In the news this month: two married couples with Parkinson's who lived (consecutively) in the same home for decades, multiple children with leukemia at one small elementary school, premature births, asthma and cancer. What do these cases have in common? The victims live next to fields where pesticides are used. Pesticides that can cause those conditions.
What protection does the law provide against these health violations?
Administrative law: mainly permits and precaution
The legal debate on pesticides takes place primarily in administrative law. Proceedings before the Council of State and the Board of Business Appeals are about whether a pesticide may be authorized and used. Protection of natural areas is gaining more and more weight in these proceedings. For example, on April 2, 2025, the Council of State decided that users must prove that no damage to nature will occur during use. If the user cannot, a nature permit is required (ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:1428).
Health also plays a role. In a ruling on goat farms, the court decided that even without conclusive evidence, government intervention can be justified because of plausible health risks. The causal link was not proven, but the risk of health damage justified the goat ban (ECLI:NL:RVS:2023:2791).
Civil law: no compensation for injuries so far
In civil law, local residents seek their protection primarily in claims to prohibit the use of pesticides within a certain distance of their homes. To date (as far as we know), no local residents have claimed and been awarded compensation for actual health damage caused by exposure to pesticides. Proceedings have thus been exclusively about (preliminary) bans, not financial compensation.
When seeking damages for health damage caused by pesticides, one of the bumps in the road will be causation: is it plausible that the damage actually resulted from pesticide use? The latter is often considered virtually impossible proposed. There is often confusion about what is meant by causation.
The difference between medical vs. legal causation
Medically and epidemiologically, a statistical correlation at the population level (e.g., a greater likelihood of a particular disease in people who have been exposed) does not mean that, in an individual case, it can be established without question that exposure was the cause. This is why doctors and scientists are often reluctant to speak of causality in concrete cases: scientific certainty can rarely be given in the case of environmental factors.
In civil law, however, the "conditio sine qua non" criterion (literally: condition without which no): the question is whether the injury would have occurred even without the standard violation or conduct. Plaintiffs must make a plausible case that their injury resulted from the use of pesticides, that it was the most likely cause in the particular case. Absolute certainty is not required, but the court will have to appreciate the evidence in light of all the circumstances of the case.
The role of statistics as evidence in civil law
Statistics and epidemiological research can help the court in this regard: for example, if it is made plausible that exposure has occurred and the type of harm fits known, research-supported risks of the pesticide in question, this can help to make causation plausible. This can be done, for example, by bringing in expert reports or environmental studies. Thus, the court does not look at absolute certainty, but rather at the picture that the available facts and statistics conjure up together.
Certainly when other causes are less likely, or when there is direct, measurable exposure on which the effects have followed, the court may come to the conclusion that causation is plausible based on a combination of the known data and statistical insights. Thus, proving causation in pesticide cases is not at all impossible.
Case examples: material damage compensation awarded
For material damage - such as damage to an adjacent property - the legal instruments have already been put into practice. In the judgments of the Central Netherlands District Court of September 8, 2021 (ECLI:NL:RBMNE:2021:4395) and of the North Holland District Court on November 9, 2022 (ECLI:NL:RBNHO:2022:10013), arable farmers were held liable for damage to the neighbor's yard caused by windblown pesticides. Here it could be established directly that the pesticide had blown over from one plot to another: the causal link was thus evident and was also legally accepted.
Even for health damage to local residents, especially in obvious cases, the court can reach liability if the combination of facts, circumstances and (statistical) science makes it sufficiently likely that the damage was caused by pesticide use.
Legal development: space for local residents grows
Although civil liability has so far revolved mainly around prohibitions, and compensation for health damage has not yet been claimed or awarded, you can see a growing sensitivity to the interests of local residents in case law. We see in this development many opportunities for recovering damages for victims of pesticides.
Questions?
Do you have questions about liability and compensation for pesticide use or other environmental factors? Please feel free to contact Victor Vandersmissen.