Conference of parties to Stockholm Convention begins in Geneva on April 25 The Kerala government will press the Centre to adopt a stand in favour of a global ban on the production and use of Endosulfan at a conference of parties to the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants beginning in Geneva on April 25. Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan said here on Monday that he would soon write to the Centre demanding...

The world will be watching India as the conference of parties to the Stockholm Convention meet in Geneva from April 25 to 29 to discuss, among other things, a global ban on the pesticide endosulfan. India was the only member country to take a stand against the ban at the Sixth Meeting of the Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee to the Convention that recommended the ban last year. Domestic opposition to India's...

Evidence is mounting on the ill-effects of Endosulfan sprayed on cashew plantations in Kasaragod district, even as the Union government continues to be ambivalent on the issue. A survey done by the Health Department has identified nearly 4,000 victims after screening 16,000. The household survey and the screening done in 11 affected panchayats during December and January identified 3,937 victims, besides 336 in nearby panchayats. The numbers are likely to go...

As the demand for a ban on Endosulfan in India is gaining pitch and Karnataka being the latest state to ban the pesticide, the Pesticide Manufacturers and Formulators Association of India (PMFAI) is going around crying foul. They are leaving no stone unturned to save endosulfan. Press meets across the country and plugged newspaper reports maligning studies that have indicted endosulfan in the past is a desperate attempt to save...

Twice every year, between 1981 and 2000, a helicopter would whirr around the hills of the Western Ghats in Kasargod, a district in north Kerala bordering Karnataka, spraying endosulfan over the cashew plantations on the upper reaches. Children would rush out to take a look at the helicopter and the white spray would settle like mist on their heads and on leaves and shimmer in the sunlight. But that’s also...