Australia’s agricultural watchdog is under renewed criticism over its stance on a controversial farming product allegedly linked to Parkinson’s disease, after it was banned in a US state.
Paraquat is a herbicide widely used in Australia for no-tillage farming despite being banned by the courts or regulators in 70 countries including the UK and Europe.
China, the world’s biggest manufacturer of the product, has even limited its use domestically where the highly-toxic chemical has been blamed for 5000 poisoning deaths per year.
Last week the Governor of Vermont in the US signed a bill banning the weedkiller, noting “exposure substantially increases the risk of Parkinson’s disease … non-Hodgkin lymphoma and childhood leukaemia”.
Vermont was the first US state to introduce a ban but several others are currently considering outright prohibitions or limitations on the product.
The move saw Independent Senator David Pocock grill Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicine (APVMA) chief Peter Hansen during an estimates hearing on Thursday.
Mr Pocock asked how the regulator was still assessing paraquat almost 30 years after it first started investigations into the product in 1997, before listing a range of nations that have already acted.
“My understanding was that APVMA was finally, after 28 years of whatever it was, to make a decision last year,” the ACT Senator asked. “That hasn’t happened?”
Mr Hansen said the report had been delayed due to new findings from the US Environmental Protection Agency, regarding paraquat’s “volatility of the chemical in the field”.
He said the review into paraquat had been “constantly evolving” over the decades and there had been “numerous milestones along the way”.
Mr Pocock asked if the chemical was now believed to be more “volatile” – meaning it turned into gas more readily – whether the APVMA was “confident that this is actually safe for humans”.
“If we didn’t think it was safe, we wouldn’t be looking to make a decision that would allow it to continue to be used,” Mr Hansen replied. “If we thought it wasn’t safe, we would be making a decision that looks to ban it … if it was imminent and urgent we would have taken actions already.”
Mr Pocock then argued Australians would “be concerned” that the APVMA was reviewing the product for three decades while other nations had banned it, reading out a list of nations across Europe, Asia and Africa. “This all while you’re reviewing this herbicide,” he said. “Is that not concerning that we can have a 30 year review of a herbicide that in the meantime is being banned left, right and centre, including by a whole range of countries in West Africa that I assume don’t have the resources that the APVMA would have available to you?”
Agricultural giant Syngenta recently announced it would end its global production of paraquat by the end of June after facing thousands of lawsuits over the herbicide.
Australia’s farming lobby the National Farmers Federation (NFF) has pushed back against proposals to change paraquat use here, saying in a 2024 submission to the APVMA it would “have a significant and adverse impact on the agricultural sector, rendering the use of the chemicals impractical or ineffective in many circumstances”.
“In essence, in addition to protecting crops from yield losses, paraquat and diquat products allow farmers to improve soil health, minimise machinery usage, retain soil moisture, and reduce erosion,” it argued. “That is, farmers use these chemicals to achieve additional and positive environmental impacts and productivity gains.”
The NFF noted the APVMA had previously concluded evidence did “not support the claim that there is a growing body of evidence indicating a causal link between exposure to paraquat and the development of Parkinson’s disease”.
NFF president Hamish McIntyre said in a statement on Monday farmers relied on the independent and science-based APVMA “to determine which products they can use and how to use them safely”. “Farmers are not scientists or medical experts, and that’s why the role of the independent regulator is so important,” he said. “The APVMA independently reviews the latest scientific evidence from Australia, and around the world, against our unique Australian conditions. Farmers take chemical use very seriously and need to abide by strict PPE guidelines.”
The Australian published a story on Friday featuring an interview with a West Australian farmer who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s after exposure to chemicals including paraquat. Frank Geers told the newspaper he knew at least a dozen retired farmers who now had the debilitating disease. “The vast majority believe their Parkinson’s was caused by the herbicides,” he said. “And some of them are very angry that paraquat is still available for use. They saturated themselves in the stuff for years.”
Parkinson’s Australia has campaigned for paraquat to be banned saying it poses “a serious health risk to farmers, agricultural workers, and the general public”. “Parkinson’s Australia has long heard stories from individuals and families about the use of pesticides and the prevalence of Parkinson’s in their area,” it wrote to the APVMA. “Over the years, we have seen what we describe as ‘anecdotal clusters’, a name that doesn’t give respect or justify what agricultural communities are experiencing.”
Mr Hansen told the senate hearing the APVMA would release its findings on the paraquat review in coming weeks.
