ATTENTION: EDITOR, News/Environment/Resources

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Dec. 13, 2004

“CHEAP FIX” CREATES POISONED FOREST AND COSTLY BUREAUCRATIC MESS

SMITHERS, B.C. - Newly released documents from the B.C. government show that disregard for new
research and public concern over use of a dangerous pesticide in B.C. forests has led to an environmental hazard
which has become almost impossible to monitor, much less rectify.

“The B.C. government has created a poisoned forest, and it’s now clear that they don’t know how to manage it,”
says Dr. Josette Wier, a pediatrician by training who lives in Smithers and a former board member of the
Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment.

From 2000 to 2003, Wier led a public attempt to quash the Ministry of Forests’ (MoF) permit to apply
monosodium methanearsenate (MSMA) in an ultimately vain bid to contain the mountain pine beetle epidemic
in northern B.C.’s Morice (now Nadina) forest district. MSMA is an arsenic compound recently found1 to be
genotoxic, a fact not known in 1996 when it was last re-evaluated for use by Health Canada. Under this permit,
approximately 68,000 trees were injected with 1,568 kg of arsenic.

In advertisements, communications with the public, and during a two-year Environmental Appeal Board
Process (2002/03) the forests ministry repeatedly claimed that MSMA was both cost-effective and safe, as it
would be applied in “inoperable,” “isolated” and “inaccessible” areas. It repeatedly referenced Health Canada’s
approval of the pesticide’s use, which explicitly presumed that the poisoned trees would be left standing and not
milled or disposed of in beehive burners.2

Documents3 obtained by Wier during the past month prove otherwise.

For example, an audit by the Ministry of Water, Land & Air Protection’s Pesticide Branch—provoked by Wier's
inquiries and released to her last week through an access to information request—reaffirms observations already
made by B.C.’s Forest Practices Board in a November 2004 report4: considering where MSMA has actually been
applied, the Ministry’s use of the terms “isolated” and “inaccessible” have misled the public.

In addition, the audit found that:

o MSMA treatments proceeded in 2002, in several cases, without necessary approvals in place
o During a seven-month inquiry in 20035, the Ministry of Forests established that MSMA-treated trees
were poorly tracked and being logged—but it failed to properly investigate a logger’s claim that he had
suffered arsenic poisoning after cutting MSMA-treated trees.
o There was no clear policy in place to deal with the poisoned trees, if and when they should be cut.

1 Testimony of Bill Cullen at Environmental Appeal Board hearing can be found at

http://www.eab.gov.bc.ca/pest/2001pes003b.pdf.reference and/or see “A Sip of Arsenic” C & EN Journal May 21, 2001 by Cheryl
Hogue
2 Sept. 12, 2003 letter to Josette Wier from Wendy Sexsmith, Chief Registrar, Health Canada’s Pesticide Management Regulatory Agency
3 A File Review and Audit of Pesticide Use Permit #402-582 01/03, by R.W. (Bob) Baker, R.P.F. of NuForest Consulting Ltd. Sept. 14,
2004 Prince George. Forest Practice Board Report Nadina Beetle Treatments: http://www.fpb.gov.bc.ca/News/Releases/2004/11-
12.htm, Nov. 2004
4 Forest Practices Board Report Nov 2004, Nadina Beetle Treatments: http://www.fpb.gov.bc.ca/News/Releases/2004/11-12.htm
5 “Monosodium Methanearsonate (MSMA) Incident Investigation – Decision for Next Action” by Bill Quinn, Regional Compliance
Leader, of the Northern Interior Forest Region of the Ministry of Forests.
 o Forest managers did not respond when discrepancies between their use of the words “inaccessible,” and
actual practice, were raised by a member of the public, but MoF correspondence with the B.C.’s
Ministry of Water, Land & Air Protection (WLAP) in June 2003 reveals the MoF intended to use
MSMA “in a more discreet manner, trying to minimize public concerns over widespread use.”

Other documents obtained by Wier prove that MSMA-treated trees are being milled and illegally burned in
beehive burners—and that the issue isn’t going away soon. For example:
o A report prepared by Canfor-hired consultants and submitted Nov. 1 to WLAP indicates that the
company is processing and burning MSMA-contaminated bark in its beehive burners, while planning
for thousands more in 2005 and 2006--from their tenures in the Nadina forest district alone.
o On Nov. 30, the WLAP ministry advised Nadina-area forest companies (Pacific Inland Resources,
Canfor and Houston Forest Products) in writing that burning of arsenic-contaminated wood waste is
prohibited in their burner emission permits, and asked for complete technical and environmental impact
assessments to support any application for amendments to their permits.
o In a Dec. 1 letter, WLAP told KPMG, the firm which audits the certification of forest companies, that
burning of MSMA-contaminated wood is absolutely prohibited.

Wier is pleased to see the WLAP ministry taking steps in the right direction. “It's about time,” she says.
“Common sense and best scientific practice dictate that where there are gaps in knowledge about health risks,
we apply the internationally recognized Precautionary Principle—which Canada has officially endorsed.”

Wier says the potentially costly task of monitoring the fate of MSMA trees and assessing the health risks of
milling and burning them could easily have been avoided had up-to-date research on MSMA and public concern
been seriously considered from the start. She agrees with the audit’s conclusions that the “biggest mistake was
ignoring the fact that the pesticide use permit impacted [sic] people.”

“The Ministry of Forests tried a quick, cheap fix,” concludes Wier. “And taxpayers end up paying for a
bureaucratic mess, a poisoned forest and its associated risks to workers, communities and the environment. It’s
ironic that all these mistakes were made under the regional management of Jim Snetsinger, B.C.’s newly
appointed Chief Forester, who certainly showed a lack of leadership and forethought on this issue.”

-30-

Media contact:
Dr. Josette Wier
Tel.: (250) 847-8743 or Cell: (604) 220-4311
Email: josettecp@bulkley.net

BACKGROUND

o MSMA is the active, arsenic-based ingredient in a pesticide registered under the trade name of
Glowon Tree Killer. It was applied to trees infested by the mountain pine beetle in the Morice Forest
District (now renamed and incorporated into the larger Nadina Forest District) near Smithers and
Houston, B.C. in 2001-2003.
o At the 2002 B.C. Environmental Appeal Board hearing in Smithers, where Wier sought to have the
MoF’s MSMA permit quashed, UBC’s renowned arsenic expect Dr. Bill Cullen testified that very
recent research suggests MSMA is far more toxic than previously thought and almost certainly
carcinogenic.
 o The company which registered Glowon for use in Canada has been requested by Health
Canada’s Pesticide Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) to supply additional research
data for its required re-registration. The company declined6 because this research will cost more than
the expected revenue from sales Meanwhile, the MoF is considering asking taxpayers to spend up to
$100,000 to finance this research.7
o MoF managers have long claimed that MSMA use is cheaper than fall-and-burn methods of
removing beetle-infested trees. However, it has become clear that the true costs—which include
properly tagging each treated tree, recording its location, providing maps and performing spot checks to
ensure that the trees aren’t later cut—were not considered, notwithstanding the human health risks yet
to be evaluated.
o MoF managers have frequently claimed that the pesticide is being used in areas that are
“inoperable” for logging and therefore unsuitable for a fall-and-burn treatment. In fact, trees have
been injected with MSMA as close as 200 m to private properties at François Lake and logged in as little
as a few months after the pesticide has been applied.
o New research suggests that MSMA is not even very effective at killing beetles in the trees it is applied
to, and is making its way into the food chain: for example, a study funded last year by the Canadian
Wildlife Service of Environment Canada looked at birds’ exposure to the pesticide in B.C. forests. It
found that MSMA treatment is only about 60 per cent effective in containing the beetle, and that 30 per
cent of beetle-infested trees were being foraged by woodpeckers—which then demonstrated elevated
levels of arsenic in their blood. Woodpeckers are natural predator s of beetle larvae.
o Canadians should not be complacent about pesticides approved for use by Health Canada’s
PMRA. A comprehensive report on the PMRA’s performance by Canada’s Auditor General in 2003
repeated the serious deficiencies previously identified. Those deficiencies include product approvals
based on inadequate information, untested and incorrect assumptions, unrealistic assumptions about
pesticide user behaviour, and inconsistently applied evaluation processes. All pesticides re-evaluated
since the agency’s creation in 1995 have been found to pose unacceptable risks for some uses and had
to be restricted or removed from the market, and re-evaluations are proceeding very slowly. In
November 2003, Auditor General Johanne Gélinas told Parliament: “This is the fourth time since 1988
that we have raised the issue of progress on re-evaluations, however, the federal government still cannot
ensure that the older pesticides we are using are safe. It is likely that some old pesticides on the market
will fail to meet today's standards.” MSMA will almost certainly be one of these.
o Josette Wier is a member of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment,
www.cape.ca

6 See Forest Practices Board Report Nov. 2004 Nadina Beetle Treatment
7 Letter from Peter Hall, B.C.’s Provincial Forest Entomologist to Ms. Wier, Oct. 21, 2004