Government action regarding the pesticide DDT has moved from one extreme to the other, first overusing it and then prohibiting any use of the pesticide. The controversy over DDT is rooted in the governments violation of property rights during spraying programmes in the 1950s and 1960s, claim researchers at the Political Economy
Research Centre (PERC) in the U.S.
Widespread DDT spraying eliminated mosquito-borne malaria in developed countries. However, blanketing millions of hectares of agricultural and residential properties with DDT was an uncompensated trespass that deprived owners of the full value of their property. It also endangered several species of birds.
If the government had been held liable for damages as private individuals would have been the programme would have been halted, tragic consequences might have been avoided, and pesticides would not have become subject to political decisions.
Today, in reaction to those government spraying programmes and the perceived environmental damage they caused, DDT has nearly been banned worldwide.
Today, individuals in developing countries are being denied healthy lives because of the U.S. federal government’s overuse of DDT in agriculture. Markets and the rule of law would have created the flexibility politicised decision-making doesn’t allow.
Source: Roger E. Meiners and Andrew P. Morriss, Pesticides and Property Rights, PERC Policy Series No. 22, May 2001, Political Economy Research Center, 502 South 19th Avenue, Bozeman, Mt. 59718, (406) 587-9591.
For text http://www.perc.org/ps22pr.html
For more on Pesticides http://www.ncpa.org/pi/enviro/envdex13c.html
