Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Tom Gilbert and the Highfields Center for Composting team of Hardwick.
Open letter to the Vermont community re: toxins in our food system
To the Vermont Community,
Many of you are aware that Green Mountain Compost (GMC), formerly Intervale Compost, has ceased sales and recalled compost from retail outlets due to the presence of two persistent herbicides in some of its products. The composting community is extremely concerned by the contaminations at GMC and is actively investigating all potential sources of the contamination, with support from the Agency of Agriculture and the Agency of Natural Resources, as well as a nationwide support network.
One herbicide in particular, picloram, is extremely persistent (active up to five years). What has been found in GMC’s compost is only a small fraction of the total amount of this herbicide that is used and will continue to persist in farm soils, lawns, and in the environment for years to come.
Compost and composting plays a vital role in replacing the use of agrochemicals and fertilizers, protecting water quality, preventing erosion, and offsetting greenhouse gas emissions from our food chain – we discard enough food scraps in Vermont to provide fertility to over 20,000 acres of mixed vegetables annually.
For those of you who use compost and have seen your farms and gardens flourish with its life-giving properties, this is a sad day. The careless use of a toxic agrochemical somewhere well upstream of GMC – or any other composting facility in the world for that matter – has the potential to make their way into your farms and gardens uninvited. In the larger context of our food system, the current herbicide issue makes it abundantly clear that our response to “contamination in compost” align with our statewide goals for composting as an integral part of our commitment to agriculture in Vermont.
Composting is an essential mechanism for developing food and farm systems that reflect ecological principles. Highfields is urging regulators to implement long-term solutions. We cannot allow the use of chemicals to undermine the best mechanism we have (composting) for recycling organic materials to grow local food, which in itself is a critical strategy to mitigate the use of agrochemicals, nor should we tolerate the accumulation of these substances in the environment. Highfields supports greater regulatory rigor, and as appropriate, the delisting of certain products on a national level.
In order to build a food system worthy of our grandchildren and great-grandchildren, we must stop poisoning and landfilling their inheritance. Compost and composting plays a vital role in replacing the use of agrochemicals and fertilizers, protecting water quality, preventing erosion, and offsetting greenhouse gas emissions from our food chain – we discard enough food scraps in Vermont to provide fertility to over 20,000 acres of mixed vegetables annually.
As more information becomes available, it is our greatest hope that our community can rally toward the most effective outcomes possible in responding to this situation, and point our collective attention at the source and root cause of this issue: widespread use of toxics in our environment.
Thank you for helping to build a non-toxic food system.
