A Nova Scotia high speed wireless network is in doubt after a local garlic farmer managed to get a council to refusing planning permission for microwave towers.

Lenny Levine, who has been planting and harvesting garlic by hand on his Annapolis Valley land since the 1970s, is afraid his organic crop could be irradiated if EastLink builds a microwave tower for wireless high-speed internet access a few hundred metres from his farm. He fears that his garlic will mutate into something worse because the microwaves from the tower will shake up the molecules.

Levine's beliefs are stopping his rural neighbours from getting a decent broadband connection as EastLink uses microwave transmission to provide high-speed internet access to places that otherwise would be too expensive to connect.  As a result the region is on dial up which is one step up from having your data sent by pigeon. However Levine is unrepentant.  He said he moved to the country to get away from pollution, and he sees the radiation from the towers as another form of pollution.

"I view it with dread, fear and panic," he said. "I don't want to grow food under those conditions."

Levine has convinced Kings County Council that his unique business is at risk if the tower goes ahead as planned. EastLink has appealed council's decision to the federal department, and a decision is expected soon. Radiation from the internet tower is 60,000 times lower than the government's accepted limits for organic farms.