Mojito with pesticide, Greenpeace denounces: products banned by the EU are used elsewhere (and return to Europe with limes)

2023-04-27 09:56:46

Evan Swigart from Chicago, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Greenpeace NL recently published a document which highlights the limits of the pesticide policy implemented by the European Union: if on the one hand the European Commission tightens its belt on products that can be used in domestic crops, on the other it pushes for a trade agreement with the Mercosur countries of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay which will increase trade in pesticides, where such strict internal limits do not exist or are more difficult to verify.

This also includes substances banned in the EU itself. European consumers bring these toxins back to their dishes, as residues on fruit and vegetables, as demonstrated by a study carried out by the NGO on Brazilian limes among Dutch wholesalers and 7 other European countries.