Paraquat ban would increase production cost by 129% in Brazil

Worried about how this would hurt the Brazilian agricultural production, the federal representative Sérgio Souza requested a public hearing. The meeting occurred last Wednesday (11.04) at the Agriculture Commission of the House of Representatives and relied on the presence of several leaders of the sector.

For Souza, the issue is extremely important and will have an impact on the prices charged to the final consumer: “Brazil is a tropical country, where there is production all over the year. Without products such as paraquat, the production will get expensive. At the end of the hearing, we have forwarded a guidance to Anvisa in the sense of maintaining the use of this molecule in the country. Because that is an defense for rural producers.”

According to the National Union of the Industry of Crop Protection Products (Sindiveg), paraquat does not represent risk to human health when used according to the approved recommendations. The herbicide, used as desiccant, has other functions such as increasing soil biodiversity.

Being economical is also an advantage, because it is off-patent. That guarantees a low price to the final consumer. According to Fernando Adegas, a researcher of Embrapa Soja, the farmer would have an additional cost of R$ 407 million in case that Paraquat is banned.