Future innovation for pesticide use reduction in agriculture

Agricultural production largely depends on external inputs both for plant nutrition and crop In order to ensure food security while protecting the environment and mitigate climate effect agricultural production methods, including the use of chemical-synthetic pesticides, needs to be revised.

Lined out in the European Green Deal and the Farm to Fork strategy, the reduction of pesticide use by 50 % until 2030 should be one element to reach the expected goals.

In the recent years several scientific studies has been performed to develop strategies and techniques to enable a reduction of chemical-synthetic pesticides use.

Next to methods like organic farming, which omits the use of mineral fertilisers and chemical-synthetic pesticides, but result in lower yields, Integrated Pest management (IPM) has gained a lot of attention and was subject of national and international research activities.

Advanced IPM is characterised by implementing a high degree of preventive measures to avoid establishment of pests and only resorting to chemical pesticides when there is no other option to avoid severe yield loss.

However, the implementation of IPM at a multidisciplinary level is still lacking due to economic reasons and a low acceptance by farmers.

Therefore, a key element of FORTUNA is to identify and analyse the available methods, tools and mechanisms from a biological/ecological, technological, socio-/economic perspective that unlocks a substantial reduction in use and risk of chemical pesticides and ultimately novel pesticide-free farming practices.

Results and strategies will be discussed with stakeholders along the food- and supply-chain, which could contribute to a transition to a reduce reliance on chemical pesticides while supporting successful yields and enable food security.

One major point in this process is to identify strategies that have a lower risk of productivity and profitability and profitability losses than other strategies and target the long-term perspectives.