As the Executive Director of Long Island Farm Bureau, I must pick and choose our PR battles. However, last week’s letter to the editor on pesticides beckons an educational moment here. Most people have concerns on issues or perceptions where they don’t have direct control or knowledge. Such is the case with pesticides.
First of all, pesticides are “toxic”. That means they are designed to eradicate the pest. Toxicity is a relative term. There are materials whereby a grain of pesticide can kill a horse like arsenic, or lbs of a material may be necessary to kill a pest over a number of acres. People do not realize chlorine is a pesticide but we swim in it as it controls algae. Baking soda is a registered pesticide, yet we use it to brush our teeth or control odors in our refrigerators. There are thousands of pesticides, fungicides, rodenticides, insecticides, etc. approved by United States Environmental Protection Agency and NYS Department of Environmental Conservation for use by licensed professionals, including farmers. People should be concerned about their legal and proper uses. No one is more concerned than farmers, their families and their employees who are at the front line of exposure to these materials.
You must also recognize the benefits to Society for the use of these chemicals. Imagine living in cities where rodents such as rats spread bubonic plague. Or, every time you opened the cabinet cockroaches run out of your cereal boxes. Imagine growing crops or vineyards where you have invested tens of thousands of dollars to grow a crop only to have it destroyed by potato beetles, aphids, fungus and other pests. Farmers use chemicals the same way people use pharmaceuticals as medicines for diseases or illnesses.
Our farmers on Long Island are among the leaders in the United States utilizing the Agricultural Stewardship Program administered by Cornell Cooperative Extension, USDA, NRCS and SC Soil & Water Conservation Services. The Ag Stewardship program teaches farmers the very best agricultural management practices known to us based on sound science. Farmers are active environmentalists’ learning and using the best scientific principles not environmental activists who make noise but have no actual scientific knowledge. Old Polish proverb – empty heads make the most noise!!
Joe Gergela
Executive Director – LI Farm Bureau
In response to a "Letter to the Editor" in the November 12, 2009 edition of the Times Review newspaper titled "Stop the Spraying".