In an interview on the sidelines of a National Environmental Education (EE) workshop that ended here last Friday, Pete Hancock of Birds Botswana said carbofuran was outlawed in the European Union and the United States where it is manufactured by FMC Corporation in Philadelphia. However, the poison is exported to Africa where it is in use in a number of countries, including Botswana where it is available for sale in a number of agricultural outlets.
According to Hancock, some of the poison enters Botswana illegally from Zimbabwe and is sold on the black market.
Hancock said 52 vultures were poisoned with carbofuran in Hainaveld Farms in 2008, 55 in Xadum in 2009, 15 in the Chobe in 2010, while nearly 200 vultures died in one incident in Kwando so far this year. The vultures died after eating poisoned carcasses set by farmers to kill problematic predators like lions and wild dogs. Birds being killed in this manner include the lappet-faced vulture, a globally threatened species.Hancock blames this threat to Botswana's biodiversity on the country's "weak" pesticide control laws and monitoring."The carbofuran is an insecticide for use in non-food crops like tobacco," he said. "We don't grow any tobacco in Botswana, so why sell the insecticide here?"
