Such is the power of routine usage, that the word ‘pesticide’ is now taken completely for granted. It means, of course, ‘a killer of pests’ and thus carries the unspoken presumption that everything it kills must, therefore be a ‘pest’. This is, of course, very far from the truth: the greater part of any toxic substance spread on the land fails to find its target, but deals death and destruction to all manner of other living things that are inevitably exposed to it. Those who profit from the sale of these chemicals are only rarely called to account to clear up the mess or restore the habitat their products destroy and so - often with taxpayer-funded subsidies - they are free to operate their ‘crop protection racket’ along the same lines as drug pushers: dominate the market, create dependency and tolerate no competition.
Posted on: Mon, 17 Mar 2014 11:17:20 +0000
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