Pesticides are chemicals that you want to handle carefully. Part of being able to do that is reading the label and information available about safety procedures. In the past, pesticide companies had a label that explained best practices, and a safety data sheet (SDS) available, which contained technical information about the pesticide’s physical properties and emergency handling.
However, the federal government’s changes at the beginning of June to the Pest Control Products Act now make it optional for pesticide companies to provide SDS at all. Advocacy groups say that the move leaves agricultural workers at risk.
“It’s very disappointing what the government is doing, because the safety data sheet really makes a difference when it comes to the well-being and protection of agricultural workers. The safety data sheets explain re-entry time when you spread the pesticides, what to do in case of being exposed to pesticides, and the chemicals that are inside,” said Santiago Escobar, national representative at United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Canada.
Some pesticides stipulate that there should be a window of eight to 48 hours before agricultural workers re-enter a sprayed area. This is information that would be found on the SDS.
“If workers don’t have that information, and if they receive orders from supervisors or the employer that they have to spread out the pesticide… we have videos of while the greenhouse is packed with, say, 30 workers picking tomatoes of cucumbers, someone is also spreading pesticide, and all the workers inside the greenhouse are not wearing personal protective equipment, so it’s very problematic,” said Santiago.
The concerns raised about SDS sheets point to bigger issues with how pesticide application and worker safety are treated in agriculture.
“We have done many surveys for all workers, all migrant workers, all agricultural workers, including local workers, and the knowledge of pesticides is zero. They don’t know what they are handling. They don’t know re-entry times, especially when it comes to greenhouses.”
This isn’t just a local issue, the group notes, as it extends across the country.
“What I’m telling you is happening as we speak now, unfortunately, across Canada. So, the employer can say, ‘Because we didn’t receive the safety data sheet, we don’t know how to handle it.’ The sprayer doesn’t know how to handle it. Nobody knows, because this safety sheet is not attached to the pesticides,” said Santiago.
It is a common malpractice he has seen across the country. He expects the changes to make SDS optional will worsen the situation for agricultural workers.
Health Canada declined to comment on why regulations were changed, but did provide some context.
“Pesticide labels already serve as the primary and legally required source of safety information. Under the Pest Control Products Regulations, all pest control products must undergo a rigorous pre-market review, and as a condition of registration, each product must carry an approved label. These labels provide comprehensive instructions on the safe handling, use, storage, and disposal of the product,” Marie-Pier Burelle, spokesperson for Health Canada, said in a statement to The Observer.
There are skeptics of the timing of these regulation changes, as they come less than three weeks before a hearing between Health Canada and UFCW Canada.
Last year, UFCW Canada, represented by Ecojustice lawyers, launched a lawsuit for Health Canada’s previous failures to protect agricultural workers by not enforcing the safety data sheet requirements under the federal Pest Control Products Act.
Changes to the Act meant that the lawsuit had no grounds to continue since pesticide companies no longer have to provide SDS.
“We were ready to have our day in court, and so it’s certainly disappointing that at the 11th hour they made those changes,” said Ian Miron, the Ecojustice lawyer working on the case.
He is puzzled by the reason for the amendments, especially considering that pesticides are now among the few groups of chemicals that do not have an SDS requirement.
“This is a standard basic safety information requirement. Certainly pesticides have other information provided with them on their labels, but those labels don’t include information about some of the longer-term health impacts,” said Miron, adding that if a worker wakes up with a rash or other health issue, they might not know what they used that could have caused that at the workplace.
“There’s potentially a very large gap right there where there’s just no way to know, and there’s no way to link the exposure back to the specific chemical.”
