The N.S. Green Party’s agriculture critic says the provincial government’s failure to ban bio-solids on farmland exposes Nova Scotians to untold health risks.

“Sewage sludge does not belong on our dwindling farmland,” Anna-Maria Galante said Friday.

Galante, appointed agriculture critic by party leader John Percy last fall, was responding to Friday’s news that the province had rejected a request from Kings County council to ban the spreading of treated Halifax sewage as a substitute for conventional fertilizer.

Galante says the Green Party is calling on the province’s health organizations to question the province’s guidelines for the treatment of the sludge, which is collected from residential, hospital, industrial, commercial sources and street run-off.

“It’s not that we oppose returning waste to the land. It’s that our waste is toxic. We’re not just talking about heavy metals. There are pharmaceutical residues and synthetic hormones that are going to end up in our food.”

She added that in other locales, bio-solids are being used an alternative fuel source.

“In Malmo, Sweden, public transit is being run on bio-fuels generated from organic waste. That makes sense. Nova Scotia Power could be using bio-fuel instead of harvesting our forests for so-called bio-mass.”

Galante is hoping that Kings County will join with other municipal units for a  collective consensus ban on bio-solids fertilizer.

“The health concerns are paramount. Bio-solids won’t help the reputation of our struggling agriculture sector in the long run. And climate change and oil scarcity are making unspoiled farmland a precious commodity.”