Agriculture, use of pesticides

The agricultural use of pesticides such as insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides has clearly reduced crop losses due to insects, weeds, and plant diseases in the US and throughout the world. The benefits from agricultural pesticides include improved crop yields, greater availability of fruits, vegetables, and grains, and lower consumer costs (Ecobichon, 1996). 

The widespread agricultural use of pesticides increases their concentration in river waters. Many of these contain sulfur, e.g., herbicides thiobencarb (S-4-chlorobenzyl diethylthiocarba-mate) isoprothiolane (diisopropyl 1,3-dithiolan-2-ylidenemalonate), diazinon (O-O-diethyl 0-2-isopropyl-6-methylpyrimidin-4-yl) and feni-trothion (0,0-dimethyl O-4-nitro-m-toryl phos-phorothioate), fungicide (isoprothiolane) and two insecticides (diazinon and fenitrothion). The concentrations of these pesticides typically show strong seasonal patterns which reflect their use (Sudo et al, 2002). 

Groundwater contamination in the U.S. was reviewed by Pye et al. in 1983 (J. The most common sources of such contamination included human and animal wastes, industrial wastes, petroleum products, landfill leachate, and (along coastal regions) saltwater intrusion. Contamination from the agricultural use of pesticides was apparently far less common. Nevertheless, by 1984, Cohen et al. (2) reported that... 

The occurrence of pesticides in the atmosphere or in water supplies is an important national issue (1-3), Numerous monitoring studies have demonstrated that agricultural use of pesticides can contribute to both atmospheric and water... 

Agricultural uses of pesticides have increased tremendously from the begiimings of this industry in the 1950 s. Armual expenditures on pesticides nearly doubled in the United States from 1980 to 2000, with increases in herbicide, insecticide and fungicide use (Figure 1 4). At the same time, the number of insect species that have evolved resistance to at least one insecticide has reached about 500 by the year 2000, with some insects evolving powerfirl resistance to multiple, commonly used chemicals (5,6). 

International Code of Conduct on the Distribution and Use of Pesticides, United Nations Pood and Agriculture Organization, New York, 1985 amended to include provisions for "Prior Informed Consent," 1990. 

Approved Code of Practice. Safe use of pesticides for non-agricultural purposes. Control of substances hazardous to health regulations. 

Training m the Use of Pesticides Protective Clothing for Use with Pesticides Agricultural pesticides... 

One reason for the rapid growth in the use of pesticides worldwide has been the "Green Revolution" (5), Although there have been some benefits from pesticide use in agriculture, they also cause significant environmental and public health problems. The same is true in public health where Insecticides have been used to control malaria. However, today Increased resistance to insecticides in mosquitoes and Increased resistance to drugs by the malarial parasite are resulting in an explosive increase of malaria worldwide (5). 

Each year the use of pesticides in U.S. agriculture costs the nation about 4.1 billion (15). This cost Includes the cost of the chemical plus that of application. Approximately 16 billion worth of crops is saved through the application of pesticides. Thus, for every dollar invested in pesticides about 4 is returned in protected crops. 

From this analysis it is clear that in addition to their benefits, the use of pesticides in food production not only causes serious public health problems but also considerable damage to vital agricultural and natural ecosystems in the United States and world. A conservative estimate suggests that the environmental and social costs of pesticide use in the United States total about 4 billion each year. Worldwide the yearly environmental and public health costs are probably at least 100 billion. This is several times the 18 bllllon/yr spent on pesticides in the world. 

Future studies must focus on those specific agricultural technologies that have contributed to the increased use of pesticides during the past 40 years, and why crop losses to pests continue to Increase. Research needs not only to identify the detrimental technologies, but, more Important, develop ecologically sound practices that farmers can use as profitable substitutes (15). 

USDA. 1978. Farmers use of pesticides in 1976. Agricultural economic report No. 418. Washington, DC Report to U.S. Department of Agriculture by Economics, Statistics, and Cooperative Services, 16. 

Nitrosamines and Pesticides A Special Report on the Occurrence of Nitrosamines as Terminal Residues Resulting from Agricultural Uses of Certain Pesticides (10), P. C. Kearney, Project Coordinator, Pure and Appl. Chem.,... 

Further, the authors have carefully examined and documented the public health and environmental impacts of pesticide use in the USSR. The USSR was the largest country by territory in the world and the use of pesticide here was enormous. As the authors have shown, this happened mostly because the USSR s Communistic rulers decided at the end of the 1960 s — to turn all chemical weaponry plants (constructed in the beginning of the cold war) to pesticide production. With rich government subsidies, pesticides were distributed through all collective farms The Soviet official policy, the chemicalisation of agriculture, was an attempt to overcome its prominent ineffectiveness in crop production. 

In the USSR it was thought that 1.2-1.3 billion rubles a year were spent on pesticides, while 7-8 billion rubles a year of additional agricultural product were produced (i.e. a 5.8-6.2 ruble return on 1 ruble spent in prices from the end of the 1980s) [1]. However, reality was different. There is every reason to speak not so much about profits earned by pesticides, but about the direct damage to rural and forestlands, to human health, etc. caused by the large-scale use of pesticides. 

In the book The Safe Use of Pesticides While Intensifying Agricultural Production [21], the paragraphs on polychlorpinen in beet fields were lost among data linked to OCP contamination of breast milk in Japan, the USA, and Sweden the dangers to the inhabitants of Italy from herbicide contamination of the Po river the poisoning of the inhabitants of the USA and Canada by watermelon from a plantation treated with pesticides and many other facts. Here is the text on the beet fields ... 

LESSON 6. THE WIDESPREAD USE OF PESTICIDES IS PRIMARILY DETERMINED NOT BY AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY, THE FISHING INDUSTRY, OR MEDICINE, BUT BY THE INTERESTS OF THE CHEMICAL COMPANIES THAT PRODUCE THEM. 

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