Geneva, May 2025: On Friday, the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Stockholm Convention adopted the decision to list chlorpyrifos in Annex A of the Convention with time-limited specific exemptions, thereby agreeing to the global elimination of uses of this highly hazardous pesticide. Parties tripled the number of exemptions from the seven uses originally recommended by the Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee (POPRC) to 22 uses, without the POPRC experts’ review.

Chlorpyrifos is an organophosphate pesticide known for its damaging effects on the human nervous system. Chlorpyrifos is highly toxic, and there is strong evidence in humans that prenatal exposure causes adverse effects on neurodevelopment, and that there is no safe dose of exposure. According to the 2024 PAN Consolidated List of Bans, the chemical is already banned in at least 44 countries across the globe.

Dr Emily Marquez, Senior Scientist, PAN North America, highlighted, “PAN advocated for listing chlorpyrifos with no exemptions, as we’ve campaigned for decades to stop the use of this dangerous pesticide. The POPRC experts discuss the scientific evidence supporting any specific exemptions requested by Parties. Instead, Parties wishing to dodge the POPRC’s process submitted their requests during the COP, and these were accepted without any evaluation. PAN urges all Parties to respect the scientific committee’s guidancem because protecting the scientific integrity of the POPRC process protects the Convention’s integrity. That is our guarantee to protect us and future generations from the impacts of persistent organic pollutants“.

Jayakumar Chelaton, Chair, PAN International, said, “The years of work of members and regional centres along with PAN International across the globe with communities impacted and poisoned by chlorpyrifos got a promise of a toxic-free future from the Stockholm Convention this week. The promise is, however, blurred by a few countries that added exemptions without review for protecting companies’ profits, thus weakening science-based decision-making. We failed to protect the future for our children. We urge countries that care for people to stop all uses and uphold listing in the Stockholm Convention Annex A without any exemptions”.

Alia Diyana, Project Coordinator of PAN Asia Pacific, also reflected, “This hard-won progress is overshadowed by last-minute requests for additional exemptions, despite the availability of safer alternatives. These exemptions continue to put people at risk, especially in parts of Asia where chlorpyrifos is still being used. With its persistent and bioaccumulative nature, chlorpyrifos does not stay within borders. It moves through the environment, enters women’s breast milk, and harms babies’ brain development even before birth”.

Maimouna DIENE, Coordinator, PAN Africa, said, “More than 95% of pesticides now being used in East Africa to fight locust swarms are scientifically proven to cause harm to humans and other organisms such as birds and fish. Half of the locust control pesticides delivered in East Africa contain chlorpyrifos, a pesticide linked to brain damage in children and fetuses, and wipes out honey bees and pollinators, which is banned in the EU”.

“In Latin America, chlorpyrifos has been banned in Colombia, Peru, Nicaragua, Chile and Argentina, and there are wide examples that agroecological alternatives exist ”, said Maria Carcamo from RAPAL Uruguay and Fernando Bejarano from RAPAM Mexico. They added ”the list of exemptions for the global elimination of this neurotoxic insecticide grows as requested by countries like Uruguay to control some pests in maize, and Costa Rica, for the use in pineapple, despite documented alternatives existing”.

Dileep Kumar, CEO, PAN India, highlighted, “The approach by a few parties requesting more exemptions despite having effective and viable alternatives, bypassing the scientific assessment and process followed by the POPRC, is more than disappointing. We urge Parties that have requested exemptions to start implementing non-chemical alternatives and agroecology-based farming practices to eliminate the use of chlorpyrifos as soon as possible. Otherwise, this will reduce the burden of this chemical on farmers, consumers, children, as well as the environment”.

As we transition the week from Stockholm Convention negotiations to the negotiations of the Rotterdam Convention, another important convention that requires Informed consent and restriction in the trade of hazardous chemicals, PAN-International requests all parties to list Chlorpyrifos under Annex 3 of the Rotterdam Convention.

ENDS

Editors’ Notes:

• Pesticide Action Network (PAN) is a network of over 600 participating nongovernmental organisations, institutions and individuals in over 90 countries working to replace the use of hazardous pesticides with ecologically sound and socially just alternatives. PAN was founded in 1982 and has five independent, collaborating Regional Centres that implement its projects and campaigns. https://pan-international.org/
• The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants is a multilateral environmental agreement to protect human health and the environment from chemicals, known as POPs Stockholm Convention – Home page (pops.int)

For further information, please contact:

• Dr Emily  Marquez, Senior scientist, PANNA: emily@panna.org  
• Jayakumar Chelaton, Chairperson, PAN International: jayakumar.c@gmail.com 
• Alia Diyana, Project Coordinator, PAN Asia Pacific: alia@panap.net 
• Manon Rouby, Co-coordinator, PAN International : manon@pan-uk.org 
• Tadesse Amera, Co-coordinator, PAN-International: tadesse@panna.org 
• Fernando Bejarano, RAPAM : coordinacion@rapam.org
• María Cárcamo, RAPAL Uruguay: coord@rapaluruguay.org
• Dileep Kumar, CEO, PAN India: dileep@pan-india.org
• Maimouna Diene, Director, PAN Africa: maimounadiene@pan-afrique.org

Pesticide Action Network International is a global network with 600 citizens groups working towards eliminating the impact of highly hazardous pesticides and advancing food production with agroecology.

We face a multitude of problems which are now compounded by the severity of the ecological crisis, acknowledged by the UN and many experts. A contributing factor to this crisis is the current agricultural practices of monocultural production that encourages the overuse of fertilizers and highly hazardous pesticides which reduce biodiversity and soil fertility, contaminate the environment and adversely impact human health.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) recognize the need for sustainable food production and resilient agricultural practices in reducing hunger. Targets under goal 2 include ensuring genetic diversity of seeds and other genetic resources. This new goal and associated targets clearly puts as a priority the needs for more ecological solutions for food production that protects biodiversity and increases productivity. Moreover, consumer demand and support for such safe ecologically-produced food is also increasing in both developed and developing countries providing impetus for farmers to produce food ecologically. In 2013 the UN Special Rapporteur on Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter emphasized that “agroecological methods have been shown to improve food production and farmers’ incomes, while at the same time protecting the soil, water, and climate” as well as to protect the “right to food” of the most marginalised groups.

In reality, we already have millions of women and men farmers in all countries already practicing sustainable agroecological farming, showing that it is possible to reduce pesticide use, increases yields and profit, and to improve food security/ sovereignty, farmer health, biodiversity and resilience to climate change. However despite their proven success, these methods are still not the norm for agricultural production. The challenge for the global community is to magnify their efforts and mainstream these proven sustainable production methods. We also like to suggest the need for an indicator on the number of countries that have taken action to identify and replace HHPs.

We believe the importance of SAICM contributions to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, in particular Goal #2 Target 4 on sustainable food production systems and resilient agricultural practices lies in the need to have concerted work to progressively phase out the highly hazardous pesticides and advance agroecological food production. Tonight PAN is releasing its new book on “Replacing HHPs with Agroecology” which we believe will assist countries to meet Goal 2, to “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture”. Further we believe that meeting this goal would be greatly facilitated by this conference taking concrete steps to assist countries to phase out HHPs and replace them with safer alternatives particularly agroecological practices.

Open letter to Mr Achim Steiner, Executive Director of UNEP, Dr José Graziano da Silva, FAO Director-General of FAO, and Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of WHO on the occasion of the fourth session of the International Conference on Chemicals Management

Many pesticides pose a threat to human health and the environment and result in heavy costs to societies. Due to their extensive use over a long period of time, highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs)^[1] are now widely dispersed throughout ecosystems globally. Pesticides are found in human bodies and other living organisms, food and water, soil, and in the air.

Early statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO) indicated that about 200,000 people were being killed worldwide and as many as 25 million agricultural workers in the developing world were suffering from occupational pesticide poisoning, every year.^[2] In the decades since that estimate, surveys have indicated that occupational poisoning is increasing.^[3] Official studies grossly underestimate these numbers. It is known that many children are poisoned by pesticides but there is no estimate of numbers.^[4] UNEP’s Global Chemical Outlook report points out that “Acute chemical poisoning data are highly variable and depend on the surveillance infrastructure in place in individual countries or regions”.^[5] WHO acknowledges that there are no reliable estimates of pesticide poisonings and that existing estimates likely significantly underestimate the global burden.^[6][7]

A recent meta-analysis of worldwide literature on pesticide self-poisoning resulted in a conservative estimate of suicides by pesticides accounting for approximately 33% of suicides globally.^[8] According to this WHO study restricting access to the means of suicide such as pesticides is a key element of suicide prevention efforts as pesticides are among the most common methods of suicide globally.

Further, Maximum Residue Limits, Acceptable Daily Intakes and Maximum Allowable Concentrations support a belief in “safe” levels of exposure that do not exist. Because of their inherent toxicity to humans and/or biological systems, the risks associated with HHPs cannot be managed safely, and thus ‘risk management’ approaches do not effectively prevent their disastrous effects on the health of humans and the environment, including the widespread disappearance of honeybees.^[9]

Current risk assessment is largely based on the idea that “the dose makes the poison.” However, recent advances in science have demonstrated that chronic exposure to low, so-called “non-toxic” doses and to mixtures means there is unacceptable uncertainty in identifying safe levels to exposure to carcinogens, reproductive toxins, neurodevelopmental toxins and endocrine disruptors.

Existing regulatory guidelines are insufficient for hazardous effects such as immunotoxicity, endocrine disruption and postnatal reproductive toxicity effects.

There is growing evidence that the health of future generations may be severely jeopardized by HHPs. The foetus and the newborn child are sensitive to the harmful effects of many pesticides and other environmental contaminants, which may irreversibly influence their developmental processes.

Our understanding of the many ways in which chemicals can affect humans and the environment is still unfolding. For instance, our understanding of the fact that environmental chemicals can interfere with hormone action has developed slowly over the past half-century,^[10] but is still insufficiently defined for regulatory systems to take appropriate action on them.

For the above reasons, it is ethically important for us, as concerned toxicologists and health professionals, to call for the immediate global elimination of HHPs. Their production, distribution and use must be stopped to protect our children and the succeeding generations from an impending toxic tragedy.

Signatories:

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^[1] For more on the definition and history of HHPs, please refer to the PAN International List of HHPs, available at https://pan-international.org/. The FAO/WHO Joint Meeting on Pesticide Management first used the term “HHPs”, and identified criteria for HHPs, which PAN since expanded to include important criteria missing from the JMPM definition, such as endocrine disrupting properties and inhalation toxicity.

^[2] Jeyaratnam, J. (1990): Acute Pesticide Poisoning: A Major Global Health Problem. World Health Statistics Quarterly 43, no. 3 (1990): 139-44.

^[3] The figure of 25 million was based on an average of 3 percent of agricultural workers in low-income countries suffering one episode of pesticide poisoning per year. However recent surveys show that figure may be very much higher now, with, for example, acute occupational pesticide poisoning amongst young male Korean farmers reported to be 24.7%. [Lee WJ, Cha ES, Park J, Ko Y, Kim HJ, Kim J. (2012): Incidence of acute occupational pesticide poisoning among male farmers in South Korea. Am J Ind Med 55(9):799-807.]

^[4] Watts M. (2013): Poisoning Our Furure: Children and Pesticides. Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific, Penang.

^[5] Prüss-Ustün et al. (2011): Knowns and unknowns on burden of disease due to chemicals: a systematic review. Environmental Health 2011, 10:9. See also: United Nations Environment Programme (2015): Global Chemicals Outlook Towards Sound Management of Chemicals, p. 57. United Nations Pubns, 2015.

^[6] Thundiyil, J.G., Stober, J., Besbelli, N., Pronczuk, J. (2008). Acute Pesticide Poisoning: A Proposed Classification Tool. Bulletin of the World Health Organization. Available from http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/86/3/07-041814/en/.

^[7] Goldman. L. (2004). Childhood Pesticide Poisoning: Information for Advocacy and Action. United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health Organization. Available from http://www.who.int/ceh/publications/pestpoisoning.pdf

^[8] WHO (2014): Preventing Suicide: A Global Imperative. World Health Organization, Geneva.

^[9] Some of the target sites of pesticides (proteins and enzymes) have been conserved throughout the evolution of species and can be found in very different organisms, for example humans, fruit flies, yeast and bacteria. Thus it is not surprising that some pesticides are toxic for non-target species.

^[10] Endocrine Society (2015): Position Statement: Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in the European Union. http://www.endocrine.org/~/media/endosociety/Files/Advocacy%20and%20Outreach/Position%20Statements/2015/Position_Statement_EDC_EU.pdf