“There is an urgent need to end this exploitation of lower standards of protection. This is a morally and ethically unjustifiable situation,” Baskut Tuncak, United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights and toxics, told Swiss NGO Public Eye on Wednesday. “States should have mandatory human rights due diligence for chemical manufacturers.”

Syngenta has earned billions selling pesticides that are not approved for use in Switzerland, announced the NGO in a reportexternal link published this week...

In response, a Syngenta spokesperson told swissinfo.ch that, "the Public Eye report is politically motivated and deliberately misleading – its rhetoric is designed to scare the public and promote the Responsible Business Initiative in Switzerland. The report is based on a list developed by PAN, which no national or international organization recognizes". 

Syngenta’s Switzerland director, Roman Mazzotta, told Swiss Public Television RTS that, "Our products are safe, they are subject to long-term inspections and are regularly checked. It takes many years for a product to be registered. There is therefore no reason for us to remove these products from the market”.

In an interview published on Monday [...], Syngenta CEO Erik Fyrwald argued that effective crop protection products play an important role in feeding the planet and tackling climate change.