Nigeria’s National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) on Wednesday, announced plans to ban the use of paraquat by farmers amid mounting evidence that the product hurts applicators and the environment.
The decision is coming at a time when new herbicides that are more safe and environmentally friendly are being registered in Africa’s most populous country.
A date for the ban has not been announced but it will happen very soon, according to Dr Bukar Usman, a director with NAFDAC, at the inauguration of Lifeline (a herbicide with the active ingredient, Glufosinate-ammonium) at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) in Ibadan on Wednesday.
“Paraquat has been banned in several countries and we can not continue to allow it to come into Nigeria, Other herbicides to be banned include atrazine,” Dr Usman said. Read more