Meet the Farmer who Stopped Eating his own Produce — An Account of Pesticide Overuse at a Farm in Southern China
By Sandy Lee, Translated by Janice Yeung
(This article is taken from a seasonal Hong Kong magazine “Breakazine 037 Planting Poison”, published on May 2015)
In August 2014, I visited a local non-profit organization in Conghua, an urban district of Guangzhou in central Guangdong, China. While being there, I talked to Yeung Wah (Ah Wah), a local farmer at an ecological farm. Upon hearing that I am from Hong Kong, Ah Wah exclaimed, “Vegetables exported to Hong Kong are the worst!”
Coming from a city with the fourth most efficient government in the world, I rested assured that my hometown had tight food safety checks, strict inspection of fruits and vegetables, and frequent laboratory tests. I have even heard of cases where mainland Chinese opt for imported vegetables in Hong Kong rather than local organic produce in China. Ah Wah, however, burst my bubble as he gave me an honest insider perspective of a farmer in southern China. “I never eat my own produce. The only vegetables I eat are the wild shrubs growing along the borders of my field.”
When we met, Ah Wah had already quit his job at a farm that supplies Hong Kong with daily produce. He switched to an ecological farm to learn more earth-friendly ways of farming. On a day with mild showers, I trailed Ah Wah to press him in speaking more about his previous job.
“We spray pesticides every day. From what I remember, amongst the farmers I knew who spray pesticides, one died and one became seriously ill.” His account of what happens at Chinese farms chilled my heart. I decided to visit one to experience for myself the reality of how my daily vegetables are produced.
A Land Without Life
On a humid and misty March afternoon, I followed Ah Wah to his previous workplace, a farm of over 400,000 square meters, enshrouded in a poetic daze of light fog.
As we hiked along the landscape of emerald green, it became natural to me as a city dweller to breathe in deeply to take in some wild fresh air. However, as soon as I inhaled, I could smell a stench of chemicals. As I looked more closely, the workers in the field had no face masks or gloves, their kids were even playing in the crops.
“They think they only need masks when the sun is out, but actually pesticides are denser in the fog.” Having worked at a pesticide company for four years, mostly performing clinical trials for new technical samples, Ah Wah had more knowledge about pesticides than the common farmer. The samples he used to create at his company were then sold to other factories to create combined products, adding emulsions and solvent fluids. “This process is hazardous,” he explained. “When mixing technical samples, you can still wear gloves and a face mask to protect yourself, but when you add vaporizing emulsions, it is hard not to inhale some of these chemicals. Most of us who work at these factories have leukemia.”
Ah Wah finally decided to quit his job at the pesticide factory to ‘detox’. In fact, it became usual for mainland Chinese pharmaceutical workers to leave their jobs when they have to prepare for giving birth.
While overlooking the vast fields, Ah Wah pointed at a worker in the distance. “That guy is spraying the blue powder, I forgot the scientific name of it, but let us check out what happens afterwards.” As we turned a corner, we found a pile of empty pesticide bottles and bags near a ditch. In the mud, we found traces of Butachlor (herbicide), Flubendiamide (pesticide), Dimethomorph (fungicide), Niconate Synthesizer (pesticide) and Zineb (fungicide). Zineb was the blue powder sprinkled over the plants.
Fortunately, we could not source DDT or Methamidophos in the soil, insecticides phased out due to their toxicity. However, Ah Wah reminded me that just because a pesticide is not banned or is labeled ‘Low in Toxicity’ does not mean it is completely safe, what matters is the amount is used. Using Zineb as an example, he says farmers usually mix it with other insecticides and herbicides, sometimes even adding plant hormones, so that produce comes out looking exactly the same.
“To ensure vegetables do not rot and do not have insects in them, farmers keep spraying chemicals on the plants. Generally we feed them chemicals five days a week, much more than the seven to 30-day time lag that is recommended.” As I listened to Ah Wah’s account of usual agricultural procedures, I could not help but wonder whether my daily routine of soaking vegetables for an hour was enough to clean the toxic spray that has permeated the plants. I started to understand why he only eats produce grown off the borders of the farm.
“It is alright, you can always choose to eat newborn shoots that grow after the main crops are harvested, these are usually not sprayed with that many chemicals. The huge and tidy vegetables you find at supermarkets, those have the most pesticides in them.”
Tests in Theory
Won’t the authorities eventually find out about an overdose of pesticides at farms? Does the government not do regular checkups? “Theoretically they should, but in reality…” Ah Wah completed his unfinished sentence with an embarrassed grin. That grin gave me goosebumps.
“I worked on two farms that supply vegetables to Hong Kong, theoretically each of these farms should have testing labs, they have to send personnel to the Import and Export Commodity Inspection Bureau for regular training, they even receive a subsidy of RMB$1,000 per month if they agree to weekly vegetable sample inspections.” Sounds reasonable enough.
“The procedures are there, but my colleagues told me that even if pesticides were sprayed, the machine would not be able to recognize them. The machine used for inspections can only test for pesticides with Organophosphorus compounds and Organochlorides, those that do not contain these elements would not be discovered.”
What happens even if an overdose of chemicals is found out? “The farm I worked on grew leek flowers that are exported to Hong Kong’s supermarkets. Once the farmers sprayed blue powder on them the day before they were sent to their destination, some of the powder stayed on the tips of the flowers. The supermarket then asked to see our managers in Shenzhen. Our manager was quite experienced in dealing with these cases, he kept making up lies, even saying that the blue powder is a new type of nutrient additive. In the end the produce got through to the sellers.”
Being the straightforward guy that he is, Ah Wah found it difficult to continue working at the local farm, he switched to ecological agriculture, where he tries to grow food that are 100% organic (chemical free) and which do not use monocultures. “I did not think that was the way agriculture should be like. That was not what I dreamed of.”
As a millennial who studied bioengineering, agriculture in the mainland started booming when Ah Wah was in high school. He dreamed of being an agricultural pioneer. “I envisioned huge farmlands like in America, with jet planes streaming over fields to spray pesticides.” After graduating, he worked at a high tech pesticide factory and at two large local farms, but all of these workplaces left him disheartened.
“Now I am more interested in small-scale farming, like what our ancestors used to do.They hiked mountains to find special plant species, and made natural pesticides out of them to ward off insects. We used to own these traditional methods, now these natural ways are all lost.”
Ah Wah shared with me his plans excitedly, he plans to rent a field near home, using natural farming methods, raising pigs and planting dragon fruit, making use of the pig manure to build a biogas pond, bringing in weeds to fertilise the land, even sourcing indigenous microbes to add more humus to the soil.
The Silence of the Land
As we talked about the soil, Ah Wah started sighing as he pointed to lumps of cracked mud beneath us, he said that this indicates the land lacks humus, essentially losing life. “This is just like a hospital environment. A germ-free ward does not mean that health is nurtured.”
I could not tell whether it was the gloomy weather or my own heavy-heartedness that affected me, but as I looked across the farm fields, I saw ripe vegetables that looked like they were on drips, lifeless, silent.
“The environment here used to be good for farming,” Ah Wah gazed at the pesticide bags at our feet, his grin was lost. While I was worried for my health after eating toxic produce, he was more troubled by the lasting contamination done to his homeland. For some reason, as an outsider, I felt culpable.
（The digital version of Breakazine can be purchased here: https://goo.gl/hD2SlA ）
(Original article in Chinese)
「食， 我只會食田邊的野菜。」
— — 前供港菜場農夫楊華
（轉載自 Breakazine 037《種毒》）
這訪問是大半年前開始的。
去年8 月，我和同事應邀到廣州，跟當地的NGO 交流，順道參觀從化的生態農場，認識了楊華（化名）。他知道我們是香港人後，扮了個鬼臉，就爆了一句：「供港菜最流（差）呀！」
什麼？我們瞪大了眼睛不能置信。不是說供港菜檢測嚴格，是信譽保證，大陸人寧願買供港菜，也不買當地的有機菜嗎？「那是因為他們未曾在供港菜場做過吧。」阿華仍是笑笑口，像笑世人太無知，再爆了叫我們瞠目結舌的另一句：「我就不會食自己種的菜，食，我都只會食田邊的野菜。」
那時，他辭退了供港菜場的工作不久，轉到生態農場再學耕種。相遇那天，天下着大雨，我們就擱下原本的行程，找着他追問供港菜的問題，生命攸關呀。「天天都要打農藥嘛，我知道的，在供港菜場打農藥的，都有一隻死咗，一隻殘咗。」
他廣府話的「一隻」是我們的「一個」，指的是「人」。聽着，我們的心涼了半截，遂決定無論如何都要到供港菜場走一趟。
嗅不到生機的大地
3 月18 日的下午，回南天時，大地起了一抹霧水，我們跟着阿華來到他以前工作的供港菜基地。遙望700 多畝的農田，輕煙迷濛，好一幅「茶是故鄉濃」的畫面。
但走近如此綠油油的大地，你卻自然閉起了呼吸，因為用力一索，就嗅到一陣化學藥水的味道。農場的工人卻沒戴口罩和手套，他們多是從外省來的民工，還帶了家中的小孩在田上玩。
「他們以為有陽光才需要戴口罩，但潮濕時農藥會更易霧化。」阿華來到以前的工地，整個人變得嚴肅起來。他有4 年時間在農藥廠工作，主要是配製原藥，原藥會再賣到其他藥廠製造複配藥，過程中會加乳化劑和溶劑溶解稀釋。「這個過程是危險的。原藥你仍可戴手套和口罩去保護自己，但所有溶劑都有揮發性，你很難避免吸入，我們都是白血病多發的。」他最終辭去了藥廠的工作，就是要「淨身」，預備生孩子，這是內地製藥廠工人的慣例。
他指着遠處的工人說，「他噴的是藍粉，學名我忘記了，等陣看看吧。」果然不出他所料，拐了半個彎，在水溝旁，就見丟了一地的空農藥袋和空樽，這時才明白「等陣看看」的意思。我們在泥濘裏找到了打草劑丁草胺，殺蟲劑氟苯蟲酰胺，殺菌劑烯酰嗎啉、唑醚·代森聯、代森鋅。代森鋅就是藍粉。
一大堆陌生又難讀的化學名字，仿如外來物種，猶幸沒有什麼滴滴涕、甲胺磷的禁藥，農藥袋上都註明是低毒的。
阿華提醒我們，不要以為農藥註明是低毒就安全，問題在於劑量。他還說所謂的藍粉，除了代森鋅，還會混合其他殺菌劑、殺蟲劑的，有時還會加上激素，所以黃瓜的花才不會丟，西瓜才會爆，菜才會長得一模一樣。
「工頭為了確保無菌無蟲賣相好，產出的菜無問題，都會叫工人不停打藥。一般5天餵一次藥，絕對少於要求的7–30天間隔期。」這樣餵大的菜，即使浸泡一小時再加洗潔精，也洗不掉滲入每個細胞所累積的毒。我們開始明白，為何他只會吃田邊野菜。
這次再見面，他安慰我們說：「你還可以選擇吃菜毛，菜毛即是收割後在側枝再新長出來的菜枝，很不齊整的那隻，不會特意打農藥的；那些在街巿放得很整齊，條條一樣大的，農藥就多了。」
理論上的驗證
不停打藥總會超標吧，內地政府不是會定期檢測嗎？「理論上是的，但實際上就……」阿華又再笑，他每次笑，我的心都會發毛，深怕他又會說出什麼驚世的陰謀。
「我在兩個供港菜場工作過，理論上每個供港基地都有檢驗室，要派員到進出口商品檢驗局接受訓練，還會得到每月1,000元的補貼，負責每星期去抽查菜樣本檢驗。」聽着，似乎安心了些。「對，手續是做足的，但我同事跟我說：放心，即使剛剛打了藥，部機都測不到。因為這部機只能測到有機磷、有機氯這些農藥，其他的都驗不出。」
被發現又如何？「我以前的菜場，專門供應韮菜花給香港的超巿的。有一次下午打了藍粉，第二天上午就收菜交貨，結果部分韮菜花上面仍染了藍色。超巿就要求我們的管工即時到深圳面談。我們的管工老練呀，不停吹水，甚至吹那些藍色粉是新研製的營養素，結果仍是過了關。」
阿華自問沒這吹噓能力，難以繼續如此下去，後來也就辭退了菜場的工作，投入生態農業。「我覺得農業唔應該咁……這不是我的理想。」這位80後，讀生物工程出身，中學時內地農業急速發展，就想着要當農業先鋒。「當時我夢想的是美國幾千畝的農田，用高科技用飛機噴農藥的那隻。」畢業後，在高科技的農藥廠做過，在兩間極有規模的供港菜場工作過，但原來這都不是他的夢。
「我現在反而喜歡小農的耕種，像我們的上一代，他們仍會上山找魚藤，用天然的農藥來驅蟲。這些我們都懂的，但現在都失傳了。」阿華是興奮地分享他的理想，計劃在家鄉租田，用自然農法去耕種，一邊養豬一邊種火龍果，用豬糞來建沼氣池，再加雜草來養地，還說要採「土著微生物」叫泥土更多腐植質。
寂靜的泥土
談到泥土，他是感慨，指着田上一塊塊乾裂了的泥土，說泥土沒有了腐植質，這是沒生機的表現。「這裏情況就好像醫院，一個無菌的病房，但無菌絕不代表健康。」
不知是否天色問題，或是心理影響，望向四野，菜長得飽滿，但卻像在吊鹽水，沒有生氣，一片寂靜。
「這裏的水土，本來是好的。」阿華定睛看着水溝的農藥袋，感慨地說，收起了他慣有的笑容。當我們擔心農藥危害港人健康時，他眼中看見的，是家鄉水土的污染。不知怎的，身為香港人，我心中有點內疚。
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