{"id":4025,"date":"2009-02-12T18:41:09","date_gmt":"2009-02-12T18:41:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetsave.com\/?p=4025"},"modified":"2009-02-12T18:41:09","modified_gmt":"2009-02-12T18:41:09","slug":"thailand-labels-ginger-12-other-herbs-as-hazardous-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetsave.com\/articles\/thailand-labels-ginger-12-other-herbs-as-hazardous-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"Thailand Labels Ginger, 12 Other Herbs as "Hazardous Plants""},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/h3>\n

Ginger and chilli are among the plants deemed “hazardous” by Thailand’s Department of Agriculture in a recent announcement.<\/h3>\n

[social_buttons]<\/p>\n

Instead of only regulating the toxic pesticides used by large-scale agriculture, Thailand’s new law mandates that the plants themselves should be treated as hazardous substances. Farmers take this to mean that even their small-scale organic farms must follow expensive safety regulations, or else face risk of jail time.<\/p>\n

Organic farmers are fighting back and threatening to sue the government if the list is not removed from the law.<\/p>\n

“The committee listed the 13 traditional Thai herbs without consulting those who would be hardest hit, who are the farmers, not large-scale hazardous chemical pesticide producers,” said Witoon Lianchamroon<\/a>, founder of an NGO organic farmer association called Biothai<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Biothai, the Southern Alternative Agriculture Network<\/a>, and other groups view the list as a direct manipulation of law to benefit large-scale agricutlure and hurt subsistence farmers, grassroots agriculture, and the organic movement. They have given the Thai government one week to retract the list before filing a lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The 13 herbs and plants are vital in traditional Thai cooking and are clearly not hazardous: ginger, chilli, neem, lemongrass, turmeric, Chinese ginger, African marigold, Siam weed or bitter bush, tea seed cake,\u00a0 Chinese celery, ringworn bush, glory lily, and stemona.<\/p>\n

Rachada Singalavanija, director-general of the Industrial Works Department, tried to assure the farmers that the law was not directed at them, but towards chemical and pesticide-using farms.<\/p>\n

Photo Credit: Harris Graber<\/a> on Flickr under Creative Commons license.<\/address>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ginger and chilli are among the plants deemed “hazardous” by Thailand’s Department of Agriculture in a recent announcement. [social_buttons] Instead of only regulating the toxic pesticides used by large-scale agriculture, Thailand’s new law mandates that the plants themselves should be treated as hazardous substances. Farmers take this to mean that even their small-scale organic farms […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1457,26336,33542,34556],"spectra_custom_meta":{"social_buttons":["digg, reddit, yahoo"],"tweet_this_url":["getnew"],"dsq_thread_id":["145092987"],"_oembed_aa20535cb8511d381766a04c2f7b642f":["