Herbicide abuse: "legal basis exists, but no one enforces it" | Council of Agriculture sends letters to local governments: roadsides, graves, and parks must not be sprayed
Our country's herbicide use ranks among the highest in the world. The Council of Agriculture sent letters to local governments months ago, and will strengthen herbicide management; use is prohibited outside approved scopes, for example roadside slopes, parks, campuses, graves, betel nut orchards and the edges of aquaculture ponds are all prohibited, and violations may be fined under the "Pesticide Management Act" between NT$15,000 and NT$150,000.
Although the Council of Agriculture reiterated the ban, Feng Haidong, deputy director-general of the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine, admitted that the "Pesticide Management Act" long ago stipulated the scope of herbicide use, but "pesticide use management" is a local responsibility, "we have no authority to manage it," and violations must be fined by local governments. At present, only Taipei City and Yilan County in all of Taiwan, China have passed "Herbicide Use Management Self-Governance Ordinances"; other counties and cities have no clear responsible unit, leading to "violations exist, but no one issues fines." How to truly implement herbicide management remains to be tested.
Campuses, parks, roadsides and graves: herbicide use is prohibited in all of them
The approved and registered herbicide use scopes of the Council of Agriculture include: food crops (rice and miscellaneous grain crops), horticultural crops (vegetable gardens and fruit tree orchards), special crops (tea gardens, sugarcane fields, tobacco fields, flax fields and wind-rue fields), forests (afforestation land), flowers (potted roses), turf (Bermuda grass and carpet grass turf) and others (aquatic weeds water hyacinth, non-cultivated farmland weeds and mile-a-minute weed), etc.
Feng Haidong said herbicides must be used within the approved use scope; apart from the above scopes, all others are prohibited. Campuses, roadside slopes, parks and the like are all prohibited. Regarding grave areas where herbicides are heavily used, Feng Haidong said graves also belong to public land, so using herbicides there is illegal.
Only Taipei and Yilan in all of Taiwan, China have a "Herbicide Use Management Self-Governance Ordinance"
At present, only Taipei City and Yilan County in all of Taiwan, China have passed a "Herbicide Use Management Self-Governance Ordinance." Taking Taipei City as an example, it controls at the source, such as selling herbicides only to those with farmer status; pesticides for agricultural use, apart from land used for agricultural production in agricultural zones and protected zones, herbicide use is prohibited in all other areas; end-point control, illegal use of herbicides on non-agricultural land will be punished with doubled penalties.
Xu Yiwen of the Wilderness Protection Association Kaohsiung Branch said the Council of Agriculture issued two official letters in a row this year, requiring county and city governments to comprehensively publicize and penalize the current rampant misuse of herbicides, showing that government agencies have also discovered that herbicides are being used excessively, and it is hoped that the proactive stance of the central competent authority can prompt local governments to proactively enact local self-governance ordinances.
Xu Yiwen gave an example: Yilan County, which was the earliest to enact a local herbicide management ordinance, saw its biggest change in that public departments previously mostly used herbicides for weeding, but after the self-governance ordinance took effect, they have switched to manual weeding. Residents feel less threatened by pesticide contamination, the landscape feels better, and it is also better for the ecology of ditches and streams.
Guo Huaren, professor emeritus of the Department of Agronomy at National Taiwan University, said the central government's reiteration of the scope of herbicide use helps local efforts to promote self-governance ordinances, and it is easier for local governments to act in line with regulations. Guo Huaren said that spraying herbicides indiscriminately in parks, water source areas and roads affects children's health, and even spraying herbicides in water source areas will affect many people who go to collect spring water. In the past, the government regarded weeds as harmful organisms and neglected excessive herbicide use, but now many ecological and environmental issues are involved, and the government should pay more attention.