Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
we could also say that the situation bears some similarities to the problems with the nuclear weapon
stockpiles of the former Soviet Union.
Before the EU-wide ban in 2007, access to anything with carbofuran in it was restricted. The earli-
est registration of a carbofuran product within the government database was in 1973, and, between that
time and the ban, fi ve chemicals including carbofuran or 'carbofuran-like' (i.e., the chemically simi-
lar carbosulfan) were used legally as agricultural pesticides in Hungary: Agrofur (40% carbofuran),
Chinufur 40 FW (40% carbofuran), Furadan 10G (10% carbofuran), Furadan 4 F (40% carbofuran)
and Marshal 25 EC (25% carbosulfan) (Central Agricultural Offi ce, personal communication, 2011).
Only people with specifi c education and licenses could buy, store and apply these products or they
were required both to oversee its application and to log the use of it. Such logs had to be kept at the
farms themselves so that they could be shown to the authorities if requested. Transportation, storage
and disposal were also strictly regulated, until the demise of many of the former collective farms in
the last two decades. Sometimes the pesticide storage facilities at these farms were left abandoned, and
quite a lot of the pesticides were, let us say, 'redistributed' among the local population.
5.6.2 Incidents of carbofuran-related wildlife mortality in Hungary
According to the database of BirdLife Hungary (MME), between 1998 and 2008, 77 different wild-
life poisoning cases were reported. Aside from a single case of negligent pesticide use by a farmer
and three reported cases of secondary lead poisoning (from lead shot) almost all of these cases
were the result of deliberate poisoning. Carbofuran was detected in 75% of the poisoning cases (i.e.
58/77). New cases have emerged since then, and are being recorded every year. In contrast to some
of the other contributions offered in this chapter, here, such poisonings tend not to target birds of
prey. Instead, they tend to be motivated by the imperative to protect small game species from foxes
and corvids, although it must be noted that one of the poisoning incidents occurred because a hob-
byist had wanted to protect his pigeons from birds of prey. The victims' susceptibility is mainly
infl uenced by the method of poisoning used. Small animal carcasses (e.g., a pheasant) or scraps of
meat generally serve as bait and thus animals such as foxes and various birds of prey, who are drawn
to such items, are readily poisoned.
BirdLife Hungary reported that 36 Imperial eagles have been found poisoned and nine more are
assumed to have died either directly or indirectly as a result of poisoning since 2005, when the fi rst
such case was reported since the 1970s. The population status of Imperial eagles in Hungary is now
seriously threatened by an increasing trend of persecutions which is very unfortunate because the
species had previously been considered a real conservation success story. Mortality from poisoning is
much higher than from other forms of persecution. For example, during the same period 'only' four
eagles were shot and two nests with clutches were fi red upon. In total, an estimated 54 Imperial eagles
have been the victims of persecution incidents during the last years, equivalent to 23.1% of the national
and 14.2% of the European Union breeding population size in 2010. In addition to Imperial eagles,
932 other protected birds belonging to 20 different species (e.g., 65 white-tailed eagles (
Haliaeetus
albicilla
), 12 saker falcon (
Falco cherrug
), 271 common buzzard (
Buteo buteo
)) have been found
poisoned in Hungary since 2000 (Horváth et al. unpublished data). And these numbers are very con-
servative because only a fraction of all poison deaths are reported to nature conservation organisations.
5.6.3 Analysis of wildlife samples for poisons and other incidents
of poisoning in Hungary
In recent years, BirdLife Hungary has used the services of a single laboratory in Budapest
(M. Horváth, personal communication, 2010). Tests cost about 10 000 HUF (USD 50) per sample,
and Birdlife Hungary primarily assumed the costs during the fi rst few years when the poisonings
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