Judge bans lily cultivation due to health risks from pesticides in Sevenum, Limburg

Lilies may not be grown next to a residential area in the town of Sevenum in Limburg. The court in Roermond decided this.

According to the judge, “there is a serious risk of harming the health of local residents and their children” when they use the pesticides used in cultivation. So the judge banned the use of the materials, which is the result of a legal brief recently filed by local residents, reports News L1.

This is the second time in a short time that a lily grower has had to go back. On March 27, a grower in Diever, Drenthe, did not get permission from the town to grow lilies next to a primary school and playgroups.

In that case too, it was local residents fear that “long-term exposure to pesticides is an additional risk to our health, especially for growing children. “

Lily growers argue that they comply with all the rules when they use pesticides. That is right, the court in Roermond says now, but that does not reduce the concerns of the residents of the area. “The fact that the drugs have been tested and approved does not mean that the drugs are safe. When the drugs are tested, they are not only tested for long-term neurological effects, such as Parkinson’s disease. we conducted research on developmental disorders of children,” the court said in a statement pronounce.

The court refers to reports from the Health Council and the RIVM, which establish a link between poisons, health complaints and developmental disorders in unborn children. According to the decision, it specifically applies to seven of the approved substances that are dangerous.

A toxicologist who reviewed the list of poisons on behalf of the court says that they “are a real risk of serious damage to brain health. Not just for adults. “

The problem is that lily cultivation requires a lot of pesticides: “In the five to six months that the grower wants to spray the lilies with the products every week, there is so much to uproot as much as for another crop in ten years,” said the court.

For the grower in Sevenum, the regulation means he can’t start. The grower was offered a place in Diever on the other side of town, far from buildings and places where many children come to play.