2024-08-15 16:11:19
| Marcelo Camargo / Agência Brasil
Law 14,785/2023, known as the “Poison Package”, is the subject of an Unconstitutional Direct Action (ADI) filed, this Wednesday (14/8), Anti-Pollution Day, at the Federal Supreme Court (STF) by PSOL, Rede Sustentabilidade, PT, Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT) and the National Confederation of Salaried and Rural Workers (Contar). The initiative has technical and legal support from socio-environmental organizations and popular movements.
The act shows that the rule violates, by weakening the regulation of pesticides, constitutional principles that guide public administration, such as legality and efficiency, and the rights to an ecologically fair environment, health, indigenous people, a dignified life, the consumer, of. children and young people, among others. The authors of the ADI require that unconstitutionality be recognized before the trial of the activity is carried out, through a precautionary measure.
Jakeline Pivato, from the Permanent Campaign against Pesticides and For Life, explains that the law goes against the very real health and environmental needs that organized civil society has historically expressed.
“It is about making the law more flexible, making it unable to protect people and the environment, encouraging death. Historically, the impact of pesticides in Brazil has been criticized by movements, organizations and civil society The Poison Package Law brings even more dangerous products to the head already a tragic reality. healthy, sustainable environment and the health of the Brazilian population. In this sense, we continue to fight to confirm its unconstitutionality”, says Pivato.
Flexibility of the law
Law 14,785/2023 represents a profound change to the previous legislation, Law 7,802/1989. In the old legislation, it was the duty of the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (Mapa), the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) and the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama) to carry out assessments jointly, based on technical. criteria and scientific, in relation to release or veto the registration of pesticides. In the new standard, Mapa, a department strongly influenced by agribusiness, became the exclusive task of apportionment. The other bodies are only responsible for further review.
Former senator Blairo Maggi (PP-MT), known as the “soy king”, authored the bill that led to the current “Poison Package” law. The project included intense lobbying from agribusiness and efforts from the Parliamentary Agricultural Fund (FPA). The main argument was whether the regulations needed to be updated, as the legislation in force at the time would prevent the approval of new records.
However, despite this argument, Brazil has seen an increasing scale of pesticide authorization in recent years. Until the year in which the “Poison Package” was approved, 2023, there were 555 new registrations.
A direction contrary to the global trend
In addition to centralizing the registration release process on Mapa, the new law has a more vague definition of the criteria for vetoing registrations of pesticides with a higher level of toxicity, as well as revoking a set of rules on environmental fees that pay and with exemption. from registration of pesticides for export purposes, among other measures.
“[A Lei] to go against the global trend to limit and ban this type of toxic substance, increases the risk of environmental and human contamination, increases the risk of cancer incidence and other acute and chronic diseases related to the exposure of the Brazilian population to pesticides, “contaminates ecosystems in the different biomes of Brazil and endangers rural workers above all and goes against the principles of prevention, precaution, agro-ecology and sustainable development”, states the document filed yesterday.
Aerial spraying of pesticides in Pedro de Toledo, Vale do Ribeira (SP) | Maurício de Carvalho Nogueira / ISAI impacts on health and the environment
At the time Congress approved the bill, Anvisa highlighted in a statement that the measure, if implemented, would “endanger the life of Brazil”. Ibama classified the bill as a “flagship socio-environmental rollback”.
During the process, other public bodies, national and international authorities, rights and social control councils and bodies of the Justice System, such as UN Special Rapporteurs, the National Rights Council and the National Cancer Institute (Inca) made the proposal deny and deny and deny. ).
Since 2011, Brazil has topped the ranking of countries that use the most pesticides. In 2022 alone, more pesticides were applied here than the combined amount of the United States and China – a total of 800 thousand tons, according to FAO/UN. Between 2010 and 2019, the Ministry of Health recorded the poisoning of 56,870 people by pesticides in the country.
“Taking into account the significant underreporting in these cases, about 1 in 50, the number could be much higher, reaching 2.843 million people poisoned by pesticides in the country”, the act states. The authors also emphasize the high risk associated with the registration and use of pesticides with carcinogenic potential.
The ADI also emphasizes the link between the use of pesticides and the production of commodities, such as soybeans and corn, and not in a generic way with the food of Brazilian families, as is present in the agribusiness discourse. Another highlight is the impact on the environment. “It is already widely documented that this type of agricultural production causes deforestation and therefore contributes to GHG emissions. [gases de efeito-estufa]”, emphasize the authors.
“The Direct Action of Unconstitutionality drawn up by political parties in collaboration with civil society organizations and social movements brings fair and necessary measures”, says Suely Araújo, public policy coordinator at the Climate Observatory. .
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