JEDDAH, 17 June 2006 — The hazards of consuming fruit and vegetables are increasing with the indiscriminate use of pesticides and other toxic substances in local farms.
Unscrupulous farmers display scant regard for human health when they harvest their produce before the stipulated interval after pesticide application, consumers and officials say. The interval is needed for the breakdown of the toxic contents of pesticides, according to Al-Madinah newspaper.
Abu Humaidan, a farmer in Madinah, explained the difficulty involved in keeping the interval between the pesticide spraying and harvesting. “It is because some pesticides require 10 days while some others 21 days after application for the fruit or vegetable to be safe for human consumption. In the meantime, vegetables, such as cucumber, ladyfinger or pumpkin, may over-ripen or decay and become unfit for the market, resulting in our total loss,” Humaidan said.
Abu Badr, another large-scale vegetable farmer, agreed. He said the long interval between the pesticide application and harvest would only increase the chances of our missing profitable markets.
Fruit and vegetable vendor Nur said he did not know whether the produce he sold had any toxic content because he had no access to the method the farmers were following.
But Abdul Hakim Hussein, a Bangladeshi farm hand, admitted that the workers never follow any guidelines while preparing the pesticides for spraying. “Neither did we wait for the prescribed number of days before harvesting to ensure the crop is safe. We believe that all poison will disappear when the vegetables are cooked,” he said.
Hassan Sanguf, an expert at the Agriculture Ministry’s office in Makkah, said the ministry stipulates that pesticide manufacturers should provide the directions of use and specify the interval to be observed before the crops could be harvested apart from explaining the method of its application.
Consumers have urged the concerned authorities to punish the violators of the regulations. They have also called for establishing laboratories to check the toxic level in fruit and vegetables sold in markets.
