frequently the case, they can mislead their customers. It was observed that most of the pesticides are sold to the farmers in unlabelled containers such as used water bottles, fizzy drink bottles, alcohol bottles or sachets (Fig. 2).It was revealed from the focus group discussions that some of the vendors can deliberately or out of ignorance mislead customers by selling the wrong products to them. In Bo, a farmer said during the focus group discussions:“I went to buy a pesticide to kill bedbugs in the house but what the lady selling the pesticides brought out and wanted to sell was propanil which is an herbicide. Even after telling the lady that it is not the correct one she argued that it is because that was what the agricultural extension worker from which she bought it said”.To verify this story a small survey was carried out. An extension worker in charge of pesticide distribution was contacted to purchase chlorpyrifos which he said he had for sale. He brought out propanil and claimed that the two pesticides are the same. After buying the propanil from him, he was asked to bring chlorpyrifos in addition to propanil. He did not have chlorpyrifos but went to a local vendor to purchase some. This suggests that the extension worker, in this case, was familiar with pesticide identification. This is an indication that illiterate farmers sometimes buy and sell the wrong products unknowingly.
3.3. Sources of pesticides
Results from the interviews also indicated that 46% of the pesticides used in Sierra Leone originate from packaging and processing factories in the Republic of Guinea from where they enter Sierra Leone illegally (Fig. 3). They are brought into the country by illiterate small scale traders who do not understand the instructions written in French.Focus group discussions revealed that most of the limited supply of legitimate pesticides that comes from Freetown also end up in the hands of street vendors as in the case discussed above.It appears that pesticides are being illegally importated into Sierra Leone and as this represents an uncontrolled use it requires regulation.However, based on interviews carried out in this study pest control stake holders are of the opinion that the scale of such illegal imports is low and therefore can be expected to have a minimal negative impact.These expectations have never been justified by any research evidence.The pest control units are supposed to regulate and monitor the use of pesticides. However, interviews and focus groups discussions showed that, instead of regulating and monitoring the use of the supplied pesticides, extension workers often sell the supplied stock to the street vendors who in turn sell them to the farmers.It was found that 26.4% of the respondents did not know the source of the pesticides they use. They just go to the market and buy from petty traders. There is evidence that petty traders sometimes mislead their customers (the case of the farmer mentioned above). This means there is high risk of buying the wrong pesticides. From the focus group discussions, farmers said sometimes the pesticides they buy from petty traders have lost their ‘power’ so when they apply them they are not effective. This indicates that the farmers do not even know what they are buying. Any type of pesticide can be applied even if it is not suitable for the target pest.
3.4. Training and education
It was found that 71% of the respondents have never received any form of training on the safe use of pesticides. Only 17% received some form of training and 80% of these trained farmers received informal training from untrained farmers. As a result the application methods are haphazard and largely by trial and error. This is has important implications for both the environment and the health of the farmers.However, there are groups of trained personnel present in major cities across the country. Some of these are attached to government pest control units and some to private pest control units. Most of these trained personnel are semi-illiterate youths who do not understand the complexity of pesticides. They are supplied with personal protective equipment although they are often not used as intended. During a discussion with two of these groups, it was discovered that these trained personnel do not apply pesticides on rice farms except those farms owned by government officials who could afford to hire them. They apply pesticides to homes and offices most of the time. Even these trained personnel do not know the differences between some of the pesticides they use.From the interviews, it was found that 56.4% of the farmers have no formal education (Fig. 4a). Twenty three percent (primary and junior secondary levels) are not educated enough to understand instructions written on the labels. Only 20.6% of the respondents are considered to have adequate education to read and