The government official said a research conducted by Anvisa showed that the global use of agrotoxics increased 93% between 2000 and 2010, while in Brazil it increased 190%.

Besides, the website of the Rural Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) of Brazil reported this week that new data was revealed on the impacts of this model imposed on Brazilian agriculture.

During the same press conference the responsible for labor and environmental health of the Ministry of Health, Guilherme Franco Netto, estimated that in 2011 there were nearly 8,000 cases of intoxication by agrotoxics in Brazil, although it is estimated that the figure could be much higher because of the cases that are not reported.

These studies also showed that the most vulnerable people to agrotoxic contamination are “young adults” between 20 and 49 years and children, who usually get intoxicated by accident.

Meanwhile, Brazilian professor Larissa Mies Bombardi recently published a study called: Intoxication and death for agrotoxics in Brazil: The new version of oligopolic capitalism, which is quoted by the MST.

She explains the organization model used by the agribusiness corporations and says that in the Brazilian countryside these corporations have installed a “form of silent violence” because of the intoxication caused by the use of this agriculture poison.

The study shows that 92% of the corporations operating in the country are controlled by foreign capitals: Swiss companies Syngenta and Novartis; US Dupont and Dow Chemical; German Bayer and Basf, and Dutch-Israeli company Milenia.

Photo: www.mst.org.br