Need to weed out spurious products

Sanjeev Singh Bariana

The Pesticide Management Bill, 2020, approved last month by the Union Cabinet, has generated a debate among various stakeholders. The Bill is aimed at regulating the pesticide trade and compensating farmers in case of losses caused by the use of spurious agro-chemicals.

“Provisions under the Bill need to be made strict for punishing manufacturers pushing in spurious pesticides,” says BS Rajewal, president of the Bharti Kisan Union (Rajewal).

“We only hear and read about raids on vendors. Any Act without teeth means nothing. There is no instance of exemplary action against makers of spurious pesticides in Punjab,” he says.

“Before passing the Bill, Parliament should also address all ways, including imports, through which the pesticides reach the market. There is a need for an inbuilt mechanism of quality checks before the product reaches the farmer,” Rajewal adds.

Government data shows that Punjab is the highest per-acre consumer of pesticides (0.74 kg), in the country, followed by Haryana (0.62 kg) and Maharashtra (0.57 kg). Paddy accounts for the maximum share of the pesticide use (26-28 per cent) in Punjab, followed by cotton (18-20 per cent) and vegetables (12 per cent).

A farmer from Jabewal (Ludhiana), Maninder Singh Gurm, says, “We are unaware of any strict action against manufacturers of spurious pesticides. There is no information about the inflow of pesticides from abroad which are known to have substandard material.”

A former dean of Postgraduate Studies, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, Prof Darshan Singh, says, “The draft Bill proposes to raise penalties on the manufacture and sale of prohibited/spurious pesticides to Rs 50 lakh and a jail term up to five years from the current fine of Rs 2,000 and jail term up to three years.”

Experts say that the new Bill proposes removal of the applicability of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. This will in a way favour decriminalisation of the agro-input manufacturing industry. This means that when the authorities could not control the trade of spurious pesticides even with a harsher criminal liability clause earlier, there were more chances of potential defaulters getting away with just simple fines under the new Act.

The managing director of a Ludhiana-based pesticide manufacturing company, requesting anonymity, says, “We know that farmers are getting spurious pesticides, mainly in smaller mandis of the state. At the same time, our country has sizeable number of companies which adhere to the government standards.”

“The law alone is not enough to check the sale of spurious products. Most of the poor farmers have no knowledge about the products’ contents. They depend on the arhtiyas,” he says.

A pesticide dealer from Dasuya (Hoshiarpur), Rajesh Gupta, says: “I have not read the Bill, so I can’t comment on it. I can only say that if the government stops the supply of spurious pesticides, there is no chance we could sell any. Yes, we cannot absolve ourselves of the responsibility of selling spurious products. However, sometimes we are unable to make out the quality of the product from what we are told about it by the sellers or what is written on the bags. Besides creating awareness among sellers, the job of checking quality will have to be done by the government.”

Pointing out pro-farmer provisions in the Bill, Prof Darshan Singh says, “There is a provision for cess to compensate farmers for losses due to the use of spurious/low-quality pesticides.” He opines that since the new Bill aims to rectify shortcomings in the Insecticide Act of 1968, the matter should be deliberated upon extensively and amendments considered before it is enacted.

It has also been suggested that state governments should be empowered to regulate the manufacture or use of pesticides in their jurisdiction keeping in view their respective environment/ecosystem requirements.

Agro-chemical business

Across the country, about 350 companies are engaged in the manufacturing of agro-chemicals and cater to the domestic market, which is pegged at around Rs16,000 crore annually for the organised sector. In Punjab, the annual sale of pesticides is around Rs1,500 crore. It is among the top five markets for agro-chemical firms in India (Haryana’s market is worth Rs1,200 crore). Punjab has witnessed sale of spurious insecticides and pesticides. The state had banned a company based at Dera Bassi and seized spurious, unauthorised and expired products worth crores of rupees.