The Stockholm Convention, scheduled to be held in Geneva on April 25-29, is expected to take a final call, on whether Endosulfan can remain in use globally or will cease to exist, even as manufacturers and farmers in India, China and Brazil oppose any such ban.
The Convention had categorised Endosulfan as a persistent organic pollutant (PoP) in 2010 and if this decision is ratified now, the countries across the world will be bound to ban the pesticide.
The Stockholm Convention on PoP is an international environmental treaty, signed in 2001 and effective from May 2004, that aims to eliminate or restrict the production and use of POPs.
In India, the issue has gathered a renewed momentum with the meeting between an all-party delegation from Kerala and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last week.
The government had been constantly reiterating that the insecticide had no harmful effects on human lives, while its manufacturers had urged a ban might impoverish the farmers, affecting the growth of agriculture adversely.
Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh had said Endosulfan would be nationally banned if its adverse effect on health was proved. Kerala and Karnataka have already banned Endosulfan.
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Endosulfan formulators and manufacturers in India allege that the move to ban its use is a conspiracy by the EU and US to push in their costly products in India, as Indian companies manufacture and sell almost 70 per cent of the global production of Endosulfan. The remaining 30 per cent is shared between Brazilian and Israel-based companies.
“The truth is that the original manufacturer of Endosulfan, a German company, has not supported its new registration because it had a competing high priced product ready. Due to this, many European countries had stopped the use of Endosulfan. But there is no ban, as is being claimed. This is a conspiracy by multinational crop protection companies to push their costly products in India by the raising the bogey of health concerns,” said Pradeep Dave, president, Pesticide Manufacturers and Formulators Association of India.
One litre of Endosulfan is priced at Rs 286, while its alternatives are priced between Rs 2,000 and Rs 13,000 a litre.
A study done by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) had found high levels of endosulfan pesticide in Padre village of Kerala in 2001.
Dave alleged that the European Union has provided financial support to CSE for one of the projects called 'Policy Research and Awareness Creation in the field of Environmental health Interface and Development of An Alternative Pollution Monitoring System' from 2000-2006.