Responding to the charge that vegetables and fruits produced in Tamil Nadu were high on pesticides, Tamil Nadu’s Agriculture Minister R Vaithilingam told the TN Assembly on Friday that pesticide content in the produce is under permissible limits.
The New Indian Express reports that he said on the floor of the Assembly, “The presence of pesticide residue in vegetables at the national level stands at 2.7 per cent while in Tamil Nadu it is only one per cent — under the permissible limit. Mangoes, bananas and cucumber are being exported in large quantities to foreign countries. If there is pesticide residue in these items, how would they accept it.”
He was responding to a call attention motion raised by CPI and CPM legislators.
He pointed out that out of the 103 samples of cardamom from Kerala which were tested, 64 had pesticides above permissible limits.
Further, he stated that reports of the high pesticide residue in TN vegetables were motivated by the KAU’s interest in marketing their new veg-wash liquid product.
TNIE reports that,
Revealing that 800 tonnes of vegetables continued to be transported to Kerala in 250 trucks per day, the minister said the Kerala government never banned the flow of vegetables from Tamil Nadu but only insisted on transport of vegetables by licensed suppliers. Slamming the Kerala government for not getting Tamil Nadu’s concurrence for its field study in the state to detect presence of pesticides, the minister said TN government would ask Kerala to stop its officials from sounding unnecessary warnings and placing curbs over vegetables and fruits supplied there, citing unfounded suspicion.
It is also reported that the Minister said that it was improper for Kerala officials not to inform TN officials about their study.
Kerala government had earlier said that pesticides from Tamil Nadu were high on pesticide content, which lead to a controversy. You can read about it here.