I wouldn't say that pesticides are a threat to Canadian agriculture. I said that overuse, extensive use, and over-dependence on synthetic pesticides, as the first tool to combat pests, are the problem when we know that we have beneficial management practices, integrated pest management, and organic practices that should be our first weapons in managing pests.
They are a threat, because when we register new synthetic pesticides in Canada, the industry is required to demonstrate the efficacy of the product. The requirement under the act is that the new product need only increase yield by an incremental fraction. Years later—10, 20, 30 years down the road—when those pesticides are used in the real world, what we see is that in fact the promise of increased yield is not delivered; it is marginal, as I've said, in the case of atrazine in corn, for example, or non-existent.
There are also many non-essential uses of pesticides in Canadian agriculture. I would cite, for example, the use of glyphosate pre-harvest in wheat and grains, which is meant only as a desiccant to the crop, and is most responsible for glyphosate in food contamination.
Basically what we are saying is that if we look at the long-term sustainability of agriculture, if we want to maintain healthy soils, healthy ecosystems, healthy pollinator populations, and healthy watersheds that are really the foundation of long-term agriculture, we need to rethink using synthetic pesticides as the tool of choice, every single time we need to prevent or manage a pest problem.