Support a Pesticide Bylaw
Over 150 municipalities, including Vancouver, Toronto, Maple Ridge, Nelson, and Invermere as well as the provinces of Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick have passed legislation banning or regulating the use of cosmetic pesticides. This means that over half of Canadians are protected from cosmetic pesticides.What you can do NOW to help eliminate carcinogens in your life. . . The following resources will help your community get a pesticide bylaw in place before Spring 2011!
COMMUNITY TOOLKIT
ACTION
● PESTICIDE RESEARCH
● PESTICIDE FACTSHEET
● MODEL PESTICIDE-USE BYLAW
● ONLINE TOOLS & ACTION
MODEL PESTICIDE-USE BYLAW
- Adapt the following Model Bylaw to your community!
ONLINE TOOLS & ACTION
- Petition for a Pesticide By-Law (Download it!)
- Tell your retailer to stop selling pesticides (Thanks to the David Suzuki Foundation)
- Let the NS Government know where you stand on cosmetic pesticides! (Thanks to the Ecology Action Centre)
- Stop the use of cosmetic pesticides in Alberta!
- Send an online letter to your Premier (Thanks to the David Suzuki Foundation)
- Planet Natural: Tips for a Healthy Lawn
PESTICIDE FACTSHEET
WHAT IS A PESTICIDE?
- Pesticides are substances intended to kill or otherwise control weeds, insects, fungi or pests. They can be over-the-counter products, or special chemicals not easily available to the public. Examples include herbicides that kill weeds or insecticides that kill bugs.
- Also known as the ‘ornamental’ or ‘non-essential’ use of pesticides, this means pesticides which are being used to enhance the appearance of private gardens and lawns, as well as parks, recreational facilities and golf courses, by controlling unwanted weeds, pests, and plants or to prevent blemishes and other imperfections.
- Increasing evidence links pesticide exposure to serious health and environmental problems.
- Young children and babies are at a greater risk from the effects of pesticides because of their small size, their rapid development and immature immune systems, as well as their behaviour including playing on lawns and floors and putting their hands in their mouth. Exposure to pesticides is linked to childhood cancers, kidney and liver damage, and birth defects.
- In adults, pesticides have been linked to Parkinson’s disease, reproductive problems, and cancers.
Pesticides don’t stop at the fence or garden gate and they pollute waterways and the air, landing in our yards, gardens and homes. - Risks to pets include increased aggression and thyroid enlargement in cats and increased rates of cancer in dogs. Also vulnerable are many wildlife species, including fish, frogs, turtles, and of course the beneficial insects, earthworms, and pollinating bees.
- Use healthy alternatives - there are numerous alternatives to using pesticides;
- Check labels on garden products and ask questions;
- Use non-toxic solutions such as herbicidal or insecticidal soap, borax, acetic acid (vinegar) or corn gluten;
- Adopt healthy lawn practices such as pulling weeds by hand, over-seeding, mowing high and watering infrequently; and
- Spread the Word and Speak Out! Let your local government and others in the community know that you support making your community pesticide-free. Email, fax or hand-write a letter to your local Mayor and Council and/or the local newspaper to voice your support for a pesticide-free community. See the resources section for model legislation and more.
Our Mission:
• To build a Canada-wide movement to eliminate the preventable causes of cancer.
Our Purpose:
• To make the primary prevention of cancer a priority through education, legislation and policy changes.
Our Goals:
• To create a broadly based national movement for cancer prevention and environmental health promotion.
• To promote the use of the precautionary principle.
• To promote improved regulations and policies that protect the public’s health and the health of workers exposed to carcinogens on the job.
• To eradicate environmental and workplace exposures to carcinogens and other health hazards.
• To educate the public on actions that individuals, communities, businesses, and governments can take to reduce or eliminate cancer-causing exposures.
“Until the province enacts cosmetic pesticide legislation, stores like Canadian Tire will continue to sell products that negatively impact human and environmental health,” says Toxic Free Canada campaigner Emily-Anne Paul. “Even though many municipalities have bylaws preventing the use of these products, without provincial laws against it retailers can continue to sell them.”
Over thirty municipalities across British Columbia have already acted to ban cosmetic pesticides. They join two Canadian provinces, Ontario and Quebec, in recognizing the negative impact of these products and are acting to protect their communities and the environment. However, without provincial legislation in BC aimed at preventing the sale of these cosmetic pesticides municipal bylaws have little effect.
Cosmetic pesticides, those used to kill unwanted plants such as dandelions and other weeds, contain many active ingredients that are classified as human carcinogens, reproductive toxins, neurotoxins or endocrine-disrupting chemicals. These chemicals have negative impacts on the environment when they travel through groundwater and storm drains into rivers and oceans, and on human health, especially children who are the most venerable to exposure.
“Toxic Free Canada is calling on the provincial government enact a legal prohibition on the use and sale of cosmetic pesticides as soon as possible,” concludes Paul. She also encourages the public to learn more about what Toxic Free Canada is doing to raise awareness about cosmetic pesticides to visit the website at: www.toxicfreecanada.ca.
The 200 delegates to the Union of B.C. Municipalities (UBCM) convention in Penticton voted Sept. 25 to endorse a motion submitted by Kamloops city council urging the provincial government to enact legislation to ban the sale and use of cosmetic pesticides province-wide. A similar resolution from Comox, calling on the province to give municipalities the authority to set bylaws on the use of pesticides on all private lands, also passed.
The vote on the resolutions capped months of campaigning by an alliance of Toxic Free Canada, the Canadian Cancer Society(CCS) and the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE), which have been staging forums around the province alerting British Columbians to the health and environmental effects of pesticides and encouraging municipal councils to enact bylaws curbing pesticide use.
CCS, CAPE and Toxic Free Canada were first together on a forum in Kamloops in 2006 called Chemical Trespass and Preventing Cancer: The Pesticide Connection that was organized by Thompson Rivers University Faculty Association and the Canadian Union of Public Employees.
At the UBCM convention both Kamloops mayor Terry Lake and Burnaby mayor Derek Corrigan, as well as Burnaby councillor Dan Johnstone, spoke forcefully in favour of the pesticide resolution.
The Kamloops resolution, listed as B81 in the delegates' book, states:
“WHEREAS residents of the Province of British Columbia are increasingly requesting their local governments to ban the use of cosmetic pesticides within their boundaries in order to mitigate concerns that these pesticides present a threat to the environment, children, pets and personal health.
“As these bylaws are being implemented in some municipalities, it has been found that community bans have little effect on overall pesticide sales. This is in sharp contrast to the Province of Quebec which has seen a fifty percent drop in pesticide use since their legislated ban in 1994;
“AND WHEREAS the Community Charter does not give communities the legislative authority to ban the sale of pesticides, only to regulate their use:
“THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Province of British Columbia enact provincial legislation that will ban the sale and use of cosmetic pesticides province-wide.”
The Comox resolution, number B82, states:
“WHEREAS the application of pesticides contributes to the cumulative chemical load absor by the natural environment;
“AND WHEREAS pesticides cannot be necessarily confined to a single location, but move through the environment in the air, land and water and may have an impact on non-target organisms and plants;
“THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the provincial government be urged to control pesticide use by mandating sales and retail display restrictions across BC;
“AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the provincial government be urged to amend the Spheres of Concurrent Jurisdictions Environmental and Wildlife Regulation to allow local governments to regulate, prohibit and impose requirements in relation to the use of cosmetic pesticides on all private lands.”
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