Editor’s note: This commentary is by Amy Cochran, of Montgomery Center, who is a retired chemistry teacher and farmer. She developed an environmental illness when farming and ultimately had to give up her 12-acre vegetable farm in East Berkshire.
[E]very Vermonter understands the joy and relief that accompanies the arrival of spring. Finally, birds singing, longer days, and the sweet smell of fresh spring air. Increasingly, however, this spring sweetness is met with the bitter reminder that half a billion gallons of farm septic waste will be deposited in Franklin County alone. The formerly earthy smell of animals, hay and balanced fertilization of the land has been replaced with the pungent smell of a witch’s brew of fresh manure, urine, chemical waste products, partially decomposed animals, rotten silage and anything else that has lost its usefulness. By combining these products into a careless watery slurry and allowing them to ferment and chemically react, the byproducts form a toxic stew that is released into the air upon spreading and ultimately settling into the soil. Half a billion gallons of untreated septic waste unregulated added components manure is an egregious and dangerous situation. The surrounding population breathes in the air, unaware of the potential dangers.
There are alternative practices that are known to improve this situation, such as manure injection. Sadly, few factory farms can afford to make such changes when competing with farms exercising unregulated behaviors, despite the potential long-term effects on the community. Similarly, medical personnel are wary of offending powerful economic and political forces that present themselves as defenders of “small dairy farms.” Nonetheless, recent scientific publications have described a condition called “dung lung.” Regarding dung lung, these researchers state: “the use of liquid manure storage facilities it poses several serious threats: toxic gas inhalation, asphyxiation, aspiration of liquid manure, and infection. Hydrogen sulfide poisoning in a manure storage pit resulted in three deaths. Two of the persons who died had massive aspiration of liquid manure; the third had severe pulmonary edema but had not aspirated manure.”
When one has to wear a mask while this manure is being spread, not only because of the smell but the potential transmission of deadly mycotoxins (fungi which are very resistant to many medications), and unknown organic substances, perhaps we should be asking about the responsibility of farmers to be good stewards of the land and good neighbors. Especially those neighbors who are elderly or young children. Pope Francis recently published an encyclical describing the immorality of not properly caring for the gifts of creation.
Though this topic often stirs anger, it is important to recognize that the farmers themselves are not to blame.
Unfortunately, the dangers do not end with manure spreading. The unannounced use of herbicides on the thousands of acres of corn throughout Vermont affect those living alongside these fields, especially those in the valleys, where such airborne toxins can accumulate due to wind drift. Roundup (which was once lauded as “perfectly safe”) is now mired in a national lawsuit brought by individuals who have developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma due to exposure to this toxin. In early 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer warned that the weed killer glyphosate (the active ingredient in Roundup) was a probable carcinogen. Monsanto, the company that produces both Roundup and the requisite seeds resistant to glyphosate, failed to adequately inform the public about the potential cancer risk; as a result, financial compensation may be available through a Roundup lawsuit for individuals diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, multiple myeloma, leukemia and other cancers. (See more at: http://www.youhavealawyer.com/roundup/#sthash.OuAJ7uwh.dpuf
http://www.youhavealawyer.com/roundup/ )
Roundup as well as atrazine and 2,4,5T (a component of Agent Orange) are combined to increase the potency of weed killers. Studies have shown that the combination of these chemicals creates a synergistic effect on the toxicity. For many, it is unimaginable that public signposts are not federally mandated, which would enable neighbors to close windows and keep pets, children and themselves protected. While the electric company must post signs and notify people of weed control plans, agricultural business giants are not required to notify the public despite using a comparably enormous amount of the same or worse toxins.
Though this topic often stirs anger, it is important to recognize that the farmers themselves are not to blame. They too have been exploited, given encouragements to expand, build enormous lagoons and spread toxins, with false assurances of the safety of these methods. However, with increasing information on the dangers of such practices, the continuation of these practices is not sustainable. Injection of toxic wastes is an option, along with notification of neighbors during spreading. These are small steps toward the ultimate goal of maintaining earth-friendly farming practices to allow Vermont to continue its beautiful legacy long into the future.
