St. Francis College will be showcasing a photography exhibition of Meredith Davenport's photographs of children who were born with birth defects because their parents worked on banana plantations that used the highly toxic chemicals that had been known to create sterility and other health problems, so they were outlawed in the United States, but were still sold for export.
The opening reception will be held on Tuesday April 1, in the Callahan Center from 5:30 - 7:30. All are welcome!
On April 21, between 12:30 and 1:30, SFC will host a panel discussion regarding the pesticide issue and what people can do to stop this epidemic from affecting more innocent children's lives.
Speaking of Bananas
There's an excellent Op-Ed in today's New York Times, Did Your Shopping List Kill a Songbird? Did Your Shopping List Kill a Songbird? by Bridget Stutchbury about how migrating songbirds are being poisoned while wintering in Latin America. This is mostly due to heavy use of pesticides, which while manufactured in the United States, are used in levels that are illegal here. These toxins are making out-of-season fruit available to use, but poisoning the environment.
Her Suggestions:
"What should you put on your bird-friendly grocery list? Organic coffee, for one thing. Most mass-produced coffee is grown in open fields heavily treated with fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides and insecticides. In contrast, traditional small coffee farmers grow their beans under a canopy of tropical trees, which provide shade and essential nitrogen, and fertilize their soil naturally with leaf litter. Their organic, fair-trade coffee is now available in many coffee shops and supermarkets, and it is recommended by the Audubon Society, the American Bird Conservancy and the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center.
Organic bananas should also be on your list. Bananas are typically grown with one of the highest pesticide loads of any tropical crop. Although bananas present little risk of pesticide ingestion to the consumer, the environment where they are grown is heavily contaminated.
When it comes to nontraditional Latin American crops like melons, green beans, tomatoes, bell peppers and strawberries, it can be difficult to find any that are organically grown. We should buy these foods only if they are not imported from Latin America."