Killers of silence !

My next blog in the series 'With a cause !! :)' will be about the effect of pesticides and insecticides.

First of all I thought, the topic can be given as 'Shiva or Yama' through which I wanted to imply that these chemicals which were initially used for destroying have turned out to be killers. This has become a worrisome change.

Coming to the point, lets see what are these chemicals and what are they being used for.
Each crop has a particular pest which hinders its growth. These pests can either be microbes or insects. To prevent the attack of these organisms on the plants, many chemicals are being used. These chemicals are called as pesticides and insecticides.

Eventhough these insecticides and pesticides have a positive impact i.e. it increases the growth of the plant by killing the unwanted organisms. It has 100s of negative impacts or the aftermath effects of these chemicals are numerous.

Let us look at a few suitable examples:

• During the 1930s, when the dutch elm disease struck the tall towering elm trees, the US government started praying the trees with DDT a powerful chemical which killed the Elm beetle. The aftermath effects were disastrous. The DDT killed almost one-third of the bald eagles in US

• The insecticides methyl parathion has been found to interfere with the legume-rhizobium chemical phenomenon. Reduction in this symbiotic relationship in turn results a decrease in nitrogen fixation and in turn a reduction in crop yield. But we need to remember that this root nodule formation saves the world economy almost $10 billion in synthetic nitrogen fertilizer every year.

Most of these chemicals are non water soluble and are hence carried away from one place to another easily. These chemicals mainly have three important characteristics namely persistence, bio accumulation and toxicity.

These are not degraded easily by physical and chemical phenomenon which renders them to be persistent in nature. These chemicals are also called as Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). Bio accumulation is the accumulation of hazardous chemicals along the food chain. It is estimated that bio accumulation at higher levels of the food chain is 70,000 more hazardous in nature.

The problems caused by these chemicals are numerous. These chemicals render the soil almost useless devoid of nutrients and kill the earthworms which help in composting. Mot of these chemicals are found to be carcinogenic in nature (cancer causing). In the case of pregnant women, these chemicals result in diseased newborns. Eventhough some chemicals like DDT and Endosulfan are banned throughout the world, it is not banned in our country raising questions regarding the health of people in this country.

It is found that India is the largest producer and consumer of endosulfan and an entire village Kasargod in Kerala is affected where even the ground water remains polluted. The aftermath effects are very bad which include deaths, deformed babies, many cancer affected people and so on.

It is indeed saddening to know that there is a train called ‘cancer train’ which runs from Bathinda in Bikaner in Rajasthan. This train is crowded with cancer patients seeking treatment in Bikaner. Ever since green revolution started in India, the yield has increased and at the same time, the effects of these chemicals have also increased

Punjab to

.

By understanding the effects of these chemicals, we need to look out for some alternatives like the organic farming otherwise the land will be unfit for use with a lot of diseased people.

The wealth of the country is not based on money, but based on it health of people and natural beauty. :)