A grim future for English carrots?

On their farm in Berkshire, England, Peter Gray’s family has been growing carrots and cabbage since the 19th century. But ever since the European Union parliament passed legislation that curbs the use of pesticides in EU member states, Gray worries that his days as a vegetable farmer may be numbered. "It’s diabolical," he said, referring to the new law. "It’s going to become impossible to grow certain crops in Britain anymore."

Approved by a sweeping majority of the European parliament Jan. 13 — and now awaiting confirmation in the European Commission — the legislation bans pesticides believed to pose serious health and environmental risks. "It represents major progress for ensuring less dangerous pesticides and consequently, that the food we eat is safer," said Hiltrud Breyer, a member of parliament for the German Green Party and a sponsor of the legislation.

But the change has led to an uproar from industrial farmers. In addition to contesting the EU’s methods for determining what is “safe,” farmers from Spain to Denmark have warned that their yields will drop — up to 40 percent for Spanish olives, for example — and force Europe to import more food.

The measure creates a list of approved pesticides that can be changed by agreement among the member states, while banning an estimated 22 that a Swedish research board deemed among the most dangerous — specifically those that contain substances believed to cause cancer and genetic mutation. It also allows for a future "cut-off" of compounds found to cause endocrine disruption. "They’ve got 22 convicted criminals, and a much longer list of suspects," said Per Kudsk, professor of pest management at the Danish Institute for Agricultural Studies.

The regulation comes harnessed to a directive — which in EU-parlance is more flexible than a regulation — that prohibits aerial spraying and limits pesticide use around schools, hospitals and water sources. Both are expected to be approved by the European Commission in March or April, and will go into effect 18 months later.

Environmentalists have hailed the vote. "After nearly three years of discussions the EU is just a heartbeat from eliminating dietary and occupational exposure to the worst carcinogenic and mutagenic pesticides," said Elliott Cannell, a spokesperson for the Pesticide Action Network. "This is fantastic for consumers concerned that 50 percent of food items sold in the EU currently contain pesticides."

But many critics are unhappy with the science behind the ban. Parliament’s Environmental Committee, which drafted the legislation, based its cut-off decision on an assessment of hazard — that is, on whether a compound contains substances known to harm human health — rather than on risk, or how the compound functions when it is actually applied.

"The EU hasn’t done an impact assessment," said Paul Chambers of Britain’s National Farmers Union, which opposed the regulation. "To shift to a hazard-based assessment — well, cars are hazardous. It depends on how you drive. If we applied the same standard to transport, nobody would be able to go anywhere."

Kudsk agrees that the methodology is problematic. "Even if triazoles are proven to be endocrine disruptors," he said, referring to a fungicide commonly used to treat grains like winter wheat, "does that mean that they have that impact on farmers using best agricultural practices in the field?"

But more than methodology, the impact of the regulation on yields worries farmers.

Danish apple production likely won’t survive the ban, said Kudsk. ASAJA, a Spanish agricultural organization, has warned of a 40 percent reduction in olive production. And one group of Dutch horticulturalists predicts that tulip yields will drop more than 90 percent.

Nowhere has the new legislation been greeted by more anxiety than in the U.K. and Ireland, where many observers worry that the regulation will force Europe to import much of the produce it now grows for itself. In fact, the local press has presented the regulation as nothing short of a vegetable apocalypse. "This Pesticide Ban is Poison," ran one headline in the UK’s Guardian. "Plan will Lead to Food Shortages and Send Rising Prices Higher, warned The Daily Mail. "End of the British Carrot?" asked the BBC.

Those grim predictions were repeated by Britain and Ireland’s members of the European parliament, who were among the few resisters to the measure (which passed by a margin of 577-61). And they have likewise been voiced by industry and agricultural organizations, like the Pesticide Safety Directorate, which has warned of a 100 percent reduction in yield for British carrots, which are particularly susceptible to a virulent weed called black grass that is commonly controlled by the soon-to-be banned pendimethalin.

"It’s a false dichotomy though, isn’t it?" asked Matt Liebman, an agronomy professor at the Iowa State University who specializes in sustainable agriculture. "They want you to believe that it’s either weeds or carrots. But those aren’t the only choices."

Indeed, Wales organic farmer and Soil Association director Patrick Holden noted that he has successfully been growing carrots without pesticides for years. He sees England’s greater resistance to the EU legislation as a result of its higher levels of industrialized agriculture.

"With an exacting program that combines stale seed beds, brush weeders, and hand-weeding, you can grow carrots quite successfully," he noted. "I know plenty of organic farmers who are achieving yields that are not that far away from conventional farmers."

But at his family farm in Berkshire, Peter Gray scoffs at that idea. "You can’t feed the world by hand-weeding," he said. "If people want their nice jobs in air-conditioned offices, they have to let farmers produce efficiently."