information. However, most of them do not, while others have representatives who should help farmers, but they are usually very reluctant to take up their duties and responsibilities.
Conclusion
Pesticides can have negative effects on human health if they are not handled in the right way. For instance, human exposure to pesticides can result in a number of harmful effects depending on the type of pesticide and duration of exposure, like headaches, excessive salivation, nausea, diarrhea, respiratory depression, seizures, and loss of consciousness. Therefore the adoption and application of safety measures are necessary to avoid the detrimental effects of pesticides. That is, the right balance between the need to increase food production with the need to ensure the safety of people, food and the environment should be struck.
Recommendations
- The government should provide educational (both formal and informal) and training programs on the safe use of pesticides in order to upgrade the skills and expertise of the farmers.
- Farmers (especially the literate ones) should stop being ignorant- they should ensure that they carefully read and understand the instructions provided on or alongside the pesticides before application.
- Farmers who employ other people to take care of their farms should ensure that they are present at least during pesticide applications (if they must employ illiterate persons). They should also guide them on how to handle the pesticides especially on storage and observation of the re-entry and post-harvest intervals.
- Agrochemical companies should take part in capacity building of farmers by enhancing their knowledge, introducing new technologies and replacing the old and wrong practices with new and better ones, among other practices that contribute to sustainable agriculture.
