Chennai: Tamil Nadu legislators on Friday brought in a call attention motion on neighbouring Kerala’s campaign that vegetables from the state had traces of pesticides.
Agriculture minister R. Vaithilingam said vegetables grown in Tamil Nadu were free from pesticides and safe for consumption. Per day 800 tonnes of vegetables are exported to Kerala through 250 lorries, he said in his reply.
He asserted that vegetables and fruits grown in the state are absolutely safe and the same has been confirmed by periodic lab tests done by Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).
ICAR headquartered in Delhi had been conducting sample tests on a monthly basis from different parts of the country, but nowhere in its report there is a note stating that Tamil Nadu vegetables had pesticides above the permissible level.
Even a recent test done at a facility at Tiruchirappalli Airport cited only pest attack in just 20 kg of tested 84,522 kg of vegetables with no trace of pesticide toxicity, he said.
Besides, the state through the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University had also been periodically taking vegetable samples from 12 districts where 117 samples were tested during last June.
Of this, only five samples had traces of pesticides below the permissible limits. But when the situation and the fact are clear, Kerala officials had been giving interviews to local dailies creating an issue.
Kerala officials should have taken the concurrence of Tamil Nadu government and its field studies on vegetables. The evasive campaign by neighbouring state causes unnecessary fear and TN would approach Kerala government to direct its officials to refrain from giving frivolous interviews to media, the minister said.
