 Large-scale
industrial farms pose enormous environmental and public health
risks due to their contribution to air, groundwater, soil and
light pollution and their overuse of inputs such as antibiotics,
pesticides and synthetic growth hormones. Though serious
questions about this system of farming have been raised by
scientists and researchers around the world, public health and
environmental safety advocates remain saddled with the burden of
providing scientific proof of harm before these industries can
be regulated, reigned in, or even properly analyzed by our
government.
An Alternative
The precautionary principle offers an alternative. It says that
“when an activity raises threats of harm to human health
or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken, even
if some cause-and-effect relationships are not fully established
scientifically.” i It requires the producer of
a questionable product or substance to prove that it is safe
before it can be used. Currently in the United States, harm must
be scientifically proven before a product is taken off the
market. The precautionary principle allows the public to shift
that burden of proof to the polluter without having complete
certainty of harm. If there is some question about the safety of
a new product, that item’s production can be halted to
protect society until it is proven to be safe.
One of the most important examples of precautionary
principle in action comes from the Rio Declaration from the 1992
United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. The
Declaration, which the United States signed, stated:
“In order to protect the
environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied
by States according to their capabilities. Where there are
threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full
scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for
postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental
degradation.” ii
Based on a German environmental concept first developed
in the early 1970s called Vorsorgeprinzip, the
precautionary principle has been used widely in Europe to guide
policy makers’ decisions regarding environmental and
health issues, and it serves as the foundation of the EU’s
environmental policy. iii Europe is widely considered
the leader in terms of its use of the precautionary principle,
however Canada has also taken significant steps regarding its
use, and since 2003 the Canadian government has applied the
concept to the development of every policy involving risk, harm
or scientific uncertainty. San Francisco’s municipal
environmental regulations are based on the principle, as is
Massachusetts’ state Toxic Use Reduction legislation. iv
Even though the concept of precaution can be found in the
Occupational Safety and Health Act, the Food Drug and Cosmetic
act, and Environmental Protection Agency regulations, v
the United States still lags far behind Europe in its commitment
to the precautionary principle in national policy-making.
Because the application of this principle would require
businesses to put human and environmental health before economic
gain, many industries associate precautionary principle with
financial loss. Lobbyists for agribusiness and food
corporations, and senators and representatives from states with
significant numbers of industrial farms are therefore motivated
to work against the widespread implementation of this principle.
Sustainable Solutions
Ultimately, the precautionary principle is a logical choice for
those who are forced to deal with the consequences of their own
actions. Perhaps if the agriculture industry was forced to clean
up its pollution itself, (rather than passing the cost of
cleanup onto taxpayers and society),
it would choose to implement the precautionary principle.
Sustainable farmers inherently use the precautionary
principle because they are tied to the land, their communities,
the welfare of their animals, and are therefore aware of the
immediate and long term consequences of their actions. The
sustainable methods they use have been feeding people for
centuries, and have proven to be beneficial not only to the
farmer, but also to the animals s/he raises, the environment,
the surrounding community and society at large.
What you can do
- Encourage your representatives
to order bans and phase outs of dangerous substances and
practices. Tell them to support the use of the precautionary
principle in setting policies governing agriculture.
- Support farms that have reduced
pollution at the source by moving to organic and sustainable
practices. Don’t gamble on your health or the health of
your loved ones by buying from corporations willing to put
their profits ahead of your safety. Learn more at Sustainable Table.
- Find a farm near you using the Eat
Well Guide. Just enter your zip code to locate farms, stores,
restaurants and bed & breakfasts serving sustainably-raised
meat and dairy products.
For more information
- Science and Environmental Health Network
(SEHN)
SEHN was founded in 1994 by a consortium of North American
environmental organizations (including Environmental Defense,
The Environmental Research Foundation, and OMB Watch) concerned
about the misuse of science in ways that failed to protect the
environment and human health. Since 1998, SEHN has been the
leading proponent in the United States of the Precautionary
Principle as a new basis for environmental and public health
policy.
- Towards A More Precautionary and More
Scientific Approach to Risk Assessment: A Consumer Perspective
on Food Safety.
A speech by Edward Groth III, PhD of Consumers Union to the
World Congress on Medicine and Health in Hannover, Germany,
August 2000.
- Rachel's
Environment & Health News is a publication of the
Environmental Research Foundation, a clearinghouse of news and
resources for environmental justice, which provides
understandable scientific information about human health and
the environment.
Sources
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