Pesticides Used In Farming

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Pesticides are used in crops, herbs, fruits, vegetables, and plants. They are chemical substances used for killing pests.

There are six different types of pesticides :

  • Herbicides
  • Fungicides
  • Insecticides
  • Rodenticides
  • Larvicides
  • Bactericides

By using these chemicals on things we eat/use to cook with is damaging to health. Chlorophenoxy herbicides acids contain dioxins which are weed killers that act as synthetic auxins (plant “Hormones”). Poisoning from pesticides can cause nausea, abdominal cramps, diarrhea, dizziness, anxiety, and confusion (short/long-term).
In 1990 it was estimated by the World Health Organization (WHO) that there were around 1 million accidental pesticides poisoning. Anyone who eats the crops, fruits, vegetables that have been sprayed with pesticides
will get sick depending on how much they consume. While using pesticides the chemicals may transfer into the soil/water and can harm underground insects and plant growth. Farmers are responsible for cleaning the crops so
that they would be safe for people. Although we would usually see pesticide usage as a really bad thing, there are pros and cons for it.

Pros Of Using Pesticides: it can increase crop yields, pesticides can help stop the spread of diseases, some animals/pets also eat fresh fruits so using pesticides can also save their lives and ours, spraying pesticides can increase insecticide resistance (no affect to insecticides).

Cons Of Using Pesticides: it can damage the health of farmings, consumers, and animals, pesticides can contaminate crops/fruits/vegetables that can lead to soil pollution which will create a bigger problem, it disturbs the natural flow of an ecosystem such as endangering a certain species (eg. insects, bugs, bees).

According to www.worldometers.info, China uses around 1,763.000 tons of pesticides for farming. In 2018 the total amount of pesticides used in China was around 1.5 million metric tons. They use chemicals such as glyphosate, non-glyphosate, herbicides, chemical and biological lepidopteran insecticides, non-lepidopteran insecticides, and fungicides. China also has been discovered to be using more than 30% of the global fertilizers and pesticides on 9% of the earths crop land. Because of that, China is the worlds largest user of chemical pesticides. This country is slowly working on banning the use of certain pesticides. They are planning on banning the production of chloropicrin, carbofuran, and methomyl by the end of 2022. China has already banned the production and use of ethoprop, omethoate, methyl isothiocyanate and aluminium phosphide in 2020. And they have banned the production and use of aidicarb, phorate, and isocarbophos in 2018.

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