Fight against pesticides in communities of color.
It's Thursday! Weeks go by much faster when we're not awaiting election results, am I right? Today we're diving back into our ongoing series on environmental justice. Renée joins us to unpack how pesticides are common in communities of color, and what we can do to take action. With yet another lawsuit against chlorpyrifos and the ongoing EPA rollbacks, I felt this is particularly relevant right now.
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TAKE ACTION
Urge your local representatives to support a ban on chlorpyrifos (U.S. residents only).
Have you considered pesticide usage in your community? Do you feel safe taking your child(ren) to playgrounds, public spaces, and zoos? Consider how privilege may influence whether or not you think about the air you breathe daily.
After reading this piece, consider: how can you take action in protecting farmworkers who are responsible for ensuring you have food daily?
Listen to and advocate for communities of color in your area that voice their concerns about contaminated water and air.
GET EDUCATED
By Renée Cherez (she/her)
Pesticides have a long history in communities of color in America, and like most issues that affect these communities, it is rooted in institutional racism.
Environmental justice activists continue to fight to keep poisonous and fatal pesticides like Roundup out of their communities, though the federal government approves them. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) continues to permit 85 pesticides that have been banned or are in transition in China, Europe, and Brazil; the other three nations use the highest amounts of pesticides (Environmental Health). There have also been recent lawsuits against companies that manufacture these pesticides, including Bayer, which have settled claims of $10 billion (Succesful Farming).
A pesticide is any substance used to kill, repel, or control certain forms of plant or animal life that are considered pests (NIH). When we think of pesticides, our minds may wander off to rural farmlands; however, toxic pesticides and herbicides are being used in major cities today, directly harming low-income Black and Brown communities. This past January, a disturbing report by The Black Institute discovered that of the 50 Manhattan parks treated with Roundup in 2018, 42 were in Harlem (The Black Institute). The same study also revealed that Brooklyn, with an 89% native Black population, is the most heavily sprayed borough in the entire state (The Black Institute).
Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup, is the most widely used herbicide to kill weeds and is classified as a “probable carcinogen” by the World Health Organization (Planet Watch). More infuriating, in 2017, Roy Wilkins Recreation Center in Queens, NY, located in a majority Black neighborhood, was treated with 100% glyphosate concentration (The Black Institute).
Not only are these toxins affecting the lives of Black and Brown families in these communities, but they also affect the employees responsible for applying them daily. Of the 203 NYC Parks Department staff members, 112 are Black or Latino (The Black Institute). This furthers the point that environmental racism is happening in real-time. Black and Brown communities bear the brunt of the exploitation of air and water by corporations and the federal government.
The spraying of these toxins on public grounds should be considered an act of terror similar to the spraying of Agent Orange in the American-Vietnam war. Most vulnerable to the life-altering health effects of pesticides are children and pregnant women, which can cause learning disabilities, congenital disabilities, asthma, increased rates of childhood leukemia, and autism (Philadelphia Inquirer). Editor’s note: This study has been questioned for its accuracy.
As the largest agricultural state, with over 700,000 farmworkers, California is unique in its fight for environmental justice against pesticides (Planet Watch). A key finding in a 2015 report found that more than half of the glyphosate used in California (54%) was applied in 8 of its most impoverished counties in the Southern Valley, including Tulare, Fresno, Merced, Del Norte, Madera, Lake, Imperial, and Kern (Center for Biological Diversity). The racial breakdown: 53% of residents in the eight counties identified as Latino or Hispanic, compared to 38% in the entire state (Center for Biological Diversity). Also worth noting, Hispanic children are 46% more likely to attend school nears pesticide dumping grounds than white children (The Black Institute).
Chlorpyrifos, a neurotoxin that kills insects by attacking their nervous systems, has widely affected the health of farm and migrant workers in California (Grist). After a two-day meeting with the EPA about banning the insecticide, groups representing farmworkers were censored, further proving environmental racism against the people responsible for getting food to the tables of Americans every day (ThinkProgress).
Because of the federal government’s lack of action, cities like Philadelphia are taking matters into their own hands by introducing bills that ban the use of toxic herbicides on all city or used public grounds (Philadelphia Inquirer). Earlier this year, California officially prohibited the selling and usage of Chlorpyrifos, which not only attacks the nervous system of those exposed but is also linked to brain damage in children (NPR).
How do communities of color withstand COVID-19, a respiratory virus, and bear the brunt of poisoned air? What consequence will pregnant Latina women farmworkers pay after daily pesticide exposure? What will it take for mainstream, white environmental organizations to make their work intersectional, including the needs of communities of color who carry the heaviest burden?
Effective environmental justice must safeguard communities as places where all people can live, work, and play without fear of exposure to toxic materials and conditions (The Black Institute). Clean air and water are not for the privileged but are a fundamental human right. The burden lies on white residents of communities to advocate for communities of color who continue to be silenced about the real harm they are experiencing.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup, is the most widely used herbicide and is classified as a “probable carcinogen” by the World Health Organization.
Hispanic children are 46% more likely to attend school nears pesticide dumping grounds than white children.
Exposure to the most common pesticides can cause adverse health effects.
RELATED ISSUES
10/23/2020 | Fight for environmental protections.
10/11/2020 | Support climate justice.
9/29/2020 | Learn about climate migration.
7/25/2020 | Study Hall! How to be a better ally, petitions, and plastics.
7/24/2020 | Reduce your plastic consumption.
7/12/2020 | Learn how air pollution exacerbates COVID-19.
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