Europe
June 17, 2019

The European Parliament’s Panel for the Future of Science and Technology (STOA) has published an In-depth Analysis report and staged an accompanying workshop addressing the topic ‘Farming without plant protection products: Can we grow without using herbicides, fungicides and insecticides?’

Written by Wannes Keulemans, Dany Bylemans and Barbara De Coninck, from the Department of Biosystems at Belgium’s Catholic University of Leuven (KU Leuven), it addresses the challenge of providing food security and healthy food for 11 billion people by the end of the century.

The authors examine the evolution in plant protection products (PPP), risk assessment, the contribution of PPPs to higher yields, the relationship between people and PPPs, the possibility of reducing PPP use to boost biodiversity and reduce environmental impacts, and the possible contributions of novel technologies, genetically modified organisms and resistant cultivars, and smart farming.

Published in February, the report was followed by a workshop the following month. From this workshop, the authors conclude:

• PPPs are amongst the best studied compounds in the world.
• Agriculture without any PPPs will compromise food security. However, further reduction of the use of PPPs is possible.
• On the other hand, modern crop protection can lead to more or more frequent use of PPPs. The concern is on the potential risk of a PPP rather than on the use.
• The use of PPPs leads to affordable food prices, in particular important to offer lower income classes access to healthy fruits and vegetables.
• At the global scale conventional agriculture (IPM) has less negative impacts on environment and biodiversity than other production systems.
• To reduce PPPs we need to adopt and further develop novel technologies including resistant varieties, highly effective biopesticides and smart farming.

For more information:

• Read the report here (pdf)
• View the workshop presentation here (pdf)

Website: http://www.endure-network.eu

Published: June 18, 2019