Amazon selling the banned weed killer Sodium Chlorate

A Landscape Juice investigation has revealed that Amazon.co.uk openly advertising the banned herbicide Sodium Chlorate on its website via its sellers.

Landscape Juice was first made aware of Sodium Chlorate being sold as a total weed killer on Amazon on the 6th July 2014.

Sodium Chlorate – a non-selective weed killer - was banned across Europe in 2009.

We then purchased a one litre bottle to inspect the product and then contacted Amazon on the 14th July 2014.

We were told by a Executive Customer Relations manager that the seller would be investigated.

"I can confirm that our sellers are not allowed to sell any illegal or prohibited items. Please know that the seller Cleaning and environmental solutions has been reported to the appropriate team for investigation. This team deals with possible violations of our policies and ensures that appropriate actions are taken against sellers that do not abide by the terms and conditions of the Participation Agreement."

Since we reported the seller, the product label has been changed, removing the seller's company details and website address.

The bottle we bought came from a company called Abel UK Ltd.

The product came in a bag, bubble wrapped, not in a plastic bag (best practice to reduce leakage). The bottle has no safety cap, and no foil seal. There is an MSDS with the product which does have the UN classification etc. On the bottle there is no MAPP, no chemical names etc.

A spokesperson from Progreen Weed Control said:

"From one or two comments we’ve had from our customers we had suspicions that a number of suppliers were offering illegal pesticides. Now we know this practice has been going on we see it as a serious threat to the Amenity and Landscaping industry in general.

"Progreen Weed Control and other members of the Amenity Forum have been striving over the several years to raise industry standards and establish best practice guidelines. The fact that a supplier can sell a banned product, in illegal packaging via a non-approved delivery service, with incorrect labelling is not only irresponsible but downright dangerous.

"What saddens us even more is that this is allowed on reputable retailing sites such as Amazon & E-bay who would benefit by working in partnership with the Amenity Forum and its members who understand what is needed.

"Our work as a member of the Amenity Forum has highlighted the ever increasing number of products being withdrawn from use. It is vitally important that we as suppliers protect our industry by sticking to guidelines, focusing on selling ethically, support users with knowledgeable trained staff & where possible look to reduce pesticide usage.

"Those that continue to break the law are not only a danger to the general public but also to the whole survival of an industry that is under ever increasing scrutiny – they need to be stopped and stopped soon."

A search across Amazon brings up a number of other products that clearly says (or suggests) that Sodium Chlorate is being sold as a total weed killer.

Comment

Amazon has a clear legal responsibility and a duty of care to ensure that illegal substances are not sold via any of its channels.

Despite repeated communication with Amazon, it appears that only the minimum has been done to ensure that its [Amazon] sellers are acting within the law.

Even if Amazon is now satisfied that its sellers are operating within its guidelines, Amazon does also have a moral obligation here and must be seen to act to stamp out abuse of loopholes.

Sodium Chlorate was removed from sale and use for a reason...we need companies like Amazon to police their systems to ensure that no seller (or buyer) can circumnavigate the law.

Comments

[ian]

Sodium Chlorate is for sale on ebay right now!! £29.99 how wrong is that

[andy]

Why was sodium chlorate banned ?
Just wondered

[BearUK]

Actually the EU decision to ban sodium chlorate and many other chemicals was controversial. Yes, it's toxic and hazardous, but how far do you go to protect people from their stupidity? At least before the ban the product was properly identified and carried warning labels. Now you have people, much like myself, that loved the effectiveness of this chemical for killing weeds going online to find 'illegal' sources of sodium chlorate; much like I go online to find 'illegal' sources of incandescent lightbulbs that are destroying the planet a bulb at a time. Every time I press the light switch, every time I start my V8 engined car, a whale dies and a polar bear goes hungry. I'm an eco-criminal.

Just because a government bans something doesn't mean they are good and righteous.

[Doug]

10,000 years ago, there was about a mile of Ice above the UK and a chunk of Europe. That Ice melted due to natural global warming, - (There being no cars/lorries or any humans about in gaz guzzlers).

Sodium Chlorate in granular form was regularly used by an Irish Terrorist organisation in the manufacture of bombs, - that is the real reason why it was banned by the faceless folks who now control our country from expensive offices in Brussels.

[Paul Threlfall]

Sodium Chlorate was the only weedkiller that actually worked! Man is not killing the planet, it will be here long after mans extinction.

[weedkiller]

great story! I've been struggling to find Sodium Chlorate and you have helped me find ot from a coupe of sellers on Amazon! Whould never of thought to search for it so blatently :-) You have helped me kill all my weeds! Keep up the good work.

[David Rollmeover]

Remember this when you vote at the referendum.

[Ian]

There's little wrong with using Sodium Chlorate. It does the job of killing weeds if used carefully and selectively. The weak link is the user, but as an earlier comment suggests, the faceless busy bodys in Brussels are hell bent on spoon feeding us all and running our lives by remote control.
ps Terrorists probably have ready access to commercial explosives such as C4 and Semtex so don't need to rely on garden chemicals any more !!

[Bonnemort]

Doug - I'm pretty sure the IRA used ammonium nitrate fertiliser - much more potent and available to this day in one ton bags from agricultural suppliers. I think the terrorists they worry about aren't Irish.

[Dante]

And glyphosphate is really much safer for people - now turning up in the food chain. Lovely!

The sheer Stupidity of banning a dangerous product only to replace it with something even more dangerous.

For the ecocriminal above - next time you buy a tungsten bulb just think about the saving made in not having to dispose of all those highly toxic energy saving bulbs. Any benefits of energy savers are far outweighed by the cost of safe disposal. Madness!

[Chris]

Find myself hunting out a source for sodium chlorate even though I know it's banned - and the hell with regulations. It's for my shingle driveway which has been there for decades & will remain for decades. Nowhere near a water source.
For years sodium chlorate did the job, one application kept the weeds at bay for a couple of years or more and harmed nobody and nothing. Since the ban I've spent a fortune, and plenty of my time, on every weedkiller on the market and not one of them does a half-decent job.
Damn the petty eureaucrats.

[Lizzy]

Please can you advise what the dilution ratio for the sodium chlorate solution which I have bought. I can advise it is being used in a non-EU country as a weed-killer on a driveway.
thanks

[plumb]

The EU sodium chlorate ban has something to do with one or more UK MPs who were in government at the time now being on the board of Monsanto...who manufacture Chlorate's only main alternative. Go figure.

[Sir John]

The excuse that Sodium Chlorate was banned because it could be used as an explosive is totally wrong although the IRA did use it occasionally but it needed a trigger anyway!

In any case for those years when motorways were being constructed at around 50 to 100 miles a year every 'Irish paddy' must have known about a nitrogen based fertilizer and diesel fuel which was more effective. So why pick on poor old sodium chlorate which was sold for many years in garden shops but with an inhibitor in it to prevent use for fireworks and bomb making?

What is so good about sodium chlorate is that it kills the ground for a few months such that weeds are unable to grow whereas things like Weedol are neutralised by the soil which is fine for some applications by no good if you have a gravel driveway! If you want the weedkiller to last it is sodium chloride every time.

I recently obtained a small quantity by careful use of the internet but it enters the UK from overseas (not an EU nation by the way!). I have also discovered only minutes ago that I can purchase it in the UK provided I buy 25kg.

There can be little doubt that this was just another one of those EU laws which enabled some US commercial interest to flourish, while Britain being the EU's prize mug follows all EU laws to the letter, and actually gold plates a few rules too.

Roll on independence day and at least relinquish the source of corruption we will never have control over.

[John moon]

Lost when told shops lstop ed selling it