Sradev Nigeria at NGO Advocacy and Capacity-Building Campaign Meeting on EU Pesticides Export Ban
By Aminat Ibrahim, SRADeV Nigeria
Following a series of online meetings towards hazardous chemicals and pesticide export ban, the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) hosted a face-face Advocacy and Capacity-building Campaign meeting with NGOs from the global south in Brussels, Belgium between the 12th – 14th July, 2023.
Stakeholders and partners at the event consisted of EEB consultants, the EU Parliament and NGO representatives such as SRADeV Nigeria, Community Action Against Plastic Waste (CAPws), Center for Public Health and Environmental Development (CEPHED), Journalists for Human Rights (JHRMK), PAN Europe, Nanny Africa; across countries including Nigeria, Cameroon, Zambia, Benin, Senegal, Sierra-Leone, Kenya, South Africa, North Macedonia, Nepal, India and Vietnam.
The first two days of the hybrid event were an avenue for partners to share experiences on activities carried out in their organizations, building communication capacities, providing support on database information and also review and analyze a joint campaign to ban the export of hazardous chemicals in the form of pesticides to the global south.
As part of the agenda for the event, there was a visit to the European Parliament on the 14th of July to lend a voice to introduce a mechanism prohibiting the production and/or exportation of hazardous pesticides already banned in the EU- to protect non-EU countries from their negative effects on humans and the environment.
Dr. Leslie Adogame, the Executive Director of Sustainable Research and Action for Environmental Development (SRADeV Nigeria), attended the meeting as a Global South representative. In his speech at the Parliament House, he called for the need to work on the three pillars of the framework for sustainable development (people, environment and profit). The GAIA Africa member representative also reminded the relevance of discontinuing to place profit over the health of people and the environment and that what is not good for the global north can never be good for the global south.
Dr. Leslie finished by making an appeal, as quoted below:
“I hereby make this appeal on behalf of all Nigerians towards not just the ban of export of these chemicals from EU-member states to the global south but also to stop the production of these chemicals and pesticides in entirety. AS INJUSTICE TO ONE IS INJUSTICE TO MILLIONS.”
As part of the next steps to back up the Parliament visit, a regulation to “Stop Toxic Exports” was also proposed to support the reduction of waste dumping in global south countries.
ENDS