Sanya angry city spilled the beans on cowpeas

• Source: Globaltimes
• [02:28 March 01 2010]
• Comments

Yang Tanghu, a deputy chief of the farm products inspection team at the Wuhan agricultural bureau, said earlier that the decision to ban Hainan cowpeas involved some risk.

The toxic pesticides has been banned since 2004 but are still available in some villages in Hainan because they're cheap. Other highly toxic pesticides are also available in the province, CNR reported.

A local pesticides seller said pesticides with less than 50 percent of methamidophos are not regarded highly toxic, and can be sold in the open market, the report said.

But a local agricultural official denied the seller's claims, and said sellers of banned pesti-cides will face a maximum fine of 100,000 yuan ($14,648).

The price of cowpeas produced in Hainan fell from 6 yuan ($0.88) per kilogram to less than 0.6 yuan and the Hainan farmers suffered great losses after the information was disclosed, Xinhua reported.

The Global Times was unable to reach Sanya agricultural bureau Sunday.