Posted on 15 March 2012
- It has been two weeks since the Cameroon
government authorized a military intervention
at the site of the slaughter of hundreds
of elephants. WWF is disturbed by reports
that the poaching continues unabated in
Bouba N’Djida National Park and that a soldier’s
life has been lost. The forces arrived too
late to save most of the park’s elephants,
and were too few to deter the poachers.
It is likely that at
least half the population of Bouba N’Djida's
elephants has been killed.
WWF is seeking a concrete assurance from
Cameroon President Paul Biya that he will
do whatever is necessary to protect the
remaining elephants in Bouba N’Djida, and
to bring the killers to justice. We expect
those detained to be prosecuted for violating
Cameroon’s territorial integrity with deadly
weapons in order to kill elephants for their
ivory. All those convicted of involvement
in wildlife crime must be sentenced to the
full extent of the law.
WWF also calls on President Biya to extend
an appropriate level of protection to wildlife
in other Cameroon parks that are under a
similar threat. WWF has for years cautioned
the government that its rangers are not
properly trained or equipped to address
the scale, intensity and organized nature
of illegal poaching.
Rangers’ lives are being
lost in this battle. The honourable men
and women who are putting their personal
safety at risk to protect wildlife and to
serve communities near protected areas deserve
better from their leaders.
The poachers in Bouba N’Djida are reportedly
from Chad and Sudan, thus this incident
constitutes an invasion of Cameroon’s sovereign
territory and willful slaughter of its wildlife.
WWF urges Cameroon to engage the governments
of Chad and Sudan in a coordinated response
to the criminal acts in Bouba N’Djida. WWF
has offered its assistance and is awaiting
meaningful action from Cameroon and its
neighbours.
+ More
The EU Commission’s
health and consumers department caves in
to farmers and industry lobby request to
allow the spread of highly dangerous pest
On explicit request
of the dominant farmers unions and the pesticide
industry, the department taking care of
health and consumers issues within the European
Commission (DG SANCO) has proposed(1) to
dismantle the European safety system by
removing the obligation on countries and
farmers to contain the spread of a highly
destructive maize pest - Diabrotica virgifera
virgifera Le Conte (the Western corn rootworm
– from now on cited as WCR) (2). This move
is likely to lead to a massive increase
in pesticide use unless the simple agronomic
practice of crop rotation is implemented
as a countermeasure.
The WCR is a pest of maize that has been
accidentally introduced into Europe and
is now spreading across the continent. Its
soil-dwelling larvae damage the maize roots
and if unchecked can lead to significant
yield losses. However, if adequate agricultural
practices, such as crop rotation(3), are
put in place the pest can be controlled.
Since 2003 the EU has had in place a plant
health protection system that requires Member
States and farmers to control the pest.
On request of the dominant farmers unions,
maize growers associations and certain Member
States’ governments(4), DG SANCO has now
proposed the dismantling of this system,
allowing Member States and farmers to deal
with the problem as they see fit. The removal
of this obligation is likely to result in
an even faster spread of the pest, which
might lead farmers to increase the use of
pesticides significantly.
“It is utterly cynical for dominant farmers
unions to be promoting the spread of a pest
in order to promote the business interests
of the pesticide industry, rather than defend
the long term interest of the farmers they
are supposed to represent” says François
Veillerette president of PAN Europe.
Maize, mainly used for animal feed, covers
about 14 million hectares in the EU. On
average, around 22% of maize cultivation
in the EU is on monoculture (without crop
rotation). Maize is one of the most intensively
grown crops and is widely linked to a range
of environmental problems(5) ranging from
biodiversity loss to overconsumption and
pollution of water to heavy pesticide use.
The chemical control of the corn rootworm
is based on soil insecticides such as those
used in seed treatment (which is known to
be toxic to bees) and aerial spraying with
broad spectrum insecticides such as pyrethroids
and organophosphates (which kills flying
insects, contaminates surface water and
soils far away from the application).
“In order to control the newly established
WCR without negative environmental impact,
the EU should strongly back farmers moving
toward sustainable farming, giving many
other positive effects. The WCR can be easily
brought under control by the simple use
of crop rotation which can be implemented
with different solutions according the agronomic
and socio-economic conditions. Research
on the best rotation solutions in the Member
States should be immediately promoted along
with the dissemination of the results” says
Dr. Lorenzo Furlan, Veneto Agricoltura,
Italy.
Crop rotation has proven a good agricultural
practice in traditional, conventional and
organic agriculture for its feasibility
and multiple beneficial effects (e.g. more
efficient nutrient use over the years, better
soil structures and better pest management).
We (6) believe that a meaningful response
to the WCR pest crisis has to be based on
the following combination of actions:
Maintain the obligation on Member States
and individual farmers to take appropriate
action wherever the pest is present or likely
to be spreading;
Introduce mandatory crop rotation as part
of the “greening component” of the Common
Agricultural Policy (CAP) post 2013(7);
Swiftly and correctly implement the Sustainable
Use of Pesticides Directive which requires
an obligatory move toward Integrated Pest
Management(8);
Use the newly proposed European Innovation
Partnership to promote research, experimentation
and uptake of biological control measures
and of risk prevention through appropriate
agronomic practices(9).
ENDS
Notes to the editor:
(1) DG SANCO has recently sent a proposal
to other directorate generals within the
Commission “repealing Decision 2003/766/EC
on emergency measures to prevent the spread
within the Community of Diabrotica virgifer
Le Conte”, and of “Recommendation 2006/565/EC
on containment programmes to limit the spread
of Diabrotica virgifera Le Conte in Community
areas where its presence is confirmed”.
(2) Corn rootworms are among the most economically
destructive insects affecting maize. If
left untreated, corn rootworm larvae can
destroy significant percentages of maize.
In the United States and Canada, Diabotrica
causes $1.000 million in lost revenue every
year, through yield loss and loss of treatments.
WCR was unknown in European countries until
the late 11000s. It was forbidden even in
laboratories because of the difficulty in
eliminating it with known chemical insecticides
in case of escape. It appears to have entered
Europe from the United States in large numbers
during the Yugoslav wars. It is especially
widespread around airports and it is therefore
believed that US planes were likely to have
carried this pest. It has since spread primarily
in Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania,
Bulgaria, Czech Republic and into large
parts of Italy, Poland and Austria.
(3) See more information here: Bertossa,
M.1, Schaub, L.2, Colombi, L.3, Die gute
alte Fruchtfolge als Bekämpfungsmethode
gegen den Maiswurzelbohrer (Diabrotica virgifera
virgifera LeConte), Band 1, 10th issue of
Wissenschaftstagung Ökologischer Landbau,
(orgprints.org/14414/1/Bertossa_14414.pdf)
(4)In a leak of the commission’s decision,
one can read: whereas: “(6) Some Member
States and Union farmer’s and maize grower’s
associations have expressed their dissatisfaction
with the present regulatory framework against
this organism, requesting that the current
rules be repealed, in the light of the ongoing
spread of the pest in the past years into
new regions of the Union.”
