Computerised crop protection
Crop
protection information at the touch of a mouse button is now available on
CD ROM in the form of the CABI Crop Protection Compendium. This
encyclopaedic reference has been under development for some years and the
first commercial release of the compendium which includes information on
crop protection in Asia has now been released.
The system is easy to use, fast, flexible
and very informative. Using the widely familiar PC Windows based format,
the user needs only to click on buttons to navigate through the system.
Searches can be carried out by pest, natural enemy, crop, country or
taxonomic group.
Under the pest control information
it was pleasing to see that in all the cases we explored, cultural and
biological control information always preceded chemical control
information. Where evidence existed that chemical pesticides had led to
increases in pest attack, such as in the control of brown leaf hopper in
rice, this information was also clearly stated.
Every agricultural research centre if not every extension worker should
have one. We look forward to the global compendium which includes Africa
and other regions. This is scheduled for completion in 1998.
CABI Crop Protection Compendium Module 1- South-East Asia and Pacific, CAB International, Wallingford, Oxon OX10 8DE, UK. Tel: +44 (0)1491 832111, Fax: +44 (0)1491 826090, E-mail: cabi@cabi.org 1997.
Irish
residue concerns
The Irish Department of
Agriculture has published results of pesticide food monitoring for 1994,
1995 and 1996. From a total of 3,194 samples, 46.7% contained detectable
residues of which 1% (31) were above the statutory maximum residue limit
(MRL). Of these 31 samples, over 50% involved organophosphate (OP)
insecticides. Generally, levels of pesticide residues were low, and in
line with other countries such as the Sweden, the UK and the US. However
the Department of Agriculture is concerned that a number of organochlorine
and OP residues were detected above recommended levels
The Department concludes: “The fact that
abuses can occur and that excessive residues can be detected, points to
the need for the continuation and strengthening of the monitoring system.”
Pesticides Residues in Food—1994, 1995 and 1996, Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Pesticide Control Service, Dublin, Ireland, 1997, 96pp.
Website
directory
This is the first edition of a
general environmental website directory. It includes over 85 website
addresses of major US and international organisations with a brief
description of their main areas of interest. There are a number of
organisations listed that have an interest in pesticides and/or
sustainable agriculture.
The Directory of Environmental Websites on the Internet, US Environmental Directories, PO Box 65156, St. Paul, MN 55165, US, 1997, 18pp.
Pheromones
in Peru
Peruvian
entomologists have had a number of successes in using sex pheromones to
control pests, according to the Alternatives to Agrochemicals Action
Network (RAAA) and the Entomological Society of Peru. They have
demonstrated that sex pheromones are a viable and economic alternative for
pest control in various crops, citing the control of the pink caterpillar
of India, a key pest of Peruvian cotton, as one such example.
The advantages of using pheromones are: low
toxicity; ease of application; few regulatory restrictions; compatibility
with cultural practices and biological control; little evidence of
resistance developing in pests; and the reduction of pest levels for long
periods.
The limitations of pheromones are:
migration of females who have copulated in untreated areas; the
development of secondary pests due to the absence of applications for the
main pests; inadequacy for high infestations; high cost of synthesising
active ingredient; and the lack of a market to encourage development of
techniques for release formulation.
The book is an
important contribution to the development of alternative technologies for
sustainable agricultural production systems.
Alfonso Lizáraga, Travaglini and José Iannacone Oliver (Eds.), Manejo de feromonas en el control de plagas agrícolas, (The use of pheromones in the control of agricultural pests), (in Spanish), Alternatives to Agrochemicals Action Network (RAAA) and the Entomological Society of Peru, Mariscal Miller 2622, Lince, Apartado Postal 11-0581, Lima, Peru, Email postmaster@raaa.org.pe, Fax (51 14) 440 4359, November 1996, 194pp.
Policy
problems
This forceful book explains how
agricultural policies are having damaging effects on the environment. It
analyses, in a manner understandable to both the lay and specialist
reader, the relationships between agricultural policies and the problems
of modern agriculture. The book also suggests that farmers are forced,
through subsidy prices, to farm in an environmentally damaging
manner.
In terms of pesticides, Jack Bond, a retired
international civil servant, raises concern over the impact of these
chemicals on wildlife and residues in food and
water.
He says that we should recognise and enhance
the positive contribution which agriculture can in theory make to the
environment, by reducing agriculture pollution. Governments should create
conditions where landscape amenities and conservation values are improved,
he says.
Jack Bond concludes: “EC-policies are the
main obstacle to getting agriculture and the environment closer together
in the EU; and in the South it is the World Bank with its steamroller
approach that carries on with mammoth agricultural projects which damage
the environment.”
Bond, J.W., How EU and World Bank Policies are destroying agriculture and the environment: a European and Third World perspectives, AgBé Publishing, PO Box 1, 1050 Brussels, Belgium, 1996, 168pp.
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Agriculture criticised
Graham
Harvey, author of The Killing of the Countryside is the
agricultural story editor for The Archers (a BBC radio farming
drama). This controversial book, critically received by the conventional
farming community, challenges modern British agricultural policies and
practices. It looks at how public confidence in food safety has been
affected by issues such as the BSE crisis.
In the book Harvey discovers a rural
landscape of "lifeless fields", "poisoned ditches" which is "ruled by the
crop sprayer."
The need, he says, is for a food and
farming policy that serves the public interest, encourages safe,
sustainable farming systems and re-establishes the link between the
British people and their countryside.
Harvey, Graham, The Killing of the Countryside, Jonathan Cape, Random House, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London SW1V 2SA, UK, 1997, 218pp. Order direct from Amazon.co.uk.
Biotech—farming v. science
This book
is a bold attempt to cover the application of biotechnology to
agricultural development. It begins with a farmer’s views, assesses
farmer-based as well as science-based biotechnology, and addresses the
socio-political context.
Bunders, Joske, Bertus Haverkort and Wim Hiemstra (Eds.), Biotechnology: building on farmers’ knowledge, Macmillan Education Ltd, Houndmills, Basingstoke, RG21 6XS, 1997, 236pp. Order direct from Amazon.co.uk.
Local
food production
This book advocates direct
buying from local small-scale growers. Packed with culinary and
nutritional facts, Local Harvest examines the many benefits of
consuming locally-produced food. It takes a positive look at responsible
food production, and illustrates the array of health benefits that this
can bring, for people and the environment. The book agrees with the Food
Miles campaign run by the Sustainable Agriculture Food and Environment
Alliance (SAFE) which highlights the absurdities of the rising distances
food travels before reaching supermarket shelves. It quotes official
figures which reveal that in the 15 years to 1994, the distance travelled
by food and drink on UK roads increased by 50%.
The book has a useful appendix on buying
local food and how to buy food direct.
Local Harvest: delicious ways to save the planet, Lawrence & Wishart, 99A Wallis Road, London, E9 5LN, UK, 1997, 229pp. Order direct from Amazon.co.uk.
International directory
The Crop
Protection Directory—International Edition provides full address
details and a brief description of over 1,300 public and private sector
organisations, companies and consultants.
In eight sections it covers the
international agencies with an interest in: crop protection; the
international agrochemical industry; the increasingly important area of
biological control and integrated pest management; biotechnology and plant
breeding; migrant pests and vector control; stored crops and foodstuffs;
the environment; and a section on other sources of information including
publishing, databases and conferences.
Each section
starts with a scene-setting article or interview with an internationally
recognised author. Dr Jeff Waage, director of the International Institute
of Biological Control, writes about the changing face of biological
control. Mrs Elizabeth Dowdeswell, director general of the United Nations
Environment Programme relates to biological diversity, saying it is a key
component of successful agriculture. Dr Niek Van der Graaff, chief of the
Plant Protection Service of the Food and Agriculture Organisation, writes
on the role that his agency is playing in international crop
protection.
Previously Elaine Warrell has produced a
number of UK crop protection editions, but this is her first international
edition. It is likely to prove a very useful tool for anyone working
internationally in crop protection.
The Crop Protection Directory—International Edition, Elaine Warrell Associates, 105 Lee Road, London SE3 9DZ, Fax +44 (0)181 297 0789, April 1997, 323pp. Order direct from Amazon.co.uk.
Usage changes in ten years
A new
Pesticide Usage Survey Group report summarises changes in the use of
pesticides on all crops grown in Great Britain by comparing use in 1984
with use in 1994. The influence of changes in cropping, product spectrum
and application rates are discussed with particular reference to arable
crops. If sulphuric acid is omitted, the weight of pesticides applied in
the last ten years has decreased by 33%. A move to newer potentially more
benign pesticides, applied at lower rates of active ingredient per
hectare, together with an increased awareness of the suitability of
reduced dose applications, were the main factors leading to
reduction.
In addition to
listing the most frequently used chemicals by area treated and weight
applied in each year, those chemicals showing the most change over the
decade are also highlighted. Major changes in the treated area have
resulted from a significant increase in the area of oilseeds and pulses
grown; and a significant rise in the number and range of fungicides
applied to many arable crops; and a major increase in the use of
insecticides and growth regulators on cereals.
Review of Usage of Pesticides in
Agriculture and Horticulture Throughout Great Britain 1984-94, Pesticide
Usage Survey Report 100, MAFF Publications, London, 1997, 18 pp.
Diflubenzuron
The World Health
Organisation (WHO) has evaluated the risks to human health and the
environment posed by exposure to the insecticide
diflubenzuron.
The report found
diflubenzuron has a low toxicity and is unlikely to present an acute
hazard in normal use. A review of studies of long-term dietary
administration supports the conclusion that diflubenzuron is not
carcinogenic or mutagenic. However, WHO concludes that the main
metabolite, 4-chloroaniline (PCA), is carcinogenic in both mice and
rats.
In humans, and in several animal species, PCA
can cause the formation of methaemoglobin (produced from
haemoglobin—resulting in the compound no-longer functioning reversibly as
an oxygen carrier).
PCA has been reported to cause
methaemoglobinaemia. This condition occurs when methaemoglobin levels
build up in the blood causing cyanosis, headache, dizziness, fatigue,
vomiting, nausea and coma in exposed workers and inadvertently exposed
newly born infants. Despite this no data on the direct effects of
diflubenzuron on human health were available for
evaluation.
According to WHO the toxicology studies
in animals nevertheless support the theory that exposure to 0.02 mg/kg
body weight will probably not cause adverse effects in humans.
Diflubenzuron, Environmental Health Criteria, No. 184, WHO, 1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland, 1996, 164pp.
Immunotoxicity
This WHO book
provides a comprehensive guide to methods for testing the immunotox-icity
of chemicals in experimental animals and humans. There is growing concern
about the capacity of synthetic chemicals to disrupt immune functions and
thus increase the susceptibility to tumours and infectious diseases.
Compounds known to affect the immune system include drugs, pesticides,
solvents, metals, and non-pesticide organochlorines.
The book highlights the immunotoxic effects
of a number of pesticide groups including organochlorines,
organophosphates (OPs), pyrethroids, carbamates and dinocap. Convincing
evidence for immunotoxicity has been obtained for a contaminant of various
OP formulations such as malathion, fenitrothion and acephate. The
carbamate insecticide aldicarb has been shown to alter the immune systems
of women chronically exposed to the chemical in contaminated
groundwater.
The book concludes with a step-by-step
process of risk assessment specific to the evaluation of potentially
immunotoxic chemicals. Overall the book is technical and difficult for the
lay reader to understand—there is for example a 41 page glossary of
immunotoxicity terms used in the text.
Principles and Methods for Assessing Direct Immunotoxicity Associated with Exposure to Chemicals, Environmental Health Criteria, No. 180, WHO, 1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland, 1996, 164pp.
Chlorothalonil
WHO has also reviewed
chlorothalonil, a broad spectrum fungicide used widely in agriculture and
the amenity sector. Studies cited show that chlorothalonil has low acute
oral and dermal toxicity. The main effects of repeated oral dosing in test
animals are on the stomach and kidneys.
Data of effects on human health are confined
to case reports of contact dermatitis following occupational or accidental
exposure. The WHO report recommends that researchers need to assess the
skin irritation potential of chlorothalonil more fully. The report agrees
that chlorothalonil is probably carcinogenic in rodents. But it also
concludes that “the rodent was not the most relevant species for
evaluating the long-term effect of chlorothalonil in
humans.”
Evidence from the laboratory shows that
chlorothalonil is highly toxic to fish and aquatic invertebrates, although
a detailed literature search revealed no incidents in which mass-fish
kills have occurred in the environment.
Chlorothalonil, Environmental Health Criteria, No. 183, WHO, 1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland, 1996, 145pp.
UK
pesticides list
Pesticides 1997
contains the official details of all UK products approved as pesticides
under the Control of Pesticides Regulations 1986. Up-dated annually, the
book lists products for use in areas such as agriculture, commercial and
amenity horticulture, food storage, homes and gardens, and for wood
preservation, masonry treatment or use as public health and hygiene
insecticides.
There is also a
section detailing the UK regulation of pesticides which includes a useful
up-dated summary of pesticides which have been banned or severely
restricted in the UK.
Pesticides 1997, Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food/Health and Safety Executive, HMSO, 556pp.
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Resistance
research
This British Crop Protection
Council (BCPC) monograph provides an up-to-date review of the targets for,
and approaches to, devising new mechanisms to combat crop
pests.
BCPC argues that
developing crop resistance to pests is an effective way of reducing
pesticide use. The development of natural or engineered mechanisms of crop
resistance would have economic benefits to the arable and horticultural
industries. It will also reduce public concern over pesticide residues in
crop products and the environmental consequences of excessive or incorrect
pesticide use—but for how long?
Pierpoint, WS, and PR Shewry (Eds.),
Genetic engineering of crop plants for resistance to pests and diseases,
British Crop Protection Council, Publications, Bear Farm, Binfield,
Bracknell, Berks, RG42 5QE, UK, Fax 01734 341998, 1997, 103pp.
[This
article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 36,
June 1997, page 21]