Pesticide use in Canada soars, even as danger becomes clearer

Pesticide use in Canada has skyrocketed over the past two decades. Pesticide manufacturers sold Canadians more than 130 million kilograms of pesticides in 2021, a fivefold increase from 2005, a new analysis has found.

The findings come amid growing alarm about the human health harms and environmental impacts of pesticides — harms that have led advocates to call for an overhaul of Canada's pesticide rules and agricultural policy goals. 

"There is a narrative that is out there that pesticides don't really pose any kind of a problem," said Laura Bowman, a lawyer with Ecojustice who wrote the study. But those problems are mounting.

For instance, last month American researchers found that glyphosate – the most common herbicide in Canada — can increase the risk of neurological disease. Health experts have also linked widely-used neonicotinoid insecticides to reproductive harms and other health issues, while their harm to insects prompted a European ban in 2018. 

Despite those danger signs, Canada is the world's fifth-heaviest user of pesticides, and lags behind 90 per cent of countries when it comes to restrictions or bans on the products. 

The Ecojustice study found a silent surge in use of the products, driven by a combination of the widespread use of crops that are genetically modified to resist herbicides; using pesticides as a preventative measure against pests instead of as targeted treatments; and forestry practices that rely on spraying forests with herbicides to kill off unwanted plants. Yet despite their prevalence and growing alarm about their impacts on human health and the environment, the increase in pesticide usage has largely avoided scrutiny.