A court in southwest China has accepted the country's first lawsuit filed by an environmental group against a local government, a member of the group said Friday.
The All-China Environmental Federation, a group backed by the government, filed the suit on behalf of residents against the local land resources bureau in Qingzhen city in Guizhou province, which sold land to a drink and ice cream processing plant they allege is a threat to a scenic lake area.
The land resources bureau sold 8,600 square feet (800 square meters) of land to the owner of the plant in 1994, but construction was never finished. The group wants the government to take the land back and remove the construction materials.
The acceptance of the suit is a sign of greater public involvement and use of laws to hold the government accountable for environmental problems, experts said.
"If this leads to more NGOs (non-governmental organizations) bringing public interest litigation I think this is a very important breakthrough. It means China is going to open the door to more public involvement in environmental enforcement," said Alex Wang, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a U.S. environmental group.
Ma Yong, director of the legal service center at the federation, said the group received an acceptance note from the court on Tuesday. The case will open in early September.
Although the project had not been finished, Ma said it had to be stopped because its waste water would be a threat to the environment.
"The case will serve as a warning for government departments and companies that damage the environment, as we're stepping up efforts to play a supervisory role," he said.
Ma said he hopes the case will pave the way for more organizations to file public-interest lawsuits.
The group also filed a public lawsuit earlier this month against a company that operates a container port in eastern Jiangsu province's Wuxi city for failing to control pollution. That case was accepted but has yet to go to trial.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Death by Mint Oil: Natural Pesticides
This summer, the pests around my house are dying of more natural causes.
One colony of wasps on my deck got neutralized by shots of mint oil. The cabbageworms shredding my broccoli plants were done in by an ingredient culled from seeds of trees native to India. And I annihilated several fire-ant compounds by enticing them to eat bait packed with a soil-dwelling bacterium that fried their tiny nervous systems.
Alamy (3)
Natural alternatives are available to kill aphids, cabbage loopers, carpenter ants and other pests.
Surprisingly, none of these products were hard to find. Increasingly, well-known insecticide manufacturers, retailers and even professional pest-control services are rolling out solutions derived from natural materials like animals, plants, bacteria and minerals, many of them considered potentially safer to humans, pets and the environment than their synthetic-chemical counterparts. Fueling the move is increased governmental scrutiny over what pesticides we spray in and around our homes, as well as a bid to satisfy more health-conscious consumers—especially women, who typically dictate household pest-solution purchases.
Targets include everything from carpenter ants and mosquitoes to the slugs, caterpillars and mites that feast on fruit trees and vegetable plants. For instance, Terminix, a large professional pest-control company and division of Memphis, Tenn.-based ServiceMaster Co., is introducing its first consumer product called SafeShield. The $9.99 indoor insecticide spray contains active ingredients thyme oil and “geraniol,” a substance found in geranium, rose, lemon and other plants.
Meantime, St. Louis-based Senoret Chemical Co. is expanding its line of Terro brand ant- and bug-bait products using a mineral containing the element boron, which is generally considered low in toxicity to humans and animals. And Lititz, Pa.-based Woodstream Corp. last year bolstered its Safer product line with an organic mosquito- and tick-control concentrate made in part from chrysanthemum flowers.
The biggest bellwether came earlier this year when lawn and garden giant Scotts Miracle-Gro Co., Marysville, Ohio, introduced a seven-product “EcoSense” line under its home pest-defense Ortho brand sold in major retailers such as Home Depot and Wal-Mart. Included in the EcoSense arsenal: an indoor insect-killer spray made from soybean oil and an insecticidal soap for vegetables and plants. EcoSense is on track to meet or exceed sales expectations, the company says.
“There are consumers who want a more natural product lineup,” says Jeff Garascia, Scotts senior vice president of global research and development. “A few years ago, we decided that even though the performance didn’t meet our traditional products, we would push through anyway. Now we are starting to see efficacy there.”
Efficacy is tantamount to survival. Manufacturers know there’s often disconnect between what consumers say we want (natural products) and what we really want (dead bugs, now!). Plus, pests can transmit illnesses such as West Nile virus and Lyme disease that can be more harmful than some potential side effects from pesticides. S.C. Johnson & Son Inc., for instance, launched a Raid “Earth Options” product in 2006, then discontinued it the next year due to low consumer acceptance. Spectrum Brands Inc. offers a lemon-eucalyptus version of its Cutter mosquito repellent without DEET (a common chemical repellent) but says it doesn’t sell very well.
Still, the category continues to draw investment dollars. Next year, Spectrum plans to launch a natural indoor bug killer to go along with its Hot Shot and Spectricide insecticides. “There’s just a lot of movement out there now to use safer chemicals,” says Jay Matthews, a business director at Spectrum.
Meantime, sales of organic and natural products in the past 18 months have risen 30% to 40% at the Web site DoMyOwnPestControl.com, run by P&M Solutions LLC in Norcross, Ga. Best-selling natural items include “MotherEarth D,” a powder made of diatomaceous earth (ground fossils) that triggers dehydration and death in bugs, as well as an “EcoExempt IC-2” spray made from botanical oils such as spearmint and rosemary. The latter targets a wide range of pests from mosquitoes to bedbugs.
Even the $6.6 billion professional pest-control industry, where efficacy directly affects profit margins, is adopting more natural alternatives. For instance, Mesa, Ariz.-based Bulwark Exterminating LLC, which operates 11 branches in eight states, uses only botanical sprays and boric-acid products (also derived from boron) whenever customers request all-natural solutions and often includes them as part of an overall treatment plan even when they don’t.
“About 35% of people who call now ask us, ‘Will this hurt my kid or dog?’ ” says Bulwark founder Adam Seever. One customer, Carol Kidd, lives in a rural suburb of Phoenix and recently rang Bulwark to cancel her service because she was experiencing hormone imbalances and had read pesticides might be a contributing factor. Bulwark instead switched her to an all-natural service, employing botanical oils and boric-acid bait around her foundation instead of a synthetic solution, and didn’t raise her $44-a-month price.
“I’ve seen no excess insects since switching,” 39-year-old Ms. Kidd says, “and I’ve got bugs in the yard around my chicken coop, but not on my patio or in my house.”
The Environmental Protection Agency registers pesticides—an umbrella term for products that kill insects, fungi and weeds—for use in the U.S. The agency says general health issues from exposure to pesticides may range from simple skin or eye irritation to hormonal and endocrine disruption, cancer and other illnesses.
For instance, a study published in 2000 in the Journal of the American Medical Association with research from Stanford University found that in-home use of insect-killing chemicals was associated with a 70% increased risk of Parkinson’s disease, compared with no use of pesticides. And in April, the EPA said it will intensify evaluation of spot-on pesticide products used in pet flea and tick control due to increases in reported problems ranging from skin irritation to seizures and death of the animals. Some of the active ingredients also are found in household insecticides.
Over the years, the EPA has banned some insecticides considered too risky from use in the home market, such as diazinon and chlorpyrifos. It also now maintains a list of active ingredients used in what it dubs “minimum risk” pesticides. “It’s a pretty good bet it’s a safe product if it’s on that list,” says John Kepner with Beyond Pesticides, a not-for-profit group based in Washington, D.C.
Today, the most commonly used synthetic residential insecticides fall into a broad category called pyrethroids—common names include permethrin, cypermethrin and tetramethrin—which are essentially juiced up, longer-lasting human-made versions of the natural chrysanthemum “pyrethrins” used in some natural products. Both affect an insect’s central nervous system; both can be harmful to aquatic life and honeybees. The EPA will re-evaluate pyrethroids’ and natural pyrethrins’ risks starting next year.
To be sure, natural products can trigger health concerns as well. Citric sprays, for instance, can hurt the eyes, and there have been questions about the safety of inhaling powders made from diatomaceous earth or boric-acid powders, Mr. Kepner of Beyond Pesticides notes. “There are plenty of things from nature that can hurt us—like nicotine.”
In general, though, the EPA says biopesticides are usually “inherently less toxic” than conventional pesticides and decompose more quickly, thereby resulting in lower exposures and largely avoiding pollution problems caused by conventional pesticides. What’s more, the agency says, they often primarily harm only target pests, which can help protect beneficial bugs and other animals. (See sidebar.)
Generally, my own pest issues have disappeared using only natural products. One exception: carpenter ants, likely a byproduct of multiple firewood piles around the property and a recent roof leak (the ants like moisture). To wage war, I carefully applied a tiny bit of a synthetic pyrethroid dust inside crevices around my ceiling beams where no children or pets could reach—and where the bugs had left traces of activity. (At the time, I didn’t have the botanical version on hand.) Elsewhere, I’ve used all natural controls, including a mint and herbal oil spray along the backyard foundation where my dog roams and MotherEarth’s and Terro’s boric-acid bait near woodpiles and the front door where I saw ants marching. So far, it’s working pretty well.
One day, however, my dog Dolly got free from her fence and gobbled up a mouthful of the boric-acid bait. Panicked, I called a pet poison control hotline (800-213-6680) and was told not to worry, that the active ingredient was “very safe” with low concern for toxicity, and Dolly would be fine. That was the most compelling sales pitch for naturals yet.
One colony of wasps on my deck got neutralized by shots of mint oil. The cabbageworms shredding my broccoli plants were done in by an ingredient culled from seeds of trees native to India. And I annihilated several fire-ant compounds by enticing them to eat bait packed with a soil-dwelling bacterium that fried their tiny nervous systems.
Alamy (3)
Natural alternatives are available to kill aphids, cabbage loopers, carpenter ants and other pests.
Surprisingly, none of these products were hard to find. Increasingly, well-known insecticide manufacturers, retailers and even professional pest-control services are rolling out solutions derived from natural materials like animals, plants, bacteria and minerals, many of them considered potentially safer to humans, pets and the environment than their synthetic-chemical counterparts. Fueling the move is increased governmental scrutiny over what pesticides we spray in and around our homes, as well as a bid to satisfy more health-conscious consumers—especially women, who typically dictate household pest-solution purchases.
Targets include everything from carpenter ants and mosquitoes to the slugs, caterpillars and mites that feast on fruit trees and vegetable plants. For instance, Terminix, a large professional pest-control company and division of Memphis, Tenn.-based ServiceMaster Co., is introducing its first consumer product called SafeShield. The $9.99 indoor insecticide spray contains active ingredients thyme oil and “geraniol,” a substance found in geranium, rose, lemon and other plants.
Meantime, St. Louis-based Senoret Chemical Co. is expanding its line of Terro brand ant- and bug-bait products using a mineral containing the element boron, which is generally considered low in toxicity to humans and animals. And Lititz, Pa.-based Woodstream Corp. last year bolstered its Safer product line with an organic mosquito- and tick-control concentrate made in part from chrysanthemum flowers.
The biggest bellwether came earlier this year when lawn and garden giant Scotts Miracle-Gro Co., Marysville, Ohio, introduced a seven-product “EcoSense” line under its home pest-defense Ortho brand sold in major retailers such as Home Depot and Wal-Mart. Included in the EcoSense arsenal: an indoor insect-killer spray made from soybean oil and an insecticidal soap for vegetables and plants. EcoSense is on track to meet or exceed sales expectations, the company says.
“There are consumers who want a more natural product lineup,” says Jeff Garascia, Scotts senior vice president of global research and development. “A few years ago, we decided that even though the performance didn’t meet our traditional products, we would push through anyway. Now we are starting to see efficacy there.”
Efficacy is tantamount to survival. Manufacturers know there’s often disconnect between what consumers say we want (natural products) and what we really want (dead bugs, now!). Plus, pests can transmit illnesses such as West Nile virus and Lyme disease that can be more harmful than some potential side effects from pesticides. S.C. Johnson & Son Inc., for instance, launched a Raid “Earth Options” product in 2006, then discontinued it the next year due to low consumer acceptance. Spectrum Brands Inc. offers a lemon-eucalyptus version of its Cutter mosquito repellent without DEET (a common chemical repellent) but says it doesn’t sell very well.
Still, the category continues to draw investment dollars. Next year, Spectrum plans to launch a natural indoor bug killer to go along with its Hot Shot and Spectricide insecticides. “There’s just a lot of movement out there now to use safer chemicals,” says Jay Matthews, a business director at Spectrum.
Meantime, sales of organic and natural products in the past 18 months have risen 30% to 40% at the Web site DoMyOwnPestControl.com, run by P&M Solutions LLC in Norcross, Ga. Best-selling natural items include “MotherEarth D,” a powder made of diatomaceous earth (ground fossils) that triggers dehydration and death in bugs, as well as an “EcoExempt IC-2” spray made from botanical oils such as spearmint and rosemary. The latter targets a wide range of pests from mosquitoes to bedbugs.
Even the $6.6 billion professional pest-control industry, where efficacy directly affects profit margins, is adopting more natural alternatives. For instance, Mesa, Ariz.-based Bulwark Exterminating LLC, which operates 11 branches in eight states, uses only botanical sprays and boric-acid products (also derived from boron) whenever customers request all-natural solutions and often includes them as part of an overall treatment plan even when they don’t.
“About 35% of people who call now ask us, ‘Will this hurt my kid or dog?’ ” says Bulwark founder Adam Seever. One customer, Carol Kidd, lives in a rural suburb of Phoenix and recently rang Bulwark to cancel her service because she was experiencing hormone imbalances and had read pesticides might be a contributing factor. Bulwark instead switched her to an all-natural service, employing botanical oils and boric-acid bait around her foundation instead of a synthetic solution, and didn’t raise her $44-a-month price.
“I’ve seen no excess insects since switching,” 39-year-old Ms. Kidd says, “and I’ve got bugs in the yard around my chicken coop, but not on my patio or in my house.”
The Environmental Protection Agency registers pesticides—an umbrella term for products that kill insects, fungi and weeds—for use in the U.S. The agency says general health issues from exposure to pesticides may range from simple skin or eye irritation to hormonal and endocrine disruption, cancer and other illnesses.
For instance, a study published in 2000 in the Journal of the American Medical Association with research from Stanford University found that in-home use of insect-killing chemicals was associated with a 70% increased risk of Parkinson’s disease, compared with no use of pesticides. And in April, the EPA said it will intensify evaluation of spot-on pesticide products used in pet flea and tick control due to increases in reported problems ranging from skin irritation to seizures and death of the animals. Some of the active ingredients also are found in household insecticides.
Over the years, the EPA has banned some insecticides considered too risky from use in the home market, such as diazinon and chlorpyrifos. It also now maintains a list of active ingredients used in what it dubs “minimum risk” pesticides. “It’s a pretty good bet it’s a safe product if it’s on that list,” says John Kepner with Beyond Pesticides, a not-for-profit group based in Washington, D.C.
Today, the most commonly used synthetic residential insecticides fall into a broad category called pyrethroids—common names include permethrin, cypermethrin and tetramethrin—which are essentially juiced up, longer-lasting human-made versions of the natural chrysanthemum “pyrethrins” used in some natural products. Both affect an insect’s central nervous system; both can be harmful to aquatic life and honeybees. The EPA will re-evaluate pyrethroids’ and natural pyrethrins’ risks starting next year.
To be sure, natural products can trigger health concerns as well. Citric sprays, for instance, can hurt the eyes, and there have been questions about the safety of inhaling powders made from diatomaceous earth or boric-acid powders, Mr. Kepner of Beyond Pesticides notes. “There are plenty of things from nature that can hurt us—like nicotine.”
In general, though, the EPA says biopesticides are usually “inherently less toxic” than conventional pesticides and decompose more quickly, thereby resulting in lower exposures and largely avoiding pollution problems caused by conventional pesticides. What’s more, the agency says, they often primarily harm only target pests, which can help protect beneficial bugs and other animals. (See sidebar.)
Generally, my own pest issues have disappeared using only natural products. One exception: carpenter ants, likely a byproduct of multiple firewood piles around the property and a recent roof leak (the ants like moisture). To wage war, I carefully applied a tiny bit of a synthetic pyrethroid dust inside crevices around my ceiling beams where no children or pets could reach—and where the bugs had left traces of activity. (At the time, I didn’t have the botanical version on hand.) Elsewhere, I’ve used all natural controls, including a mint and herbal oil spray along the backyard foundation where my dog roams and MotherEarth’s and Terro’s boric-acid bait near woodpiles and the front door where I saw ants marching. So far, it’s working pretty well.
One day, however, my dog Dolly got free from her fence and gobbled up a mouthful of the boric-acid bait. Panicked, I called a pet poison control hotline (800-213-6680) and was told not to worry, that the active ingredient was “very safe” with low concern for toxicity, and Dolly would be fine. That was the most compelling sales pitch for naturals yet.
China Cities Raise Water Price in Bid to Conserve
Cities across China are raising the price of water, in moves that try to balance the need to conserve an increasingly scarce resource with the effects on a public used to low fees.
The city government of Luoyang, in central Henan province, prepared to hold a public meeting Friday to argue for a proposed water-price increase of 40% to 48%. Water prices in the dry region haven't risen since 2003, which the government says is exhausting meager supplies and keeping the local water utility in the red. At least half a dozen other major cities have raised water prices in the past few months.
The changes reflect a growing official consensus that low prices are part of China's water-shortage problem, since they give companies and households little incentive to use water carefully. The government is also spending billions of dollars on a controversial system of canals to divert water from the flood-prone south to the dry north.
The amount of water available per person in China is just one-quarter of the world average. The World Bank has estimated that water shortages cost China about 1.3% of its annual economic output, with a further 1% lost to water pollution.
"Given the underpricing of water in China and its environmental consequences, I feel it is wise for governments to take the opportunity of low inflation pressure to adjust the water tariff," said Jian Xie, a senior environmental specialist at the World Bank.
Shanghai raised residential water prices 25% in June and plans a 22% increase in November 2010. The central city of Zhengzhou raised water fees 25% in April, and officials say prices will have to change more rapidly in the future.
There has been "strong public reaction" to the price increases in some cities, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a notice in early July. Some local news reports have suggested the price increases are being driven more by corporate greed than a real need to conserve water. The agency, which supervises the prices of regulated goods like water, said local governments need to take public concerns into account as they plan for necessary price increases.
The eastern city of Nanjing raised residential water prices 12% in April but also rolled out subsidies to reduce the impact on low-income households.
The rise in water bills has upset consumers even in cities where rates haven't been rising. Zheng Hong, a lawyer in Beijing who lives with seven family members, says his household spends 60 yuan to 70 yuan ($8.78 to $10.25) a month for tap water. He is against any price increases. "The lower, the better," he says. "Compared to my hometown in Henan province, the water prices in Beijing are already pretty high."
China's water prices are still low by global standards, even with the average residential water fee in major cities now up 3% since the end of 2008, to 2.44 yuan per ton. Average water prices in Europe are anywhere from four to 10 times higher, according to Deutsche Bank estimates
The city government of Luoyang, in central Henan province, prepared to hold a public meeting Friday to argue for a proposed water-price increase of 40% to 48%. Water prices in the dry region haven't risen since 2003, which the government says is exhausting meager supplies and keeping the local water utility in the red. At least half a dozen other major cities have raised water prices in the past few months.
The changes reflect a growing official consensus that low prices are part of China's water-shortage problem, since they give companies and households little incentive to use water carefully. The government is also spending billions of dollars on a controversial system of canals to divert water from the flood-prone south to the dry north.
The amount of water available per person in China is just one-quarter of the world average. The World Bank has estimated that water shortages cost China about 1.3% of its annual economic output, with a further 1% lost to water pollution.
"Given the underpricing of water in China and its environmental consequences, I feel it is wise for governments to take the opportunity of low inflation pressure to adjust the water tariff," said Jian Xie, a senior environmental specialist at the World Bank.
Shanghai raised residential water prices 25% in June and plans a 22% increase in November 2010. The central city of Zhengzhou raised water fees 25% in April, and officials say prices will have to change more rapidly in the future.
There has been "strong public reaction" to the price increases in some cities, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a notice in early July. Some local news reports have suggested the price increases are being driven more by corporate greed than a real need to conserve water. The agency, which supervises the prices of regulated goods like water, said local governments need to take public concerns into account as they plan for necessary price increases.
The eastern city of Nanjing raised residential water prices 12% in April but also rolled out subsidies to reduce the impact on low-income households.
The rise in water bills has upset consumers even in cities where rates haven't been rising. Zheng Hong, a lawyer in Beijing who lives with seven family members, says his household spends 60 yuan to 70 yuan ($8.78 to $10.25) a month for tap water. He is against any price increases. "The lower, the better," he says. "Compared to my hometown in Henan province, the water prices in Beijing are already pretty high."
China's water prices are still low by global standards, even with the average residential water fee in major cities now up 3% since the end of 2008, to 2.44 yuan per ton. Average water prices in Europe are anywhere from four to 10 times higher, according to Deutsche Bank estimates
Corby's toxic waste: the families speak out
India Harrison, 9, who suffered a birth defect due to toxic waste in Corby, rests her hand on the hand of her mother, Johanne Photo: JANE MINGAY
Mandy Wright and her son Curtis, 13, who suffered a birth defect due to toxic waste in Corby Photo: JANE MINGAY
Dylan South, 13, who suffered a birth defect in his right leg due to toxic waste in Corby Photo: JANE MINGAY
They say that you used to be able to see Corby from a distance because the steel works made the town glow. Children used to play in the 'soot hills’, or the black hills as they are known locally. “It never really occurs to you what you are playing in when you are a child, does it?” says Johanne Harrison.
There was a quarry that filled with rain water that kids swam in. They called it the Blue Lagoon because the water was so bright. “It actually fizzed at the edges,” says Johanne. Locals also talk of the red mist that enveloped the Sunday market near the works, where people would shop for clothes, meat, fruit and vegetables. It was dust from the plant.
This was an accepted part of life in Corby. Years later, as she struggled to come to terms with her newborn daughter’s limb deformity, it never occurred to Johanne that it might be linked to the toxic legacy of the steel works.
Johanne says she knew something was wrong when the voice of the mid-wife who’d been urging her on, telling her that she could see a head of black hair, suddenly changed to a tone of soothing urgency. “It will be ok,” she told Johanne. “It will be ok.”
As soon as the umbilical cord was cut, baby India was taken away. Later a doctor returned with the child and asked Johanne if she wanted to put her up for adoption. “When I asked him what was wrong he took a biro out of his pocket and stuck it through India’s curled left hand,” says Johanne. This crude gesture revealed that India was missing fingers and had a shortened arm.
When Mandy Wright gave birth to her son Curtis, now 13, the doctors and midwives had been rather more sensitive about his badly-deformed right hand. “I just thought it was one of those things. They told me that he might be brain damaged, and that I should keep an eye on him, but he was fine and we just got on with it. That his hand was as it was just seemed like a freak of nature.”
Curtis and India live within a few miles of each other in Northamptonshire, and it would now seem that there is nothing natural about their birth defects. This week they were present at the High Court in London with 16 other children with deformed hands and feet, all of them conceived in the shadow of the Corby Steel Works as it was dismantled in the eighties and nineties.The incident of deformities in Corby is 300 per cent greater than average.
The 680 acre site had, during its 46 year history, produced a dizzying array of dangerous waste – nickel, chromium, zinc, arsenic, boron and cadmium.The council had to dispose of it somehow, and that they did – in the back of open lorries, sludge spilling onto the public roads of the town. Johanne remembers the smell and the metallic taste of it, and how if you drove behind one of the lorries, your car always ended up covered in a light film.
The waste was dumped all over Corby by staff that Mr Justice Akenhead described this week as being “unqualified and insufficiently experienced”; a waste management expert who saw how the materials were disposed of, was said to have been “appalled”. Even at the time that the land was being “reclaimed”, an auditor described the operation as “naïve, cavalier and incompetent.” On Wednesday, after a ten year battle, the Judge ruled that Corby Borough Council had been negligent and that the dumping of toxic material may have caused the birth defects. He also ruled that India Harrison was not eligible because she was born after the reclamation work had finished. India and her mother plan to appeal that decision, just as it seems the Council will, though at the time of going to press they had not returned calls. Another 60 families are reported to be ready to pursue claims.
Yesterday in Corby there was no sense of triumphalism. ''I’ll tell you this story and you just won’t believe it,” Mandy Wright says. “When I was pregnant I was in hospital with high blood pressure and there was another expectant mother there. When Curtis was born she said 'I’m so sorry about his hand’. A few weeks later she called me up, distraught, to say her child had also been born with a deformity
“I was OK before the ruling,” Wright continues. “If it was just Nature, then that was fine. But to have heard a judge actually say that this town may have caused it because of their negligence is just the pits. I’m furious.”
That fury centres around the children’s suffering. Curtis has had four operations – one of his toes has been grafted to his hand to make a thumb – while India has had eight.Two fingers had to be separated, she has had a skin graft, her bones have been rotated, and she had to have skin and muscle from her groin transplanted on to her hand.
“That operation was just horrific,” says Johanne. “It was the worst thing I have ever experienced in my life. She went straight out of the operating theatre to the high dependency unit and then when she came round she had central lines coming out of her neck and she was really, really sick. She was fighting and screaming in the bed. Whenever we have to go to the hospital she is terrified. Nobody wants to see their child go through that.”
India is likely to lose all movement in the limb. Like Curtis, she has had to learn to write with her other hand. Both have endured bullying, and India had to move school. “People call me things like fishy fingers and three fingered freak,” she tells me.
“You spend the whole time justifying to her why people are staring,” says her mother. “I tell her that she is special, and that God made her that way.”
Curtis knows that he will never be able to join the army or become a pilot but he takes it all in his stride. “I have put up a barrier of humour. If I laugh with them then that’s better than them laughing at me.” He has joked with people that he had frostbite, or that his dog has attacked him, and when he first met his stepdad he tried to convince him that he had chocolate fingers.
But there is nothing humourous about this story. Corby is a town that has been blighted by the closure of the steel works in 1980. Ten thousand jobs were lost. The clean-up of the plant was supposed to rejuvenate the area but, almost 30 years on, that has not really happened. There is a new swimming pool but there are also boarded up shops and most of the employment available is low-paid warehouse work.
Corby Borough Council – it’s slogan is “building a bigger, better, brighter Corby” – has responded bullishly to this week’s ruling. “We are not yet at the point of saying sorry because nobody yet is responsible,” said Chris Mallender, the council chief executive. The council said that it would have to borrow money if they ended up having to pay the families the £5 million or more their solicitor estimates that they should get between them in compensation.
Certainly, the council have not made it easy, says Des Collins, the solicitor for the families. In 35 years of practice, he has never encountered a defendant as difficult. “The council have been stonewalling to a degree that belies belief. Trying to get hold of documentation was not easy – a lot of it, I was told, went missing in floods or fires.” A dozen new families contacted him yesterday.
Now that the judge has ruled the Council negligent, each family will have a separate trial to decide whether or not the toxic waste was the cause of the birth defects. Other possible causes, such as substance abuse, will also be investigated but the health of the families was scrutinised before the case was brought to rule this out. They will then be eligible for compensation that Collins believes could be as much as £500,000 a case.
If things go to plan, that should take two years, but if the Council continue to deny any link between the deformities of these children and the haphazard way in which they dumped toxic waste, it could take far longer.
The families say it is not about money but about someone being held accountable. Curtis, with wisdom beyond his years, puts it best: “All the money in the world isn’t going to give me a hand. After all this time, we just wanted a decision either way. Now I’d settle for a sorry from them.”
Mandy Wright and her son Curtis, 13, who suffered a birth defect due to toxic waste in Corby Photo: JANE MINGAY
Dylan South, 13, who suffered a birth defect in his right leg due to toxic waste in Corby Photo: JANE MINGAY
They say that you used to be able to see Corby from a distance because the steel works made the town glow. Children used to play in the 'soot hills’, or the black hills as they are known locally. “It never really occurs to you what you are playing in when you are a child, does it?” says Johanne Harrison.
There was a quarry that filled with rain water that kids swam in. They called it the Blue Lagoon because the water was so bright. “It actually fizzed at the edges,” says Johanne. Locals also talk of the red mist that enveloped the Sunday market near the works, where people would shop for clothes, meat, fruit and vegetables. It was dust from the plant.
This was an accepted part of life in Corby. Years later, as she struggled to come to terms with her newborn daughter’s limb deformity, it never occurred to Johanne that it might be linked to the toxic legacy of the steel works.
Johanne says she knew something was wrong when the voice of the mid-wife who’d been urging her on, telling her that she could see a head of black hair, suddenly changed to a tone of soothing urgency. “It will be ok,” she told Johanne. “It will be ok.”
As soon as the umbilical cord was cut, baby India was taken away. Later a doctor returned with the child and asked Johanne if she wanted to put her up for adoption. “When I asked him what was wrong he took a biro out of his pocket and stuck it through India’s curled left hand,” says Johanne. This crude gesture revealed that India was missing fingers and had a shortened arm.
When Mandy Wright gave birth to her son Curtis, now 13, the doctors and midwives had been rather more sensitive about his badly-deformed right hand. “I just thought it was one of those things. They told me that he might be brain damaged, and that I should keep an eye on him, but he was fine and we just got on with it. That his hand was as it was just seemed like a freak of nature.”
Curtis and India live within a few miles of each other in Northamptonshire, and it would now seem that there is nothing natural about their birth defects. This week they were present at the High Court in London with 16 other children with deformed hands and feet, all of them conceived in the shadow of the Corby Steel Works as it was dismantled in the eighties and nineties.The incident of deformities in Corby is 300 per cent greater than average.
The 680 acre site had, during its 46 year history, produced a dizzying array of dangerous waste – nickel, chromium, zinc, arsenic, boron and cadmium.The council had to dispose of it somehow, and that they did – in the back of open lorries, sludge spilling onto the public roads of the town. Johanne remembers the smell and the metallic taste of it, and how if you drove behind one of the lorries, your car always ended up covered in a light film.
The waste was dumped all over Corby by staff that Mr Justice Akenhead described this week as being “unqualified and insufficiently experienced”; a waste management expert who saw how the materials were disposed of, was said to have been “appalled”. Even at the time that the land was being “reclaimed”, an auditor described the operation as “naïve, cavalier and incompetent.” On Wednesday, after a ten year battle, the Judge ruled that Corby Borough Council had been negligent and that the dumping of toxic material may have caused the birth defects. He also ruled that India Harrison was not eligible because she was born after the reclamation work had finished. India and her mother plan to appeal that decision, just as it seems the Council will, though at the time of going to press they had not returned calls. Another 60 families are reported to be ready to pursue claims.
Yesterday in Corby there was no sense of triumphalism. ''I’ll tell you this story and you just won’t believe it,” Mandy Wright says. “When I was pregnant I was in hospital with high blood pressure and there was another expectant mother there. When Curtis was born she said 'I’m so sorry about his hand’. A few weeks later she called me up, distraught, to say her child had also been born with a deformity
“I was OK before the ruling,” Wright continues. “If it was just Nature, then that was fine. But to have heard a judge actually say that this town may have caused it because of their negligence is just the pits. I’m furious.”
That fury centres around the children’s suffering. Curtis has had four operations – one of his toes has been grafted to his hand to make a thumb – while India has had eight.Two fingers had to be separated, she has had a skin graft, her bones have been rotated, and she had to have skin and muscle from her groin transplanted on to her hand.
“That operation was just horrific,” says Johanne. “It was the worst thing I have ever experienced in my life. She went straight out of the operating theatre to the high dependency unit and then when she came round she had central lines coming out of her neck and she was really, really sick. She was fighting and screaming in the bed. Whenever we have to go to the hospital she is terrified. Nobody wants to see their child go through that.”
India is likely to lose all movement in the limb. Like Curtis, she has had to learn to write with her other hand. Both have endured bullying, and India had to move school. “People call me things like fishy fingers and three fingered freak,” she tells me.
“You spend the whole time justifying to her why people are staring,” says her mother. “I tell her that she is special, and that God made her that way.”
Curtis knows that he will never be able to join the army or become a pilot but he takes it all in his stride. “I have put up a barrier of humour. If I laugh with them then that’s better than them laughing at me.” He has joked with people that he had frostbite, or that his dog has attacked him, and when he first met his stepdad he tried to convince him that he had chocolate fingers.
But there is nothing humourous about this story. Corby is a town that has been blighted by the closure of the steel works in 1980. Ten thousand jobs were lost. The clean-up of the plant was supposed to rejuvenate the area but, almost 30 years on, that has not really happened. There is a new swimming pool but there are also boarded up shops and most of the employment available is low-paid warehouse work.
Corby Borough Council – it’s slogan is “building a bigger, better, brighter Corby” – has responded bullishly to this week’s ruling. “We are not yet at the point of saying sorry because nobody yet is responsible,” said Chris Mallender, the council chief executive. The council said that it would have to borrow money if they ended up having to pay the families the £5 million or more their solicitor estimates that they should get between them in compensation.
Certainly, the council have not made it easy, says Des Collins, the solicitor for the families. In 35 years of practice, he has never encountered a defendant as difficult. “The council have been stonewalling to a degree that belies belief. Trying to get hold of documentation was not easy – a lot of it, I was told, went missing in floods or fires.” A dozen new families contacted him yesterday.
Now that the judge has ruled the Council negligent, each family will have a separate trial to decide whether or not the toxic waste was the cause of the birth defects. Other possible causes, such as substance abuse, will also be investigated but the health of the families was scrutinised before the case was brought to rule this out. They will then be eligible for compensation that Collins believes could be as much as £500,000 a case.
If things go to plan, that should take two years, but if the Council continue to deny any link between the deformities of these children and the haphazard way in which they dumped toxic waste, it could take far longer.
The families say it is not about money but about someone being held accountable. Curtis, with wisdom beyond his years, puts it best: “All the money in the world isn’t going to give me a hand. After all this time, we just wanted a decision either way. Now I’d settle for a sorry from them.”
China bows to activist pressure over refinery
China has taken the unusual step of moving a $5bn refinery and petrochemical plant, one of the country’s biggest foreign investment projects, after a public outcry, a senior Communist party official said on Thursday.
The decision to relocate the plant is the highest-profile victory so far for China’s loosely organised but increasingly aggressive envirWang Yang, party secretary of Guangdong province and south China’s most powerful politician, attributed the decision to shift the joint venture project of Sinopec, the Chinese state owned refiner, and Kuwait Petroleum Corp, to “strong criticism from the community”.
“This reflects how Guangdong values environmental protection, the ecology and the opinions of our citizens,” said Mr Wang, who sits on the party’s 25-member Politburo, in a rare interview with foreign reporters. “It was a very difficult decision to make because [the project] has been approved by the state council and signed by the partners.
“We only have one planet to live on and whatever we do at this end affects people at the other end,” he said.
The plant was to be built in southern Guangzhou, the provincial capital, 60km upwind of Hong Kong, where the project has also come under criticism.
Last year, 14 delegates to the provincial people’s congress filed a motion opposing the refinery on the grounds that it could worsen regional air pollution. That opposition emboldened environmental officials, who also began to question the project’s suitability pending the completion of an environmental impact report.
Mr Wang declined to reveal where Sinopec and Kuwait Petroleum had agreed to move the plant to. Privately, provincial officials say it is most likely destined for the industrial port of Zhanjiang in western Guangdong, a much less populated and ecologically sensitive region.
The project was to have been sited in a new heavy industrial zone in the geographical centre of the Pearl river estuary, not far from a bird and wetland sanctuary. The site was marked out last year and villagers were relocated to new housing closer to the centre of Guangzhou.
The relocation is in keeping with a larger push by Mr Wang to engineer an industrial restructuring of the province, which accounts for about a third of China’s exports and which suffered a 20 per cent fall in foreign trade since the onset of the global financial crisis.onmental and community activists.
The decision to relocate the plant is the highest-profile victory so far for China’s loosely organised but increasingly aggressive envirWang Yang, party secretary of Guangdong province and south China’s most powerful politician, attributed the decision to shift the joint venture project of Sinopec, the Chinese state owned refiner, and Kuwait Petroleum Corp, to “strong criticism from the community”.
“This reflects how Guangdong values environmental protection, the ecology and the opinions of our citizens,” said Mr Wang, who sits on the party’s 25-member Politburo, in a rare interview with foreign reporters. “It was a very difficult decision to make because [the project] has been approved by the state council and signed by the partners.
“We only have one planet to live on and whatever we do at this end affects people at the other end,” he said.
The plant was to be built in southern Guangzhou, the provincial capital, 60km upwind of Hong Kong, where the project has also come under criticism.
Last year, 14 delegates to the provincial people’s congress filed a motion opposing the refinery on the grounds that it could worsen regional air pollution. That opposition emboldened environmental officials, who also began to question the project’s suitability pending the completion of an environmental impact report.
Mr Wang declined to reveal where Sinopec and Kuwait Petroleum had agreed to move the plant to. Privately, provincial officials say it is most likely destined for the industrial port of Zhanjiang in western Guangdong, a much less populated and ecologically sensitive region.
The project was to have been sited in a new heavy industrial zone in the geographical centre of the Pearl river estuary, not far from a bird and wetland sanctuary. The site was marked out last year and villagers were relocated to new housing closer to the centre of Guangzhou.
The relocation is in keeping with a larger push by Mr Wang to engineer an industrial restructuring of the province, which accounts for about a third of China’s exports and which suffered a 20 per cent fall in foreign trade since the onset of the global financial crisis.onmental and community activists.
House Approves Food-Safety Bill
The House approved the first major changes to food-safety laws in 70 years Thursday, giving sweeping new authority to the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the way food is grown, harvested and processed.
The action follows a wave of food-borne illnesses over the past three years, involving products as varied as spinach and cookie dough, which has shaken consumer confidence and made the issue a priority for congressional leaders and the White House. Food illnesses sicken one in four Americans and kill 5,000 each year, according to government statistics. Tainted food has cost the food industry billions of dollars in recalls, lost sales and legal expenses.
"Americans are dying because the Food and Drug Administration does not have authority to protect them, and American producers and agriculture are being hurt," said Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), the bill's author, who has been pushing food-safety change for more than 20 years. "This will fundamentally change the way in which we ensure the safety of our food supply."
The measure passed 283 to 142. The Senate is expected to take up its version after the August recess. President Obama, who has voiced concerns about the safety of peanut butter consumed by his 8-year-old daughter, endorsed the House bill Wednesday.
The legislation affects every aspect of the U.S. food system, from farmers to manufacturers to importers. It places significant responsibilities on farmers and food processors to prevent contamination -- a departure from the country's reactive tradition, which has relied on government inspectors to catch tainted food after the fact.
The 159-page bill was backed by a raft of consumer groups and trade associations but faced opposition from some farm interests and their House Republican allies, who said it gives too much authority to the FDA and will lead to higher costs and burdensome paperwork without necessarily making food safer.
"The federal government will tell our farmers and ranchers how to do something they've been doing since the dawn of mankind," said Rep. Frank D. Lucas (R-Okla.). "It goes too far in the direction of trying to produce food from a bureaucrat's chair in Washington, D.C."
The legislation requires food producers and importers to pay an annual $500 registration fee, which would help fund stepped-up FDA inspections, enforcement and related activities such as food-safety research. About 360,000 facilities in the United States and abroad would be subject to the fees. The Congressional Budget Office reported that the fees would not cover the cost of the new system, leaving the FDA to incur a net cost of $2.2 billion over five years.
If enacted, the bill would be the first major overhaul of food laws since 1938, when Congress gave the FDA the power to oversee the safety of most foods, as well as drugs and cosmetics. At that time, the government was concerned mainly about food makers adulterating products by substituting ingredients or using additives to mask rancid meat and vegetables.
But as the food industry has changed, new threats have emerged. Deadly pathogens such as E. coli O157:H7 can contaminate foods without the knowledge of farmers, manufacturers or consumers. An increasing amount of food Americans consume -- about 15 percent -- is imported, with little known about overseas growing or processing methods. And the U.S. food supply chain has grown increasingly complex, with some manufacturers unsure where raw ingredients originate.
The legislation requires food manufacturers to identify the particular risks they face, create controls to prevent that contamination, monitor those controls to make sure they are working and update those measures regularly. Such controls have been mandatory for the seafood and juice industries since the 1990s after several high-profile contamination cases; they are widely believed to have reduced outbreaks involving those products.
The House bill calls for the FDA to set safety standards for farmers and manufacturers who process food. And it requires imported food to meet the same standards.
The legislation requires the FDA to sharply step up inspections. The FDA now inspects food facilities about once a decade. The bill would also mandate inspections of high-risk facilities at least once a year and low-risk facilities at least every three years.
The measure also gives the FDA significant authority to contain outbreaks of food-borne illnesses. The agency would be able to recall food if it suspects contamination, instead of relying on the food maker to act voluntarily. It also allows the FDA to quarantine a geographic area, blocking the distribution of suspect food to the rest of the country. And the FDA would gain access to records at farms and food production facilities.
Under the legislation, the food agency will get new enforcement powers and be able to impose beefed-up civil and criminal penalties. One provision allows the FDA to declare food "adulterated" simply if the grower or manufacturer has failed to follow safety standards, regardless of whether the food is actually tainted.
The bill does not address the fractured nature of U.S. food regulation, which is spread among 15 federal agencies, as well as thousands of state and local health departments.
Agriculture interests were able to win key concessions. Small farms are exempt from registration fees, ranchers and farmers now regulated by the Agriculture Department are excluded from the requirements of the bill and the FDA will have to consider the special concerns of small growers and organic farmers, among other provisions.
The action follows a wave of food-borne illnesses over the past three years, involving products as varied as spinach and cookie dough, which has shaken consumer confidence and made the issue a priority for congressional leaders and the White House. Food illnesses sicken one in four Americans and kill 5,000 each year, according to government statistics. Tainted food has cost the food industry billions of dollars in recalls, lost sales and legal expenses.
"Americans are dying because the Food and Drug Administration does not have authority to protect them, and American producers and agriculture are being hurt," said Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), the bill's author, who has been pushing food-safety change for more than 20 years. "This will fundamentally change the way in which we ensure the safety of our food supply."
The measure passed 283 to 142. The Senate is expected to take up its version after the August recess. President Obama, who has voiced concerns about the safety of peanut butter consumed by his 8-year-old daughter, endorsed the House bill Wednesday.
The legislation affects every aspect of the U.S. food system, from farmers to manufacturers to importers. It places significant responsibilities on farmers and food processors to prevent contamination -- a departure from the country's reactive tradition, which has relied on government inspectors to catch tainted food after the fact.
The 159-page bill was backed by a raft of consumer groups and trade associations but faced opposition from some farm interests and their House Republican allies, who said it gives too much authority to the FDA and will lead to higher costs and burdensome paperwork without necessarily making food safer.
"The federal government will tell our farmers and ranchers how to do something they've been doing since the dawn of mankind," said Rep. Frank D. Lucas (R-Okla.). "It goes too far in the direction of trying to produce food from a bureaucrat's chair in Washington, D.C."
The legislation requires food producers and importers to pay an annual $500 registration fee, which would help fund stepped-up FDA inspections, enforcement and related activities such as food-safety research. About 360,000 facilities in the United States and abroad would be subject to the fees. The Congressional Budget Office reported that the fees would not cover the cost of the new system, leaving the FDA to incur a net cost of $2.2 billion over five years.
If enacted, the bill would be the first major overhaul of food laws since 1938, when Congress gave the FDA the power to oversee the safety of most foods, as well as drugs and cosmetics. At that time, the government was concerned mainly about food makers adulterating products by substituting ingredients or using additives to mask rancid meat and vegetables.
But as the food industry has changed, new threats have emerged. Deadly pathogens such as E. coli O157:H7 can contaminate foods without the knowledge of farmers, manufacturers or consumers. An increasing amount of food Americans consume -- about 15 percent -- is imported, with little known about overseas growing or processing methods. And the U.S. food supply chain has grown increasingly complex, with some manufacturers unsure where raw ingredients originate.
The legislation requires food manufacturers to identify the particular risks they face, create controls to prevent that contamination, monitor those controls to make sure they are working and update those measures regularly. Such controls have been mandatory for the seafood and juice industries since the 1990s after several high-profile contamination cases; they are widely believed to have reduced outbreaks involving those products.
The House bill calls for the FDA to set safety standards for farmers and manufacturers who process food. And it requires imported food to meet the same standards.
The legislation requires the FDA to sharply step up inspections. The FDA now inspects food facilities about once a decade. The bill would also mandate inspections of high-risk facilities at least once a year and low-risk facilities at least every three years.
The measure also gives the FDA significant authority to contain outbreaks of food-borne illnesses. The agency would be able to recall food if it suspects contamination, instead of relying on the food maker to act voluntarily. It also allows the FDA to quarantine a geographic area, blocking the distribution of suspect food to the rest of the country. And the FDA would gain access to records at farms and food production facilities.
Under the legislation, the food agency will get new enforcement powers and be able to impose beefed-up civil and criminal penalties. One provision allows the FDA to declare food "adulterated" simply if the grower or manufacturer has failed to follow safety standards, regardless of whether the food is actually tainted.
The bill does not address the fractured nature of U.S. food regulation, which is spread among 15 federal agencies, as well as thousands of state and local health departments.
Agriculture interests were able to win key concessions. Small farms are exempt from registration fees, ranchers and farmers now regulated by the Agriculture Department are excluded from the requirements of the bill and the FDA will have to consider the special concerns of small growers and organic farmers, among other provisions.
Brazil reports British shipments to toxic waste body
Brazil has reported Britain to the top international body overseeing the trade in hazardous waste over allegations it exported hundreds of tonnes of household rubbish, a Brazilian diplomat said on Friday.
The move followed the discovery in recent weeks of about 1,400 tonnes of British household waste in Brazil that appeared to have been illicitly exported under the guise of recyclable plastic.
The report was lodged with the secretariat of the Basel Convention, an agreement signed by 172 countries which regulates the cross-border movements and disposal of hazardous waste.
It was set up in the 1990s as a response to a growing wave of toxic waste dumping in eastern Europe and developing countries, mainly by private firms from industralised nations.
"Since both countries are part of the Basel Convention, we gave the secretariat the information that we found ... and now we hope that Britain will come up with a solution to the problem," the diplomat, who declined to be named, told AFP.
"The secretariat can act as a mediator or send experts to check on the denuncation, and what normally happens in these situations is that Britain removes this hazardous waste from Brazil," he added.
The diplomat said there had been full cooperation from British authorities, as both countries investigated who was responsible for both exporting and importing the waste.
The waste included used disposable nappies, syringes, condoms, batteries, food remains, used packages of cleaning products and cloth, according to Brazilian news reports and images taken during an inspection by Brazil's state environmental agency IBAMA.
However the containers, which had been unloaded in three southern ports in Brazil, had been marked as containing only plastic for recycling.
Britain's Environment Agency said on Sunday plans were being laid to bring back the 89 containers of rubbish that had allegedly been illegally exported.
The move followed the discovery in recent weeks of about 1,400 tonnes of British household waste in Brazil that appeared to have been illicitly exported under the guise of recyclable plastic.
The report was lodged with the secretariat of the Basel Convention, an agreement signed by 172 countries which regulates the cross-border movements and disposal of hazardous waste.
It was set up in the 1990s as a response to a growing wave of toxic waste dumping in eastern Europe and developing countries, mainly by private firms from industralised nations.
"Since both countries are part of the Basel Convention, we gave the secretariat the information that we found ... and now we hope that Britain will come up with a solution to the problem," the diplomat, who declined to be named, told AFP.
"The secretariat can act as a mediator or send experts to check on the denuncation, and what normally happens in these situations is that Britain removes this hazardous waste from Brazil," he added.
The diplomat said there had been full cooperation from British authorities, as both countries investigated who was responsible for both exporting and importing the waste.
The waste included used disposable nappies, syringes, condoms, batteries, food remains, used packages of cleaning products and cloth, according to Brazilian news reports and images taken during an inspection by Brazil's state environmental agency IBAMA.
However the containers, which had been unloaded in three southern ports in Brazil, had been marked as containing only plastic for recycling.
Britain's Environment Agency said on Sunday plans were being laid to bring back the 89 containers of rubbish that had allegedly been illegally exported.
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