An expert on the use of pesticides will address a Whangarei audience about the damage pesticides, industrial chemicals and waste cause to human health and the environment.
Dr Meriel Watts, who has recently returned from a United Nations Conference of signatories to the Basel, Stockholm and Rotterdam Conventions seeking to limit the effect of pesticides and other agricultural and industrial chemicals, was invited to Whangarei by the Toxin Awareness Group.
That informal group was started in the early 1990s by a group of mothers on the Tutukaka Coast concerned about the effects of aerial pesticide spraying on the health of their families.
Group member Nora Shayeb described it as a "pop-up" group, responding as concerns arose.
Recent aerial spraying close to local waterways and the coast spurred the group to reconvene, she said.