首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Stockpiled Pesticides Harming African People’s Environment Vast quantities of obsolete pesticides have posed a serious dange
Stockpiled Pesticides Harming African People’s Environment Vast quantities of obsolete pesticides have posed a serious dange
admin
2012-11-22
48
问题
Stockpiled Pesticides Harming African People’s Environment
Vast quantities of obsolete pesticides have posed a serious danger to the environment and communities in Africa. In many countries the toxic chemicals have started to leak from corroding containers and are seeping into soil, groundwater, and rivers.
Now a multimillion dollar international project is underway to rid the continent of the menace. The Africa Stockpiles Program (ASP) will soon send trained personnel to inventory pesticide stock piles and begin their safe export to Europe for incineration.
Angela Mwandla, the program’s coordinator, says estimates of government-controlled stockpiles top 50,000 tons. ,private pesticide dumps could raise the figure significantly. But because some people are trying to conceal their dumps from the government, it makes it more difficult to make an official statistics for these private pesticide &imps.
Nearly every African country grapples with the problem. Ethiopia is one of the worst off, with an estimated 3,000 tons of obsolete pesticides. Other countries are better, but this still poses a big problem for these countries.
Mwandla, who is based in Nairobi, Kenya, says the cleanup program could take 15 years and cost about 250 million dollars ( U. S. ). And he is not so sure if the government would agree to spend so much time and expenses over this project.
The program’s first phase -- estimated to cost 60 million dollars ( U. S. ) over six years -- will kick off in Ethiopia, Mall,Tunisia, Morocco, Tanzania, and South Africa. And if this works well, other countries will follow suit.
Problem Decades in the Making
Africa’s stockpiles of poisonous chemicals have been accumulating over the past 40 years and longer. The problem has been spurred by poor training, weak controls, and aggressive marketing by chemical manufacturers, who sold countries more pesticides than they needed. Although the government has already started to pay attention to this problem, it will still take a long time to get this problem under control.
The chemicals include brands such as DDT, and a range of organophosphate (有机磷酸脂的) pesticides used mainly for crop protection. And the effects of these pesticides will last over years even it becomes obsolete.
Jan Betlem, a Dutch specialist in obsolete-pesticide elimination, painted a grim picture at a re cent media briefing in Nairobi, where the cleanup program was announced.
He said many of the stockpiles were found in neglected buildings. Others were found in drums in grasslands, where they were covered by torn tarpaulins(防水油布) and plastic sheets or buried. All these, therefore, makes it more difficult for the work to carry on and makes this work lagging for longer periods.
Many containers were corroding, adding spillage to the list of contamination problems.
Toxins that have seeped into soils and groundwater have contaminated food, drinking water, and the air. And the immune system was greatly deteriorated after the people drink the contaminated water.
Betlem has often found dead cats, birds, snakes, goats, and sheep inside and around buildings where corroded containers have started leaking. It is not unusual for children to play in the vicinity of the stockpiles. And therefore, this problem poses great danger to the health of tile children.
The meat of animals grazing in such areas is sold in public markets, adding to the build-up of toxins in people.
Betlem says pesticides are normally obsolete for their intended use after two years, but from the effects listed above, it is clear that they remain hazardous for a much longer period of time.
Prior Warning
More than a decade ago, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization began warming African nations and others about the dangers of negligent pesticide use, which shows that a global attention has been paid to this increasing threat, especially in the developing countries.
But the Africa Stockpiles Program springs mainly from an initiative started in 2000 by the World wide Fund for Nature (WWF).
Together with the Pesticide Action Network, the environmental non-profit organizations lobbied governments, the United Nations, and pesticide manufacturers to start ASP.
Mwandla, who is with the WWF’s Nairobi office, says ASP is a joint effort that involves the Global Environment Facility ( GEF), governments, non-governmental organizations, and pesticide manufacturers through their international federation called CropLife. He stresses that unless all sides pay more attention and effort to this problem, the effort will last longer.
ASP’s major donors are the World Bank, on behalf of the GEF, and European governments. It has also been endorsed by the African Union’s ministerial conference on the environment. It shows that all sides have realized the, importance to work together to solve this problem.
Toxin Cleanup
John Aston, representing CropLife at the media briefing in Nairobi, said there were no facilities in Africa capable of destroying the chemicals to internationally required standards.
Pesticides need to be incinerated(烧弃) at temperatures of at least 1,650°F (900°C) to limit harmful emissions. It was therefore necessary to export the chemicals to facilities in places such as Wales and Finland, where they can be safely destroyed.
He said the pesticide manufacturers were closely involved in the cleanup operation and in training people to properly handle and use the chemicals.
In Ethiopia pesticide manufacturers have already helped to dispose of about 800 tons of obsolete material, even though many of the mountainous country’s approximately 900 stockpiles were held in practically inaccessible areas.
Though many difficulties have been met in destroying the obsolete pesticides, it is very encouraging to see that great progress have been made by the efforts from all sides.
Obsolete pesticides have posed danger to the people in Africa for decades.
选项
A、Y
B、N
C、NG
答案
A
解析
全文的中心就是围绕着废弃的杀虫剂对非洲人们的生活和身体上的巨大危害。可定位在文章的第一个小标题下的第一句话Africa’s stockpiles of poisonous chemicals have been accumulating over the past 40 years and longer.,从这句话可以看出这个问题已经存在了超过40年了。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/b6w7777K
0
大学英语四级
相关试题推荐
Top10ReasonsforAfricanAmericanStudentstoGoAbroadBeforegoingabroad,Iwasanarmchairtraveler.Isatatmydesk
Top10ReasonsforAfricanAmericanStudentstoGoAbroadBeforegoingabroad,Iwasanarmchairtraveler.Isatatmydesk
Youshouldn’thavebeenfollowinghimsoclosely;______(你应该与他保持距离).
Our______newmachinesaremuchmoreeconomicaltorun,comparedtotheoldones.
SteamboatsbegantosailupanddowntheMississippiRiveratthebeginningofthe19thcentury,whichcontributedalottheare
Globalwarmingiscausingmorethan300,000deathsandabout$125billionineconomiclosseseachyear,accordingtoareport
Intheearly20thcentury,ahorsenamedCleverHanswasbelievedcapableofcountingandotherimpressivementaltasks.Aftery
Braille,theuniversallyaccepted______ofwritingusedbyblindpersons,consistsofsixty-threecharacters.
A、Theyrefusedtoapologizeforhavingfollowedherthoughthetown.B、Theyregrettedhavingwronglyaccusedherofstealing.C、
_______________(悲伤和悔恨都没有)followedhislaterlife.
随机试题
()应当采用代销方式发行。Ⅰ.上市公司非公开发行股票未采用自行销售方式的Ⅱ.上市公司公开发行股票未采用自行销售方式的Ⅲ.上市公司向原股东配售股份的Ⅳ.上市公司增发股份的
汉语中“我去买东西”属于述谓结构中的()
饮食致病的原因有:()
下列实验检查中,最能反映贫血程度的是
某体育场将举行大型公众娱乐活动,该活动应当组织具有专业消防知识和技能的人员在活动举办前()h进行一次防火巡查。
某小区前面有一个大广场,许多人跳广场舞,因音乐声音大,影响小区居民休息,导致小区居民与跳舞者发生冲突。作为社区民警,要解决此类问题,应该如何去做?()
大抵是对那些过分关心的回帖有些不堪承受的好笑,她于是在自己的一首诗后的跟帖做了一个不___________的答复:文字只是一种姿态,不要把作者和其笔下的人物作___________的链接。填入画横线部分最恰当的一项是()。
2008年1-6月,城镇居民8类人均消费性支出占人均消费性总支出的比重超过10%的有:2007年1-6月,农村居民8类消费性支出中,第三高的是:
ItispossibleforstudentstoobtainadvanceddegreeinEnglishwhileknowinglittleornothingabouttraditionalscholarlymet
Iwishyou’dwrite______forustoreadit.
最新回复
(
0
)