Neighbors: we’re to love them as we love ourselves, the Bible says. In the same vein, being neighborly means a willingness to lend a hand, an egg, a cup of sugar.
Neighborhoods were areas where everyone knew everyone else and, what’s more, everyone cared about the others.
Now, in certain areas of Hawai`i, those qualities of neighborliness have taken a back seat to more mercenary motives. And nowhere is this better illustrated than in the small rural Hamakua community of Kapulena, where Seppe Wiesmueller, his wife, Mikki Hastings, and their three children live and run their organic farm.
Their neighbors are Bishop Estate and PruTimber, the company that has leased the estate’s land. And as Wiesmueller and Hastings are finding out, when it comes to being neighborly, these two giant companies really don’t care very much.
When confronted with concerns over pesticides – not just by Wiesmueller and Hastings but by other members of the Hamakua community – Bishop Estate representatives have protested theunfairness of it all. The practices and the pesticides sprayed on eucalyptus fields don’t differ all that much from what sugar plantations used to do, they whine. When cane was king, aerial spraying was a frequent occurrence, and there were few complaints.
But much has changed since then. In the plantation days, there were no scattered farms along the Hamakua Coast. Organic farming was not practiced on any measurable scale. Populations were concentrated in areas that could be more easily avoided by sprays than are today’s more dispersed populations. Finally, since a large fraction of the population depended on sugar for its livelihood, complaints about pesticide drift, dust, noise, or other nuisances associated with cane cultivation were few and far between.
Today, the Big Island touts its success at diversifying its agriculture. Some of the finest restaurants in the world are found in West Hawai`i resorts; often they rely on organic produce grown on farmland that has only recently been freed from cane. Medicinal herbs and plants, including `awa and noni, are proving to be high value crops not just for local consumption, but for global markets as well. Local markets for locally grown produce are strong and growing, as can easily be seen on any Saturday at the Hilo farmers’ market.
Along with this diversification should come a greater awareness of the need to be neighborly. No longer should any landowner or tenant regard itself as a Goliath who can ignore the Davids whose lands and often livelihoods are affected by practices that have impacts not confined by fencelines or boundary markers.
To date, Bishop Estate and PruTimber have not responded to years of community protests over the use of pesticides that drift over horse ranches, organic farms, and residential areas. What recourse do the neighbors of these 700-pound gorillas have?
Wiesmueller and Hastings have retained legal counsel. Perhaps their losses are best addressed through the courts.
For the larger community that is affected, is it asking too much to have representatives of Prudential Insurance, parent of PruTimber, and Bishop Estate meet with the community – their neighbors, after all – and discuss what measures might be taken to address their concerns?
Safe Houses
Manufacturers and users of pesticides often say these products are safe when used as directed. Tell that to Wiesmueller and Hastings. Or to Lonnie Williams, who says exposure to heptachlor in Moloka`i soils has ruined his health. Or to the family in Waimanalo and school children in Makakilo who also claim to have suffered – all from pesticides that have wafted beyond the area of their intended effect.
When it comes to products whose sole purpose is to kill living organisms, can any use really be “safe”?
As more and more is learned about the body’s responses to organic chemicals, the answer can only be: No. While some hardy souls are unaffected by exposure to pesticides, many sensitive individuals can be laid low by the slightest whiff. And repeated exposures to irritating chemicals – just like repeated exposures to, say, bee stings – can heighten a person’s sensitivity, to the point that life in a world of outgassing plastics, perfumed detergents, and particleboard furniture manufactured with formaldehyde glues is intolerable.
Just as insidious are the health problems – including cancer, reproductive disorders, and genetic defects – that can arise from pesticide exposure even if no causal connection can be established. Incontrovertible proof that a tumor or birth was caused by a given chemical is nearly impossible to establish, even if statistical evidence suggests a link.
Conflicts between chemical users and a population unwilling to assume the risks of exposure to those chemicals are bound to increase when and if the state’s largest landowners decide that their holdings are best kept in mono-crop agriculture, whether that is sugar, eucalyptus, pineapple, or papaya.
Those who reap the benefits of using pesticides must be more sensitive to the needs of those who unwillingly suffer exposure to them. It’s not just legally prudent, it’s the neighborly thing to do.
Volume 11, Number 5 November 2000
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