Today is one of my favorite holiday’s of the year. Yes, you guessed correctly, it’s International Day of No Pesticides! This important holiday was established 10 years ago by the Pesticide Action Network, an organization we’re working with for Food, Inc. Pesticides are harmful chemicals that pollute our food, water and bodies and are linked to a host of health ailments, including cancer, respiratory problems and autism.  (I wrote recently about PANNA’s campaign to ban endosulfan, a pesticide used on tomatoes that linked to autism and is banned in the European Union).

Despite these alarming facts, you can say no to pesticides! Here are some easy things for you to do:
-purchase organic produce from a farmers market or your local supermarket.  Can’t find any? Ask your market to carry some!
-buy organic clothes. Cotton is one of the most chemical-intensive crops.
-make your neighborhood pesticide free by working with your community and school to stop applying pesticides.
-tell food companies to stop using Genetically Modified seeds
-remove pesticides from your home; use eco-friendly cleaners and avoid toxic roach/ant treatments.
-takepart and learn more about what you can do

Today is also an opportunity to remember the Bhopal Disaster and to support its victims. When a Union Carbide pesticide production plant exploded nearly 20 years ago, it was the first major industrial disaster that killed nearly 20,000 people.  Thousands more continue to suffer today from the consequences of this tragedy. Today is a time to remember the victims and survivors of Bhopal. And, it’s an opportunity to celebrate all of the fantastic opportunities we have to remove pesticides from our lives. takepart with PANNA today.

(photo: Toban Black, Creative Commons)

Environmental Working Group posted a guide listing the fruits and veggies that have the most pesticides to help you decide what you should buy organic and what can ge purchased when conventionally grown is the only thing available.

Here are the top 12 fruits and veggies with the most pesticides.

1. Peaches (who would have thunk!)

2. Apples

3. Sweet Bell Peppers

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If you work hard enough, you can pretty much recycle anything these days. The trick is knowing where to go with your batteries, cell phones, smoke detectors, televisions, pesticides, nuclear waste, antifreeze, and so forth and so on. Lucky for us, MSN Green is here to help. While the internet has not yet figured out a way to come to your place and pick up all your stuff, it’s at least trying to make the steps you have to dispose of your things properly take slightly less complicated.

With their handy “green directory,” you can type in what you’re trying to recycle and your zip code, and they’ll give you the nearest locations where you can safely get rid of your junk.

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The TakePart Top 10 Weekly Roundup is a compilation of the week’s most notable stories from our entertainment-meets-social-action blogging network. We brought you some excellent top 10 lists this week on art, technology, director Errol Morris, and naughty celebs who should rethink their eco-lifestyles. Don’t forget to catch up with some of our other most popular articles of the week, as well as a few TakePart blogger favorites.

Katie:

Bush’s War: PBS Frontline Brings the War to a Computer Near You

Inverted Areola, Asymmetrical Breasts, & the Miss Bimbo Game

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Nicole:

Where the Wild Things Are: Top 10 Art Blogs

Dark Water: Artist Explores Consequences of Three Gorges Dam Project

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Giulia:

A Pregnant Man?

Is the Lebron / Gisele Vogue Cover Racist?

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Gina:

Top 10 Technology Blogs

Errol Morris’ Top 10 Films

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Kerry:

Top 10 Celebrities Who Need a New Cause

Dead Bats Flying: Mysterious Fatal Illness Alarms Scientists

The bat problem’s gone from bad to worse since I wrote about it six weeks or so ago.  From today’s NY Times:

In what is one of the worst calamities to hit bat populations in the United States, on average 90 percent of the hibernating bats in four caves and mines in New York have died since last winter.           

Wildlife biologists fear a significant die-off in about 15 caves and mines in New York, as well as at sites in Massachusetts and Vermont. Whatever is killing the bats leaves them unusually thin and, in some cases, dotted with a white fungus. Bat experts fear that what they call White Nose Syndrome may spell doom for several species that keep insect pests under control.

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The 80th annual Academy Awards are on Sunday and on everyone’s minds. But instead of predicting this years winners, I wanted to write about some of the losers in Oscar’s history. OK, maybe losers is a little too strong. These 5 Best Picture nominees didn’t win the Academy Award. But by highlighting important social issues, raising awareness, and inspiring action, they won our hearts and minds. So get ready to be inspired!

1. Mr. Smith Goes To Washington (1939) starring Jimmy Stewart and directed by Frank Capra is both a scathing critique of Washington DC corruption and a heartfelt and hopeful story of an individual’s ability to make change in the face of adversity. The film was criticized by the media, politicians, congressmen, (surprise surprise!) who called it Communist and Anti-American. Another measure of the film’s power and reach is that it was banned in Fascist Italy and Spain and Nazi Germany.

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So ! You can be a Mr./Mrs./Ms. Smith and you don’t even have to go to Washington. All you have to do is e-mail Washington! Tell Congress to stick to its principles and not cave in to special interests and corruption.

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Roses in honor of Rosa Parks make a great gift because it allows you to give someone something beautiful, support a beautiful cause, and honor the legacy of a beautiful woman. Organic Style, an eco-friendly, socially responsible, Fair Trade on-line boutique, is selling the Freedom: Rosa Parks Rose bouquet, and donating a portion of its proceeds to the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development, which Rosa co-founded. The Institute’s youth leadership “Pathways to Freedom” program teaches students the stories and values of the civil rights movement, and encourages them to engage in social justice and, in turn, encourage social justice in their own communities, as they do in the video above made entirely by students in the Pathways Program.

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Why did we ever think that a pesticide that poisons bugs wouldn’t be harmful to humans, too? A just-published study from British medical journal the Lancet finds that people whose blood levels contain high levels of a category of pesticides known as POPs (persistent organic pollutants) are at greater risk of developing insulin resistance, which can lead to type 2 diabetes. More research is needed, according to Dr. Oliver Jones, one of the study’s authors:

“Of course correlation does not automatically imply causation. But if there is indeed a link, the health implications could be tremendous. At present there is very limited information. Research into adult onset diabetes currently focuses on genetics and obesity; there has been almost no consideration for the possible influence of environmental factors such as pollution.”

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by Kerry Trueman

Bloomberg News reports today that corn-based ethanol has earned the distinction of being “2007’s worst energy investment.”

Bill Gates and Archer Daniels Midland are among the supposedly savvy types who embraced ethanol as the solution to our energy needs. But it’s not reducing oil demand, it takes more energy to make than it gives off, and it does nothing to help the environment. On the contrary, stepped up corn production means more fertilizers and pesticides and threatens our dwindling water supply.

So distilleries are shutting down, ethanol stocks are tanking and there’s a glut of this stuff they can’t even unload. It all adds up to a losing proposition. Why didn’t these guys do the math?