November 13, 2025
Guadeloupe and Martinique residents uncovered for years to a poisonous pesticide are demanding justice from the French authorities.
Residents of Guadeloupe and Martinique are demanding monetary compensation and accountability from the French authorities over years of pressured publicity to poisonous pesticides.
In a landmark March 2025 ruling, a French court docket held the state liable for the reproductive problems with two girls and 9 males who developed prostate most cancers, acknowledging that France had knowingly uncovered them to a poisonous pesticide with lifelong penalties, Inside Local weather Information reported. With over 90% of Guadeloupe and Martinique’s populations carrying traces of chlordecone of their blood — and each islands reporting a number of the world’s highest prostate most cancers charges — residents are demanding recognition and justice from the French authorities.
“We have been uncovered to this chemical that was recognized for its dangerous results, day by day and always. And it has ruined lives,” mentioned Georgina Lambert, a local of Guadaloupe who suffered six consecutive miscarriages earlier than realizing her reproductive struggles have been due to her pressured publicity to the poisonous pesticide.
Lambert, now residing in France, grew up in Guadeloupe, swimming in rivers and taking part in amongst banana bushes rooted in soil contaminated with chlordecone. The French authorities continued utilizing the poisonous pesticide on banana plantations till the mid-Nineteen Nineties, regardless of its recognized hazard, with the U.S. Environmental Safety Company banning it in 1976 and the World Well being Group labeling it a carcinogen three years later.
Right now, a lot of Guadeloupe and Martinique stays coated in banana fields bordered by houses and faculties the place chlordecone was as soon as closely used. The chemical continues to seep into soil and water with every rainfall, contaminating streams, livestock, and crops, with its poisonous results anticipated to linger for as much as 600 years.
“The meals chain was contaminated,” mentioned Luc Multigner, one of many lead researchers at Iserm, who spent twenty years learning the pesticide. “Because of this, contamination wasn’t restricted to banana plantation areas solely.”
Latest research from France’s Nationwide Institute of Well being and Medical Analysis (Inserm) present that chlordecone is an endocrine disruptor linked to prostate most cancers, untimely births, and developmental points in kids. New analysis printed on Oct. 16, 2025, discovered it additionally reduces girls’s fertility — these with excessive blood ranges have been 25–28% much less prone to conceive.
Nonetheless, the journey to justice continues as French Caribbean residents residing over 4,000 miles from Paris endure the scars of this environmental catastrophe. Every name for justice reignites long-held resentment over France’s colonial legacy, inequality, and neglect of its abroad territories.
In 2019, Lambert realized of a lawsuit filed by practically 1,300 Guadeloupe and Martinique residents looking for compensation for chlordecone publicity. She joined the case, and in March 2025, a court docket ordered the state to pay her and 10 others as much as €10,000 every. Although few plaintiffs succeeded, the ruling may set a precedent for future claims. Because of this, the French authorities has appealed the choice, drawing criticism from the victims’ lawyer, Christophe Leguevaques.
“The state is participating in double-talk. The president and a few ministers have publicly acknowledged the state’s share of duty, so why does it trouble them when the courts agree?” Leguevaques mentioned.
“[The state] claims it needs to enhance the scenario for its residents, but when there’s a device that permits them to take action, they problem it. It’s incomprehensible to the residents of the French Caribbean.”
In response to the disaster, France has launched measures similar to free “chlordeconemie” blood assessments and government-funded soil testing by means of teams like Jafa in Guadeloupe. A “most residue restrict” coverage additionally permits meals with low chlordecone ranges to be bought — an method usually criticized by locals.
“They’re making an attempt to include the issue, not clear up it,” mentioned Josiane Jos Pelage, a pediatrician who hosts neighborhood conferences to assist residents higher perceive chlordecone and its risks. “It’s not formidable sufficient.”
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