Proposed strategy would provide growers with risk insurance for reducing environmental impact from seed treatments
TORONTO — A co-operative approach to managing soil-borne insect risks should enable corn growers to eliminate neonicotinoid seed treatments with virtually no financial risk.
Dr. Lozenzo Furlan, the manager of a government agricultural research department in Italy, recommends a combination of risk insurance and integrated pest management (IPM) protocols to make it work.
“The described IPM strategy may lead to a considerable reduction in the use of soil pesticides and to the immediate containment of the environmental impact of agriculture with no negative impact on farmers’ income,” he said.
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Furlan was among the speakers at York University here on April 19 for a symposium sponsored by the university, the David Suzuki Foundation and Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment.
He suggested farmers form their own risk-management groups or work through a government-directed program. In either case, those with damaged crops whether from insects or the weather can be compensated from a funding pool.
Furlan said long-term data puts the risk of insect damage to Italy’s corn crop, located primarily in the northeastern part of the country, at around four percent. However, the level of risk can be greater or lower depending on several factors.
For instance, damage is more likely where organic matter levels are greater that five per cent, when corn is double cropped and when pasture or alfalfa is part of the rotation.
Field drainage, sowing date and spring temperatures also have an influence.
Furlan described expected outcomes for farmers using the insurance model alone, insurance together with IPM, insurance with IPM and monitoring and the prophylactic use of insecticides.
The prophylactic use of systemic pesticides was the most expensive approach and had the greatest environmental risk, he said.
Others at the symposium, including Jean-Marc Bonmatin with the National Centre for Scientific Research in France, recommended IPM as the means to manage insect pests.
Bonmatin said the idea encourages the targeted use of insecticides. Farmers should first use cultural and biological means manage pests, only applying chemical products like the neonicotinoids as a last resort.
Maarten Bijleveld van Lexmond, chair of the International Task force on Systemic Pesticides, said there is “overwhelming evidence” tying systemic pesticides to pollinator decline.
“There has been a lack of answers from those on the other side and now they say, ‘Oh, there is a lack of alternatives,’ which is another myth,” van Lexmond said.
“This class of insecticides has the highest toxicity to bees, 5,000 to 10,000 times greater than DDT.”
Van Lexmond said the current European moratorium on three neonicotinoid molecules, which ends in 2016, has had no impact on crop production. He sees no sense in introducing other system insecticides, even if they’re part of another class of chemicals.
There are farmers in Europe who still see a need for systemic pesticides, however. Bonmatin said there is currently a “big commercial business” based on illegal sales of the products.
“There are farmers who want the pesticides. They don’t understand, in most case, they don’t need them,” he said.
There is a long history of pesticide use in France, which may account for the phenomena.
Bonmatin said even in miniscule amounts, far less than currently being used, the chemicals can have sub-lethal impacts often with unforeseen consequences.
He cited the example of a stink bug species, Euschistus heroes, in Brazil. One study links reproductive changes in the insect to the increased occurrence of outbreaks in soybean fields.
Depending on the species, anywhere from two to 20 per cent of neonicotinoid treatments applied are taken up by the crop plants, Bonmatin said. Much of the rest moves into the environment to impact a range of non-target organisms.
Bonmatin said all neonicotinoid were banned in some regions of Italy in 2008. A partial ban was introduced in Japan in 2015.
This year the State of Maryland introduced ban on the residential use of neonicotinods and Ontario has introduced restrictions this year intended to drop the use of agricultural neonicotinoid seed treatments by 80 per cent by 2017.
Furlan, van Lexmond and Bonmatin are members of the Task Force on System Pesticides, part of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
The independent group of scientists from around the world released the Worldwide Assessment of the Impact of Systemic Pesticides on Biodiversity and Ecosystems earlier.
