Security and Prosperity? Can It!

Is it at all reasonable for a country whose health and safety oversight in defence of its population's health and security in the foodstuffs we grow and eat, and those products which we import, have its standards lowered to bring them more in line with a trading partner whose government appears to be less inclined toward protection of the consumer, more married to the support of the producer? If trade without compromising safety is of such moment, would it not make more sense, in the interests of streamlining trade, to adjust the deficient regulatory system to reflect the more stringent foodstuff requirements of the other?

Canada is currently in the throes of forging plans with the United States to simplify the process by which goods are inspected, accepted and transported across international boundaries in free trade. Canada's limits for pesticide content in agricultural products are stricter than those set by the United States in roughly 40% of the cases it regulates. News was released earlier that Canada is prepared to raise its allowable limits on pesticide residues for fruits and vegetables representing hundreds of products.

It's useful to know that, in 2005, the U.S. Government Accountability Office raised an alarm about corporate influence over the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, whose purpose it is, among other things, to regulate pesticides use. It's also illuminating to have pointed out that in 2004 no fewer than 60 leading scientists, including Nobel laureats and university presidents formally protested against the "misuse of science" under the Bush administration.

Now we learn that a partnership of pesticide reviews have been flagged as a 'key milestone' of the hitherto-secretive 2005 Security and Prosperity Partnership deal, signed on by Canada, Mexico and the U.S.; a broad-ranging plan hatched for the purpose of promoting trade by the streamlining of regulatory protocols across North America.

"Canada and the U.S. would split the workload" of reviewing pesticides, creating a simplified process for manufacturers to get their products approved in both countries, according to Richard Aucoin, chief registrar of the federal Pest Management Regulatory Agency in Canada. To my politically-untutored ear that sounds suspiciously like the consuming public is being thrown to the lions, while manufacturers are being given free rein to tamper with our food.

Yet Mr. Aucoin hastens to assure the Canadian consuming public that safety remains paramount for Canadian regulators. Sounds like it, doesn't it? Actually, sounds like political expediency, trying to please Big Brother and tossing the Canadian public into the lion's den of consuming potentially harmful, accumulative chemicals which we already have more than sufficient exposure to in our daily lives.

Even U.S. observers appear baffled by Canada's decision to rely more heavily on American reviews at a time when corporate influence over regulation in the U.S. has sparked a scientific protest. "Why would the Canadian people align themselves with a failed regulatory system?" is the response of Jay Feldman of the American environmental group Beyond Pesticides.

Well, yes. Why would the Canadian people agree to lowering our health standards in such an obviously vital area of human health and food consumption? Better yet, why would our government stoop so low as to curry favour with a neighbouring government with the certain knowledge that they will, as a result, be placing Canadian health and safety in a very vulnerable position.

Answers, please. Tony Clement? Stephen Harper? CAN YOU HEAR ME?