How deadly pesticides ended up in the food of South Africa’s poorest citizens
Aldicarb and terbufos – pesticides tightly controlled or banned elsewhere – are killing people in the nation’s townships
Terbufos and aldicarb, highly toxic pesticides used in South African agriculture, have found their way into the country’s poor townships as rat poisons. This in turn has led to the accidental contamination of stored food and poisoning deaths.
‘I almost fainted when they rushed her to the ICU,’ recalls Edith Lokwane, a mother in Soweto, the biggest township lying west of Johannesburg. Her 7-year-old daughter, on the way from school last October, had eaten seemingly harmless samosas and buns. Within three hours her vomiting was relentless, her breathing shallow, her body lethargic, she says.